fiddling with the grain bill

[gurtpint]

OK, I'm going to brew something along the lines of a brown ale as soon as I get the chance. I have a clone recipe for Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale. The recipe is based on 75% extraction but mine has been way below that with my first brews so I want to use more grain, expecting around 60% extraction to be on the safe side. The grains are pale ale with small amounts of crystal and chocolate. Should I use more of just the pale ale or all the grains included? Cheers.

 

[pjbiker]

Increase grain bills proportionally to maintain the recipe with the same ratios though it won't really matter. Most likely reason for low efficiency IMO is sparging and collecting too quickly (if you are fly sparging).

 

[gurtpint]

Thanks pj. I batch sparge, so far adding my sparge water all at once but I might divide it to two portions and see if it makes a difference.

 

[graysalchemy]

The first time I did an AG I had a stuck sparge and it took ages to get the stuff through. However as a result I had and efficiency of 85%. I now fly sparge at about 1litre a minute, and this gives me about a 75% efficiency.

PS i changed my sloted copper stainer to a false bottom and that stopped the stuck sparge.

Cheers

AG

 

[Baz Chaz]

My only brew that I haven't been 100% happy with today was one where I rushed the sparging :!:

It was still very drinkable but just not as good as all the others

viewtopic.php?f=36&t=12270

 

[gurtpint]

At the moment I'm getting all my grains pre-crushed. Is there a big difference between an optimal crush for fly-sparging and batch sparging? A batch sparging forum member told me that his extraction got better after he started crushing his grains.

 

[phettebs]

yep, at least here in the US there's a difference in the crush. To avoid stuck sparges, most homebrew shops keep their crusher gaps wider. Teh Barley crusher that I have came with a gap of .039 and I lowered it to .035. I get around 80% efficiency with that setting. When I first started AG and got my grains pre-crushed, I struggled to get anything better than 60% efficiency. I asked around and everyone blamed the crush at the homebrew shops. So I bought a crusher. My efficiency immediately jumped. Same thing happened to my buddy. I crushed for him and he had a grainbill that usually put him at 1.050 and he jumped up around 1.062, for a wheat beer!

In Designing Great Beers by Ray Daniels, there's a chapter that gives you the formula to figure out how much extra grain to add when you are at a certain efficiency and are trying to hit a target OG. It's a bit cumbersome but I had great success with that until I broke down and bought a crusher. I did write some software to do the calculations for me and that made it much easier.

-Baz

 

[gurtpint]

Cheers Baz. I do want to get a crusher at some point in order to buy malts in bulk but that might take a while since so far throwing money around for this cursed obsession has never ceased!

 

[Alan Robinson]

yep, at least here in the US there's a difference in the crush. To avoid stuck sparges, most homebrew shops keep their crusher gaps wider. Teh Barley crusher that I have came with a gap of .039 and I lowered it to .035. I get around 80% efficiency with that setting. When I first started AG and got my grains pre-crushed, I struggled to get anything better than 60% efficiency. I asked around and everyone blamed the crush at the homebrew shops. So I bought a crusher. My efficiency immediately jumped. Same thing happened to my buddy. I crushed for him and he had a grainbill that usually put him at 1.050 and he jumped up around 1.062, for a wheat beer!

In Designing Great Beers by Ray Daniels, there's a chapter that gives you the formula to figure out how much extra grain to add when you are at a certain efficiency and are trying to hit a target OG. It's a bit cumbersome but I had great success with that until I broke down and bought a crusher. I did write some software to do the calculations for me and that made it much easier.

-Baz

I've just ordered a malt mill from my Danish supplier. He says the thing isn't adjustable, but reading your interesting post, 0.039" - 0.035" is only something like 0.1 mm and I am sure with a little careful alteration I will be able to shift my rollers 4/1000 of an inch. Did you use a feeler gauge to adjust this? How does your mill maintain its setting? Friction, or restraint perpendicular to the roller axis?

 

[phettebs]

I do use a feeler gauge on mine and check it when I think of it. It doesn't seem to shift much. If you don't have a feeler gauge, I've heard guys use the width of a credit card to achieve the same.

-baz

 

[Alan Robinson]

I do use a feeler gauge on mine and check it when I think of it. It doesn't seem to shift much. If you don't have a feeler gauge, I've heard guys use the width of a credit card to achieve the same.

-baz

Thanks for that. I have a feeler gauge - a tinge rusty in places I confess - but I am a bit concerned about how to make and maintain such a fine adjustment, and indeed, if it is at all necessary. We used to say in the shipyard that we measure with a Vernier calliper, mark up with a piece of chalk, and cut with an axe. Never mind, it is results that count.

For what it is worth, my Visa card is 0.8mm thick, except the embossed bits with the numbers and my name, which is 1.2mm thick. This corresponds to about 1/(10*PI)" and 0.047". I gather the MaltMill comes with a standard 0.045" gap (1.13mm), while 0.035" (0.9mm) works well without clogging. I think it is another case of suck it and see. :

 

[Alan Robinson]

OK, I'm going to brew something along the lines of a brown ale as soon as I get the chance. I have a clone recipe for Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale. The recipe is based on 75% extraction but mine has been way below that with my first brews so I want to use more grain, expecting around 60% extraction to be on the safe side. The grains are pale ale with small amounts of crystal and chocolate. Should I use more of just the pale ale or all the grains included? Cheers.

I had the same problem with extraction, then I realised I wasn't sparging very well. I now run off all the wort from the mashing bucket before sparging, the grain being suspended in a bag. Six litres of sparging water put through 5 kg of mashed grain, and I've got most of the maltose out of the mash without spoiling things. Can't say what the extraction rate is though. Does it matter provided we get as much maltose out as possible?

 

[gurtpint]

^ Do you fly sparge or batch sparge, Alan? I do the latter and thus might not achieve as good an efficiency as with fly sparging. There are plenty of people who manage to hover around the 75% mark though, and I'm trying to get there eventually... When I did my latest mash I emptied the tun, added sparge water, stirred and left it for 30 minutes as I wanted to see if giving it a bit more time might work out better. But no such luck. Still haven't got a malt crusher, so the experimentation with finer crush will have to wait. I have a water report from the local water company and some brewing salts coming in the mail and I'll be using them in my next brew according to to calculator here to see if they will make any difference.

 

[Alan Robinson]

^ Do you fly sparge or batch sparge, Alan? I do the latter and thus might not achieve as good an efficiency as with fly sparging. There are plenty of people who manage to hover around the 75% mark though, and I'm trying to get there eventually... When I did my latest mash I emptied the tun, added sparge water, stirred and left it for 30 minutes as I wanted to see if giving it a bit more time might work out better. But no such luck. Still haven't got a malt crusher, so the experimentation with finer crush will have to wait. I have a water report from the local water company and some brewing salts coming in the mail and I'll be using them in my next brew according to to calculator here to see if they will make any difference.

,scuse my ignorance gurtprint, but I don't know the difference between fly and batch. That's probably because I am a plain speaker. :)

After mashing I draw off all the wort from the mash bucket through a tap. The mashed grain is suspended in the mash tun in a terylene bag, where it stays. I then gently pour over a kettle of hot water, let it drain through, then draw it off. I never stir because it can cause hazes I gather. I repeat this up to six times, checking the appearance and density of the runnings as I do. I find that after six kettles - about six litres - the runnings are still a little sweet, but by then, I have just about collected all the wort I need for boiling. It is a balancing act to find the right amount of grain to use, but right now I am pleased with the utilisation rate and not having to adjust the density using table sugar.

 

[phettebs]

That sounds more like a hybrid of batch/fly sparging. For true fly sparging, you are continuously sprinkling water over the grain bed (usually via a rotating sparge arm) until you get your volume. With batch sparging, you dump all of your water in at once. You said you dump a kettle of water over it and drain/repeat 6 times. Gurtpint and I would take whatever volume of water that is (for me it's 3.5 gallons) and add it all at once. I do stir to make sure all of the grain and is mixed up. Then I open the valve and run about a quart of wort through and then close it. I gently add that wort back over the top of the grain bed careful not to disturb it. That's batch sparging. I find it easier so that's why I do it that way.


About the credit card, I've never measured mine and I've never used it. Interesting to know that it is not at all close to .035! Thanks for the info. I always use the feeler gauge on mine.
-Baz

 

[gurtpint]

^ Baz did a great job explaining things there. If you are happy with the way you're sparging and get good results then more power to your elbow! Adding the sparge water and stirring seems to result to a cloudier wort compared to sparging session #1 but I ended up with a nice clear wort with the aid of a good rolling boil, kettle finings and rapid cooling last time.