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First AG batch, some mistakes, some questions
Did my first AG batch today and it went very well I think. I have a few questions and concerns that I wanted to voice here. My Recipe:
Dry Stout
6 lbs 2-row brewers malt
2 lbs flaked barley
1 lb chocolate malt
1/2 lb black patent malt
2 oz EKG Hops at 60 min
1/2 oz EKG Hops at 10 min
Irish moss at 10 min
Procedure: Batch sparge with 10 gal rubbermaid rectangular cooler with ss braid
Preheated mash tun with 1 gal. boiling water for 15 minutes.
Poured preheat water out
Added 19 qt of 162 deg water, Added grains
Mash temp stabilized at 153 for 60 mins
vorlaufed and drained 4 qts from tun to set grain bed, then drained majority of mash tun into boil kettle
Added 9 qts water at 196 deg, stirred, mash stabilized at 168 deg. Held for 10 mins
Vorlaufed and drained entire mash tun into kettle
Boiled as usual with hop schedule, irish moss, and chilling with immersion chiller.
Concerns:
I used 7 gallons of total water, in the boil kettle I only ended up with about 5.5 which ended up being about 4.5 after boil. I figured the grains would consume 1 gallon of water, but it seems they absorbed closer to 1.5 gals or it got lost somewhere in the mash tun. Is this a variable that changes with each type of mash tun, or is it due to a certain grain absorbing more than others? I have read Papazian's chart and some other info and seems a general consensus is 1 qt per lb of grain. Should I just add another gallon or half gallon to the water next time?
I ended up with an OG of 1050. Not bad but I was supposed to hit around 1040. I am guessing this is because the wort was more concentrated because of the reduced water. Should I have sparged with more water, or added it directly to the boil kettle?
How can I figure out my efficiency on this beer? I am confused since I only ended up with about 4.5 gal in the fermenter.
Other than that, the day went great. It was alot of fun and it was alot easier and more relaxing than I thought. The best was not having all the little jugs and bags to dispense of at the end of the day. Plus my chickens love the grain! Thanks for any help!
You water loss above the absorption is likely due to your mash tun's inherent efficiency.
If you batch sparged I would recommend trying the following. Set up the mash tun as if to mash. Then put in 7 gallons of just plain water. Drain it out just like you did when the mash ended. How much water is left behind? That shows that no matter what efficiency of conversion you get, your tun will always leave that much wort behind. (Above the amount lost to absportion too).
With fly sparging this test is not as valid, but it does have some validity as far as maybe not getting the best sparging at the corners of the grain bed.
Next here is how I figured your efficiency as an approximation:
9.5 lbs of malt * ~37PPG= 352 points of gravity for 100% efficiency
4.5 gallons * 50 (gravity points per gallon of 1.050)= 225 points
225/352=~64% efficiency. Not bad considering first time at it, and the variable of your tun geometry leaving wort behind.
One question I have though is that your grain bill does't suggest to me a 1.040OG for a 5 gallon or even a 6 gallon batch.
352 points max reduced for a 75% efficiency is 264.
264/5gal= 52 for an OG of 1.052
264/6gal= 44 for an OG of 1.044
Were you shooting for a 6 gallon batch?
It doesn't really matter, just thought I'd point it out.
Thanks for figuring that up for me. I did take the mast tun and turn it almost vertical trying to get every last drop out of it once I noticed the boil volume was going to be short. I will try the test to see what I am losing in the tun. I was trying to make a 5 gal batch (post boil). You are right about my expected sg being off. Now that I look at it, I made a mistake. I was jumping back and forth between between beersmith and hopville/beer calculus to figure out my recipe and the ingredients werent the same in both. If this happens again where I run short of water in the boil kettle, would you recommend me sparging with more water, or adding water straight to the kettle? I am not so much worried about SG at this point, more worried about making good beer and 5 gallons of it to boot.
By your calculations, it seems I hit my SG like it should have been, just that I didn't have all of it make it to the boil kettle. If my efficiency had been higher, then with the addition of extra water, should have made everything come out just right.
One last note, I was given 40 lbs of the 2 row from a friend who just took over brewmaster at a local craft brewery. He said the bag had been sitting around for a while in the paper Briess sack (opened, but uncrushed) and he didn't want to use it. Is it possible the old grain sitting around also hurt my efficiency?
Thanks alot for reviewing this for me. I believe I may like this All grain thing!
To the situation of coming up short with volume.... I always take gravity and volume measurements as a I am collecting wort. So if I was coming up short on volume I didn't care as long as I wasn't coming up short on gravity points. If my gravity points were coming out low, I'd add some extra water to the mash and see if I could draw out some more sugar.
For example: If I was looking for 6gallons at 1.050 in the kettle preboil that is 300 points total I need (50*6).
If after sparging I had only 5.5 gallons but the OG was 1.055, then I had all my sugar (5.5*55=~300) So I'd add half a gallon of water to the kettle.
If on the other hand I had 5.5 gallons but the OG was 1.051, then I am short 20 points of sugar as well as volume (5.5*51=~280). So I might add one gallon of hot water to the mash, collect it and add half of it to the kettle to get to 6 gallons. I probably don't recoop the 20 missing points but I might get 5-8 more points. And I let it ride from there.
To the grain bag situation....
It might effect your efficiency somewhat but I'd focus on your process first. Do another run shooting for the same gravities (doesn't have to be the same recipe, just same gravity and mash temp) and see if your efficiency gets better. Some of your loss is just experience, then maybe a touch of equipment, then slightly the grain (MAYBE).
64% isn't bad, in fact 70% is just fine and some people feel that efficiency better than 75% might not be the way to make the best beer possible. I don't know where I stand on that per se, so lets not go there.
Brewchez, again thanks a lot for your help and experience on this post. I was curious where you got the equations from to figure out my og and my efficiency? Is there a book somewhere I am missing?!
Also, after doing some further reading, it seems that my mash may have been too thin to start out with. If you were to do this recipe, how would you figure out the mash water and sparge water amounts? I am reading where some people prefer the mash and sparge water to be equal and some where people sparge with alot more water than they mash with. Once I have this mash/sparge thing figured out, I will be able to focus on some other points in AG brewing. Thanks and have a great weekend.
So I got around to bottling this beer last week. It only dropped to 1010, a little sweeter than I wanted it to finish out. Tasting it, it has a bit of astringency on the finish of the drink. Almost like I pulled some extra tannins out during the mash. The beer is very good and will probably be very drinkable but I want to try and perfect this one before I move on to the next type. I think I may do this exact brew again in a few weeks since it is so cheap to do. If I do it again, can I change the mash schedule to keep from leaching the tannins from the grains? Or should I change the types of grains I use? I don't have any friends around who do all grain and don't have any one else to bounce ideas off of! Everyone else on the internet has so many ideas and ways of doing things that I am unable to get a straight answer on water temps and mash times. Thanks for any help and ideas you guys may have.
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