Knurling on a Mashmaster Mini Mill

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got my rollers in the post this morning.....Thanks Frank,/ Mashmaster and Anthony/Craftbrewer for their help.

Is there anyone on here so far, that has replaced the rollers and has a Braumeister as I was wondering what gap you have set?
 
What email address did you use? The one on the mm site doesnt seem to work and i couldnt find the one mentioned earlier
 
OK so my mill is now up and running with the new rollers.

I set the gap at 1.118mm or 44thou in the old measurement and it milled quite well with most husks still in tact although some husks were broken in half. At that setting there were a few grains that weren't cracked but these were a very low percentage of the grist.

I then closed the roller gap to 1.016 or 40 thou in the old measurement and the crush was similar if not the same as the wider crush however close examination revealed no uncracked husks at all.

The grain I milled for the above was Barrett and Burston Ale malt.

It took 3 minutes and 18 seconds to mill 5 kilos of grain or 40 seconds per kilo. This was at a speed of 140rpm.

For the BM guys if any are involved in this exercise, I will brew at the closer setting and report back.

Putting these new rollers in is like fitting a turbo on an old Nissan Patrol :lol: :lol:
 
dicko said:
OK so my mill is now up and running with the new rollers.

I set the gap at 1.118mm or 44thou in the old measurement and it milled quite well with most husks still in tact although some husks were broken in half. At that setting there were a few grains that weren't cracked but these were a very low percentage of the grist.

I then closed the roller gap to 1.016 or 40 thou in the old measurement and the crush was similar if not the same as the wider crush however close examination revealed no intact husks at all.

The grain I milled for the above was Barrett and Burston Ale malt.

It took 3 minutes and 18 seconds to mill 5 kilos of grain or 40 seconds per kilo. This was at a speed of 140rpm.

For the BM guys if any are involved in this exercise, I will brew at the closer setting and report back.

Putting these new rollers in is like fitting a turbo on an old Nissan Patrol :lol: :lol:

Did you get much flour Geoff? That is to say less than with the knurled rollers? I'll be interested to see how it goes in the BM compared with your old crush.
 
Batz said:
Did you get much flour Geoff? That is to say less than with the knurled rollers? I'll be interested to see how it goes in the BM compared with your old crush.
Hi Jeff,

I got no where near the flour from that crush that I was getting from the Mashmaster or even my old Crankenstein.

I cant wait to use it for a real brew but my cubes and fermenters are full at the moment after the extra long weekend so I wont get to brew for around a fortnite.

At this stage I am quite impressed...
 
Dicko, I had mine set to 44 Thou as well. Hard to tell by a pic but does the crush look similar? Just interested to see the difference between two replacements and one.
 
Brad,

As far as I can tell the pic of your crush at 44 thou is similar to mine at 40 thou with the two fluted rollers...mine at 44 thou had a few uncracked grains.

I will try 40 thou in the BM and see if I get fountains.
Does the grainfather suffer loss of efficiency and wort fountains with a fine crush similar to the BM?
 
The email on the mm website does work, im just impatient. I said i dontnhave a receipt but i have the record on my Full Pint account. Replacement is being sent no questions asked. Pretty dam happy with that.
 
Brad, here are the pics of the crush at 40 thou

grain crush No 1.jpg

Grain crush.jpg
 
Looks very similar but hard to tell by pics.

Yes the GF has issues with the sparge if it's too fine. Having said that, I really do think most of my sparging problems were stemming from the poor crush I was getting. Will be interesting to see how it goes when I get to run a brew through with the new rollers.

Cheers
 
bradsbrew said:
Looks very similar but hard to tell by pics.

Yes the GF has issues with the sparge if it's too fine. Having said that, I really do think most of my sparging problems were stemming from the poor crush I was getting. Will be interesting to see how it goes when I get to run a brew through with the new rollers.

Cheers
We are only talking 4 thou here mate..hard to believe it would make a lot of difference.

Maybe we could start a new thread with our results..... with a link to this one.
 
dicko said:
We are only talking 4 thou here mate..hard to believe it would make a lot of difference.
Different grains may also make a difference
 
Hey guys I treated myself to one of these mills and ir arrived today. Just wodering how you actually measure the gap on the mill?
 
Stunts said:
Hey guys I treated myself to one of these mills and ir arrived today. Just wodering how you actually measure the gap on the mill?
You will need a " Mill Gap measuring device"

Credit cards are about 1mm or go and get a set of feeler gauges

41u37SMyamL.jpg
 
Sweet I have feeler gages so just stick them in between the two rollers?
 
Ducatiboy stu said:
Different grains may also make a difference
yes Stu, i would imagine that if I had used Marris Otter or even some Bo Pils from Wyermann then the mill may have not left uncracked grains at 44 thou
 
I emailed Frank at MashMaster for some advice about how to measure the mill gap and what he would recommend as a starting point for an ideal crush. 0.6mm seems pretty narrow but I guess the fluted rollers are completely different to the knurled rollers. I was very impressed with the detail in his reply. I should stress that Mashmaster is not recommending a specific mill gap, rather each Brewer needs to find the correct crush that suits the grain and set up they are using. Thanks Mashmaster.

Here is the reply:



Hi Chris

Short answer, feeler gauges and about 0.6mm to be on the safe side.

Long answer:
I might ask a couple of the home brew stores that sell pre-ground malt what setting they are using with the new rollers which reflects their home brew shop crush. I have actually designed a couple things into the flutes to provide a limit maximum limit of flour that you can produce, with the old knurled rollers you could adjust them way above what you would want for brewing, with the fluted rollers you will get about 10% (full sieve set including 100 mesh) or 15% (short stack no 100 mesh) max in the pan. ASBC ideal is 5%, British Mash Tun 10% (Brits are more practical less theoretical) most commercial 2, 4 and 8 roller mills around the 7-11%. Looking at the top end sieve course particle size I would start around 0.4 mm or 0.5mm as a gap setting that is close as the briess normal grind and commercial roller mills, but such grinds may still be too fine for most people systems. If you have a look at the Rock Port Brewery study in the link courser may actually get you greater efficiency. Just to make it a little more confusing I can also change the grist distribution without changing the gap by altering the running speed of the mill, the fluted rollers are less RPM dependent than the knurled rollers (between 200 and 500RPM) I did not test any higher RPMs because I dont recommend milling that fast at slower speeds down to about 120RPM there was not a big change less than 2-3% variation statistically non significant but much more exhausting because I had to hand turn the mill instead of drill power.

But still if you take RPMs in account it makes it harder again to recommend a gap setting. Other variables moisture contend of the malt and humidity. Wet milling is a totally different story again. I used to many years ago recommend a gap setting for one of my mills and I actually received the odd email of complaint that customers had a stuck sparge so I am just reluctant to offer my opinion based on my system. If I can get some info from the home brew shops to see what their shop grind is like I will publish the data, and no doubt it will not be long until users are out publishing their own experiences on the net.

Feeler gauges are useful if you want to measure the gap but honestly I would not bother for brewing unless you are using somebody’s recommendations that have the same system as you and running at about the same RPM (between 200-500 the fluted rollers will change distribution pattern 2-4% depending at what pan/sieve your looking at. I have measured gap settings at 0.1mm increments and done a full sieve analysis but only because I was looking at trend lines distribution patterns for a brewer go course loose a bit efficiency (or maybe gain it according to the rockport brewery study in the link below) as opposed to stuck sparge and slow launter speed.
 
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