First Ag Is Mashing As We Speak....

[MVZOOM]

Finished the first sparge - it ran out like a dream! Quite clear and easy done.

I'm bloody confused as to why the first runnings didn't work - it's not the gear, so Screwtop, you must be onto something there.

Second sparge in now - the little one, boiler is on, wort is in. Kitchen is clean, floor has been mopped (whoops!), wife in bed with hot chockie - she thinks I'm bonkers.

 

[Tony]

ahhhh i remember teses days.

/I like to thin the mash out as much as possible with hot water before funning out to help it flow. Its so sticky sweet and thick that it just sits there.

well done mate

cheers

 

[Guest Lurker]

Nice work, go hard! If you can, make sure you get a rolling boil to help drop out any crud that came through the first runoff, and if you have any whirlflock whack some in at the end of the boil. If not, have another lager.

 

[PistolPatch]

That was your problem Mike! Because you have such a small grain bill, you will get hardly any liquid out of a first run. On the next go, even forget the first run. It is totally unneccessary.

Look forward to hearing how it ends up and all can be corrected on the next run!

 

[MVZOOM]

Thanks guys. I'm annoyed that its going to be cloudy.

Rolling boil achieved, first set of hops in. Mash tun cleaned and dried, fermentor sanitised, ready for wort. Wife still thinks I'm nuts.

Cheers - Mike

 

[Tony]

the cloudiness is just grain particles. They will settle out if you have a bit of patience.

Your grain will soak up about 1 liter per KG of grain in the initial mash and you dont get this back so dont forget to account for that too.

My first AG was a disaster with a stuck mash and burnt hands from trying to free it up but you will learn and get better at it.

and your wife will never stop thinking your crazy............ if your an AG'er you are crezy.

now all you need is a march pump and a stir plate and a motorised mill and temperature controllers and.................. ahhhhh that will come

hehehehe and she thinks your crazy now

cheers and dont forget to but her flowers, that helps when you boil over a 1.076 stout on the stove and it takes 1/2 hr of scrubbing to get it off

 

[Ross]

sounds like you're back on track MVzoom - congrats on your first AG & welcome to the passion :beer:

cheers Ross

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

[
cheers and dont forget to but her flowers, that helps when you boil over a 1.076 stout on the stove and it takes 1/2 hr of scrubbing to get it off
[/quote]

Flower Butting can cause problems Tony... h34r:

 

[poppa joe]

BEEN THERE DONE THAT MVZOOM
Last week or so .Done everything wrong"Murphy's Law"..
Got 12lt.in sec now..
Cant wait to stuff up the next one...
Cheers
PJ

 

[MVZOOM]

BEEN THERE DONE THAT MVZOOM
Last week or so .Done everything wrong"Murphy's Law"..
Got 12lt.in sec now..
Cant wait to stuff up the next one...
Cheers
PJ

Wish I'd got 12L !

Ended up with 9.5L @ 1046 - was aiming for 12L @ 1051 with 75% efficiency or thereabouts, so some problems there!

Cheers - Mike

 

[Stuster]

Well done, MV. You did it!

It doesn't really matter about getting less than you planned for. You did an AG.

How did it taste going into the fermenter?

For next time, add some of the sparge water first, doing a mash out. Add really hot water to up the temperature of the mash which helps with the run off. (You can probably add boiling water, but I usually go with something around the 90C mark.) Since you had a smaller amount of grain, the mash temp probably dropped a bit. That may be why the sparge which you said ran off pretty easily, as the sparge water would have raised the temp.

It will get easier with practice. :super:

 

[Jim_Levet]

Congrats MVZ, an interesting read too, if only you had a web cam!
Although would have been better off with a Sparge Arm
James

 

[MVZOOM]

Ok, thanks all.

Wort tasted great going into the fermentor and a whole lot of the crud had settled by this morning. All the hop additions went fine, it's all good.

I guess I was expecting to take off around 6l of wort in the first instance as the recipe inferred that this is what would happen. Re-reading it, I missed an addition of straight water into the boiler - which doesn't make sense to me - why wouldn't you keep sparging until you get the proper pre-boil volume? Surely it's better to get as much out of the grain as possible?

Also, I modded the grain bill slightly away from the recipe whilst on the go. Only 100g, but it would have made a difference.

So, couple of lessons for me:

- Get a decent thermometer - my little digital one isn't up to the task
- I need to learn which mash method to use in Beersmith to get the right one, as there are about a million different options
- More grain - I'm not going to stress over 10% more efficiency, when a kilo of grain cost next to bugger all
- must get the boiler done, two pot boiling is one too many

Positives:

- Mash tun worked brilliantly (no leaks!), really happy with it although I may make a false bottom
- Mash tun dropped 2 degC in 60mins - that's acceptable
- Hop additions, grain measurement, hitting temps, measuring liquid - all too easy and fine
- Immersion heater works like a charm - I have no doubt that it'll boil 30l in a full batch
- Sparging's a piece of piss and I have 1/2 completed my fly sparge plate

Overall, I'm really happy as things went like clockwork. Mentally I'd run through the process a few times in my head (generally while unable to sleep!), and it followed suit. It's not rocket science and I understand now where decent gear and prep makes the difference.

Thanks to all for their help - it's amazing that you can put a post out at 9.30pm to cyberspace and get freindly, logical responses back in that make / break what your doing. Much appreciated.

I'll be back in a few weeks to let you know how she tastes!

Cheers - Mike

 

[Mr Bond]

GOOD WORK

 

[Jase]

Well done MVZOOM!!!

You have to let us know how it tastes once it's ready!!!

Cheers,
Jase

 

[pint of lager]

In answer to a few of your queries.

Don't keep sparging untill you reach boil volume, as the sg drops towards the end of the sparge, you end up extracting tannins from the husks rather than the wanted sacharides from the starch. Roughly, mash with 2.5l per kilo of grain and sparge with 3 litres per kilo. If needbe, top your kettle up with more plain boiling water. Once your skills improve you can move towards checking the last runnings so that they don't drop below 1.008 and stop sparging at this point, rather than just adding 3l per kilo as sparge.

A decent thermometer is the most important bit of kit you can have. Buy one and learn it's limitations, check it in boiling water and learn how to use it accurately. For intsance, most stem thermometers need immersing to a certain depth, usually marked on the stem. Leaving one submerged fully in a mashtun will give you way higher readings. If you have a thermocouple style, learn how to use that.

Cannot help you with beersmith.

Use however much grain your gear can handle. Don't worry about efficiency, it will improve as your methods improve. Do keep good notes as to quantities of grain and extract used, boil volumes and final into fermenter volumes. This will allow you to tailor any recipe to your specific gear.

Two pots is a pain, but it is a cheap and easy way to get into large batch ag.

Next time, try wrapping your mash tun with a few more layers of old towels or blankets to help stabilise the temp. No mashtun is perfect, but most can be improved witha bit more insulation.

Looks like your braid worked fine, so you may not need to make a false bottom, although making and trialling new bits of gear is part of the fun of your very own setup.

Well done on washing the floor, if it had a fair amount of wort drops, it may need a second go. Don't forget the flowers.

 

[Stuster]

Don't keep sparging untill you reach boil volume, as the sg drops towards the end of the sparge, you end up extracting tannins from the husks rather than the wanted sacharides from the starch.

I don't really agree with this, PoL. This is true for fly sparging, but since MVZoom is batch sparging, there is really no risk of the gravity dropping low enough for this to happen. Try to run off in two equal volumes, as long as your mash tun has enough volume. Beersmith should be able to work this out for you. You said you weren't sure about how to do this so here's an example.

If you have 3kg of grain, with 65% efficiency, you'd probably be aiming for something like 12L after the boil, a little less perhaps in your fermenter. You'll lose some to boil off and losses along the way, so I'd be aiming for 16L in your kettle. So you'll want two equal run offs of 8L. If you mash with 2.5L/kg of grain, that's 7.5 litres. As pointed out, you'll lose 1L per kg to the grain and say 1L in your mash tun. So you'll get only 3.5L out of that. So before you run off, add another 4.5L, stir it up really well, recirculate and run off. Then add another 8L, stir, recirc. and run off again. You should have your 16L in your kettle. Hope that clarifies it all. Beersmith should tell you the temp of the water you want to add for the mash in, mash out and sparge. Take careful note of the temps and you can adjust the settings for your system. Then the second time you should be spot on.

Hope this helps.

 

[MVZOOM]

In answer to a few of your queries.

Well done on washing the floor, if it had a fair amount of wort drops, it may need a second go. Don't forget the flowers.

PoL - thanks for that, very good - helped clarify a lot!

If you have 3kg of grain, with 65% efficiency, you'd probably be aiming for something like 12L after the boil, a little less perhaps in your fermenter. You'll lose some to boil off and losses along the way, so I'd be aiming for 16L in your kettle. So you'll want two equal run offs of 8L. If you mash with 2.5L/kg of grain, that's 7.5 litres. As pointed out, you'll lose 1L per kg to the grain and say 1L in your mash tun. So you'll get only 3.5L out of that. So before you run off, add another 4.5L, stir it up really well, recirculate and run off. Then add another 8L, stir, recirc. and run off again. You should have your 16L in your kettle. Hope that clarifies it all. Beersmith should tell you the temp of the water you want to add for the mash in, mash out and sparge. Take careful note of the temps and you can adjust the settings for your system. Then the second time you should be spot on.

Hope this helps.

Stuster - aaaaah - I think the penny just dropped. I was always under the impression that mash fluid is designed to be run off. So this isn't the case - the Sparge is designed to be the bearer of wort. Makes a hell of a lot more sense now.

The mash is designed to release the sugars in the grain - the sparge is designed to flow those sugars out. Simple little point that was lost on me!

Can't wait to do my next one! I'll do a false bottom just for the hell of it. It's not hard - and will post some pics of my very backyard engineered gear, including the $4 Sparge Plate.

Cheers - Mike :super:

 

[TasChris]

Well done MVZOOM.
It been amazing how many people have made the leap to AG over the last couple of months, the numbers seem to be growing exponentially!!

 

[Airgead]

Well done MVZOOM.
It been amazing how many people have made the leap to AG over the last couple of months, the numbers seem to be growing exponentially!!

And so quickly too. I think MVZOOM only joined in March as a KK brewer looking to buy his first hops. From KK to AG in 5 months is pretty good.

Well done.

Cheers :beer:
Dave