Testing New Mash Esky / Manifold / Boiler / Gear

[Maheel]

I picked up a snow box (techni ice) esky and made a copper manifold, it's about 75L
made up a keggle and fitted some taps etc
Italian spiral on normal LPG reg
piece of foam on top of mash to reduce head space / heat loss a little

I thought i would put through a bit of a random brew to see how it works.
kind of a 2.5V system using boiler for HLT then into mash then 20L pot for sparge water
soon to be changed to 3V gravity or something once stand is started...

used my dodgy pasta maker mill to grind the grain which works ok (better for half batch BIAB)

recipe

+- 6 kgs of ale malt
7 grams of Chinook @ 60 mins
90g Hallertau Mittlefrueh AA 2.6% 80grms @ 20 mins
60 min mash SG around 1045 (not 100% sure after sparging etc)
60 min boil FG 1060
no chill overnight in cube
US-05 today in the ferment fridge @ 17' SG 1052 about 21L (ex craftbrewer fresh wort cube)
intend to dry hop with something maybe cascade or citra or ?
tastes OK going into fementer

My major issue was how to calculate how much water to mash in with and then batch sparge and water temp.

I roughly tipped 72' 30L into the mash and it dropped to 66'.
forgot to measure mash temp at end of mash...
batch sparged with about 72' maybe 10L
when i tipped in the sparge water i gave it a big stir then drained off a bit and tipped it back in onto a plastic plate to settle the grain bed (did same on mash) that worked ok

manifold seemed to work fine could not notice any channeling etc

but when i ate some spent grain it was very sweet and when scooping it out there was a say 2L's of liquid in the grain bed, is that normal
should i have drained it more into the boiler while waiting for boil?

other issue was to "fill" the cube i added 2L boiling water hence the post boil change from 1060 to 1052
when transferring to cube i got some break (1/2) but left in the cube when transferring to fermenter
so my final volume was a little low, evap rate was not huge as a nice boil bit not massive

any one got a link to a simply explain how to calculate water volumes
i have brew-mate but the volumes seemed to low ?

 

[Wolfy]

Given your rough measurements, estimates and information, it all seems fine to me, but you really need to be a bit more specific and if possible give some more info.

Using a total volume of 40L is about right for a single batch of beer and its normal for the grain to retain a bit of water, even 1-2L in the bottom of the mashtun is normal, depending on your setup.
You did not mention if you measured the pre-boil volume, but I'd have guessed it would have been about 30L, nor did you mention the size of the cube or your final volume (both of which are very useful to know).
Some cubes tend to hold a little more volume than what their size suggests, but 21L out of the boiler (assuming about 30L in) is reasonable, maybe the losses are a little on the high side.

With new equipment it's a bit hard to calculate exact numbers in advance, it's more a trial-and-error process, because the losses inside your mashtun, your boil-off rate, losses to the kettle, and cooling losses are all unknown factors before you actually use the gear.

For your next batch, I'd suggest carefully measuring the water additions.
Estimate that the grain will absorb about 1.5l/kg, (10L for your 6kg of grain), a boil evaporation rate of about 12%/hr (3.5L) and then add about 1L of loss to the mashtun, and then another 1-3L to the kettle and cooling, to come to the total volume of 40L. Use half that for the initial water addition and then another 20L for your batch sparge, and you should have a good easy basis for working out more exact numbers for next time.

 

[adniels3n]

Says he used a Craftbrewer fresh wort cube. The ones I have are 20L.
Edit: Wolfy removed the question.

 

[Wolfy]

Thanks Muddzy, I missed that info, and yeah I added a few edits to hopefully make it clearer.

 

[Maheel]

With new equipment it's a bit hard to calculate exact numbers in advance, it's more a trial-and-error process, because the losses inside your mashtun, your boil-off rate, losses to the kettle, and cooling losses are all unknown factors before you actually use the gear.

thanks Wolfy great reply I appreciate it

the 1st was just a "lets see if the mastun works..."

next batch i will be a bit more organized and actually weigh and measure every thing and start recording properly

but your post gives me a bit of a rough guide of ideas / volumes to start aiming for.