What's your best mash efficiency?

[Goose]

I take most people's reporting of absolute mash efficiency with a pinch of salt.

Of course you have to know your mash efficiency only in order to plan the grain bill for the beer you are wanting to make.

The idea is to maximise it while being practical within the bounds of your equipment and process while avoiding false economy.

To calculate mash efficiency you accurate measurements, not just on SG but also on volume. I wonder how many people have calibrated their boilers by weighing water ? Who adjusts for water volume expansion (at 80 deg C, 50kg of water occupies 51.5 litres volume while at At 4 C, 50 kg of water occupies 50.0 litres) ?

Play around with any mash efficiency calculator (like Beersmith) and see how small changes in collected wort volume and pre boil SG affect the calculated efficiency. By example, the difference between 1 litre of wort and a .01 SG reading (tricky if the refractomer interface is a tad fuzzy) can mean a difference an efficiency of 75% or 78%... :blink:

Methinks there are alot of fisherman's rulers out there when it comes to volume and SG measurement.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

I agree Mark, efficiency is important and my system also runs about 80% (brewhouse). The only reason I say it isn't the be all and end all is because there are a lot of less experienced brewers than yourself who get sucked into the efficiency pissing contest and feel that if they're not getting 90%+ then they're doing something wrong. They then try and eek every single point out of their system and end up with a lesser quality final product.


JD

+1

Getting that last little bit off efficiency is hard work and takes many brews to get it to that point with lots of fine tuning from everything like grain conditioning, milling, mashing and sparging. Going from 75% to 80% is hard as you need the planets to align everytime

We should be advocating constsitancy, not efficiency for the beginers

 

[Goose]

We should be advocating constsitancy, not efficiency for the beginers

I advocado consistent spelling too

But agreed, even if your volume and SG is inaccurate, a consistent systematic error will still get you great beer!

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Could be worse...could be constipated from avaocado's

 

[Weizguy]

The guy at my lhbs, during my grain brewing journey, encouraged repeatability over chasing efficiency, and often warned of efficiency dividends vs flavour offset/losses.
Thanks MHB, for your guidance.

 

[Kingy]

I used to get 70% all the time then I upgraded my mash tun from an 80litre aluminum pot to a taller skinnier 100litre staino pot. Changed nothing else and now I get 75%efficency. I don't care about it one bit. But staino is Definately better for efficency

 

[Goose]

I used to get 70% all the time then I upgraded my mash tun from an 80litre aluminum pot to a taller skinnier 100litre staino pot. Changed nothing else and now I get 75%efficency. I don't care about it one bit. But staino is Definately better for efficency

so stainless steel improves efficiency of the mash.

I learn something every day.

 

[Weizguy]

I used to get 70% all the time then I upgraded my mash tun from an 80litre aluminum pot to a taller skinnier 100litre staino pot. Changed nothing else and now I get 75%efficency. I don't care about it one bit. But staino is Definately better for efficency

or perhaps it's the tun geometry...
Naaah, who am I trying to fool? Of course it's the stainless.
That explains how my efficiency increased by adding a stainless outlet to my Techni-Ice mash tun.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

My ugly old eksy with brass outlet gave 78-80%


Nothing to do with stainless, you need brass fittings all the way

 

[pist]

Most brews i hit about 83% full volume biab on both my keggle and double batch rig. I'm pretty happy with that using the basic gas fired rigs im running with no recirculation

 

[stewy]

Best mash efficiency?

One that can be replicated every time

 

[Goose]

Best mash efficiency?
One that can be replicated every time

Necessary but not sufficient....

 

[GABBA110360]

I must be doing things wrong I think ?'
I use brewmate software and i'm battling to get better than about 71 % according to sg/ fg from said ingredients what ever'
I do a full volume biab wring the living jesus outta the thing but I get the numbers within a point
I could probably slightly change bottled numbers but not by much
it's a dreamland I think i'll just keep paddling away

 

[Rocker1986]

FG has nothing to do with efficiency. Mash efficiency is basically the percentage of extracted sugars achieved during the mash compared to the potential that could be extracted. It is calculated via the pre boil volume and SG. Brewhouse efficiency takes it further by accounting for all the losses to boil off, trub etc. It is calculated via fermenter volume and SG (OG). I don't know the actual formulas used, I just input these figures into Beersmith for the recipe I'm doing on any given brew day and it calculates it for me.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Brewers often get the 2 confused

 

[Dave70]

+1

Getting that last little bit off efficiency is hard work and takes many brews to get it to that point with lots of fine tuning from everything like grain conditioning, milling, mashing and sparging. Going from 75% to 80% is hard as you need the planets to align everytime

We should be advocating constsitancy, not efficiency for the beginers

Yep. Pretty chuffed with a consistent 50%.
Took me ages to repair my broken hydrometer with Araldite but shes ****** bang on, brew after brew.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Hydrometer....thats a Galaxy isnt it ?

 

[Dave70]

Hydrometer....thats a Galaxy isnt it ?

I dont **** around when it comes to batch size mate.

 

[Bruer]

The best so far for was my last batch - an ordinary bitter (pretty small only 3.4kg grain): 93% mash efficiency. I thought I'd miscalculated, but I triple checked it. WTF!

 

[MHB]

No WTF, there is no reason why mash efficiencies over 90% shouldn't be what you get all the time.
Naturally its easier with lower OG beers, good milling, slow sparging and a few other basics and be happy.
Mark