Palmer's No Sparge Method Question

[cpsmusic]

Hi Folks,

After a bit of a layoff from AG brewing (I've tried a few of G&G's wort kits which are great!) I thought I'd have another crack at making an AG English-style Pale Ale. I've done about ten of these in the past and they've never come out quite right. In a nutshell, drinkable but not malty enough and too bitter. For a while I thought I was overhopping but after recently reading a few articles about No Sparging I think I've been creating astringincy due to over-sparging (batch sparging). To cut a long story short, I'm going to give Palmer's No Sparge method a try. I understand the method - mash as usual then add what would have been the sparge water to mash. What I'm not clear about is what temperature the "sparge water" (!) should be and what the final mash temperature (with the full volume of water added) should be? I'm mashing in an esky so once the water is in the temperature can't be changed without adding more water and so affecting the volume.

Cheers,

Chris

 

[Mardoo]

As Manticle recently reminded me you can always use an over the side element to stir an esky mash to raise temp. I was headed that way for full-volume mashing when I decided to build a 4V, so can't offer much experience unfortunately.

 

[manticle]

You can add the full volume at the beginning too. Similar to no sparge biab.

However the answer to your question is contingent on what temp do you want the mash to be? You then need to take into account grain volume and grain temp to calculate strike temp in order to reach desired mash temp.
There are calculators to help, ots element as suggested above will also help. Besides ots, extra hot water (won't kill it but may need a longer boil) and decoctions are other heating methods.

 

[Danscraftbeer]

So. Hey, I'm just listening here. I have a 75lt Mash Esky. I make 38lt brews with around up to 10kg grain. (Pale Ales, Lagers etc, up to Darks, Stouts)
I go through multiple batch sparging efforts and get good efficiency and good beer as far as I know of but tedious batch sparging.
Next brew (after the initial mash period) I may just try filling the esky with the total amount of 75c sparge water then draining the wort in one hit.
This would mean you Vorlauf once instead of multiple times.

Thanks for the tip brew dudes.

 

[cpsmusic]

I'm not clear about the following - say I get the mash sitting at 67C. When it comes time to add the remaining water should I aim to keep everything at 67C or should I raise the temp (to say, 76C) in an attermpt to mash out?

 

[manticle]

Depends on whether you want to mash out mate. Not set in stone.
That's what I meant above.
Your mash, your choice

 

[cpsmusic]

So if I decide not to mash out, should the full volume of wort be held in the tun for a certain length of time (if so how long?) or can I recirculate as soon as it's added?

 

[manticle]

Personally I would add, let settle for 10 or so mins, then recirculate. Or add all at the beginning and not worry.

 

[cpsmusic]

Thanks for the help! Think I'll try "mash then add" without a mashout.

Cheers,

Chris

 

[MHB]

Doing a mashout will make the sweet water more fluid (so it drains faster) and will usually give you a couple of percent better yield, so I think its a worthwhile part of the process.
You haven't given much information on your equipment, but in the OP you said the beers you had brewed weren't malty enough, lower L:G (less water at the start say from 2.5-3.5:1) and warmer mashes favour more body. Pretty typical for English style beers
Higher L:G favour lighter dryer beers more common in German brewing L:G around 5:1 isn't uncommon.

Given you have the kettle space to boil the wort, I would heat all the water (around 6 X grain mass), do any water chemistry to all the water, heat to strike temperature, do the mash, then heat the remaining water to go from mash to 80oC (mash out).
Its a pretty straight forward way to make good beer - low equipment demand and should give reasonable efficiencies (I would budget on 80%ish) but there are good reasons to mashout.

So. Hey, I'm just listening here. I have a 75lt Mash Esky. I make 38lt brews with around up to 10kg grain. (Pale Ales, Lagers etc, up to Darks, Stouts)
I go through multiple batch sparging efforts and get good efficiency and good beer as far as I know of but tedious batch sparging.
Next brew (after the initial mash period) I may just try filling the esky with the total amount of 75c sparge water then draining the wort in one hit.
This would mean you Vorlauf once instead of multiple times.

Thanks for the tip brew dudes.

Just flipping through the thread and this one rang a couple of alarm bells
With outdoing a heap of brewing maths 10Kg of malt lets just say it has a potential of 78% that would mean 7.8Kg of extract at 100% efficiency.
Say your brewhouse efficiency was 80% gives 6.24Kg
6.24 Kg in 38L well your OG should be around 1.075 (just finger counting) which sounds a bit at odds with the styles of beer you are making (well maybe not the stout), it might be well worth sitting down and doing the numbers, sounds to me like your efficiency is really about 60%.
Mark

 

[Jack of all biers]

I understand the method - mash as usual then add what would have been the sparge water to mash. What I'm not clear about is what temperature the "sparge water" (!) should be and what the final mash temperature (with the full volume of water added) should be? I'm mashing in an esky so once the water is in the temperature can't be changed without adding more water and so affecting the volume.

If I were you, I'd do a simple single step mash at say 66C (or 68C if you want more 'mouth feel') and if you want to raise the temp for sparge out raise it to between 76 & 78C by adding your 'sparge water' at the correct temp.

Now to get the correct temp in your 'sparge water'. The below equation (adjusted from a Palmer equation for stepped infusion additions) should answer your original question re what temp the 'sparge water' should be;

[SIZE=10pt]Additional Liquor Temperature Equation:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]Tw = {(T2 - T1)(0.41G + Wm)/Wa} + T2[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]Where:
Tw = The actual temperature (¡C) of the additional water (Liquor.)[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]Wa = The amount of water (liquor) added (in litres).
Wm = The total amount of water (liquor) already in the mash (in litres).
T1 = The initial temperature (¡C) of the mash.
T2 = The target temperature (¡C) of the mash.
G = The amount of grain in the mash (in kilograms).[/SIZE]

[SIZE=10pt]For example[/SIZE][SIZE=10pt] lets say you want a 30L pre-boil volume from your 'No sparge' mash and we say we lose 1.3L per Kg of grain[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]T1=66C, T2=78C, G=5.1Kg, Wm=10.2L & Wa= 26.43L [/SIZE]

[SIZE=10pt]Tw = {(78 – 66)(0.41x5.1 + 10.2) / 26.43} + 78 = 83.58C[/SIZE]

[SIZE=10pt]So theoretically, in this case the 26.43L of liquor addition will need to be at a temp of 83.58C to bring the original Mash from 66C to 78C.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=10pt]Notes: [/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]1 - Wa=26.43L is because of the 6.63L absorbed by the grain (calculated at 1.3L/Kg). If you find you consistently lose more or less L/Kg to grain absorbtion, adjust your Wa additions appropriately.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10pt]2 - The calculations are mathematics and in real world conditions I would always up the Tw temp by 1-2C to make up for heat loss in transfer, stirring etc. So in the example I made above, I would round up my liquor addition to 85C. Even if the theoretical calculations were spot on, the additional 1.32C would only raise the final mash temp slightly (less than 1C).[/SIZE]

[SIZE=10pt]Edit - Note 3 - I have calculated a 2L/Kg Grain initial mash, so if you do a higher (or lower?) water:grain ratio, then adjust.[/SIZE]

 

[technobabble66]

Hey, cpsmusic,

Slight tangent:
I'm not sure if you've discussed this elsewhere, but what is your sparge process?
Sparging is a great add-on to achieve significant efficiency gains, so it seems a shame to ditch it. I can see you've been on AHB much longer than me, so you're probably all over this, but i just thought i'd mention the following in case it'd been missed.

If you're getting astringency (i believe) it's normally from 2 things (which i think are kinda both the same things, really):
1) pH of the sparge water is not acidic &/or not buffered enough (i.e.: pH too high & maybe not enough basic minerals in the water). This encourages tannins, etc to leach into the water and causes astringency.
2) The wort sparging off the grain becomes too dilute (~SG = 1.010 is the cut-off threshold many brewers stop sparking at), which again encourages the leaching of tannins into the wort.

So, basically:
Are you acidifying your sparge water, or are you adding any brewing salts to it?
Are you sparging with too much water or for too long?

2c