First All Grain Try - S.O.S. 10 Points of Gravity Missing

[Bertie Doe]

As a guide, I used Graham Wheeler's Theakston Best Bitter for 19 litres, with a target OG of 1038. On cooling, just prior to pitching, I got an OG of 1028, oh dear
The recipe: 3040g Pale malt, 175g Crystal malt, plus Challenger and Fuggle hops and Irish moss.
Equipment: 2 x 11 litre stock pots, 30 litre primary fermenter (tapped), 25 litre fermenter (tapped) converted to a mash tun, with s/s plate with 4mm holes, resting on a 110mm high s/s cake stand. Here's some pics:-
http://s222.photobucket.com/albums/dd22 ... c2099e.pbw

Method: I filled mash tun with 15 litres liquor at 80C and added malts. These sank rapidly, so just gave one 2 second stir with paddle. Took a temp reading of 77C, replaced lid, insulated mash tun, took a second reading after 90 mins and it had only dropped to 73C. This is a little hotter than Wheeler's suggested 66C:-
Q1. Will this higher temp affect sugar extraction/flavour or both?

Sparging: I cut a circle of aluminium turkey foil, punctured it with holes and placed this on top of the mash bed. I jugged 1 litre of hot water on top of the foil and released 1 litre of sweet wort into the primary fermenter. I repeated this step with a further 5 litres, then opened the mash tun tap fully and allowed the lot to flow into the fermenter. I noticed the jugged water went through the foil instantly and the sweet wort also drained very quickly through the tap.
Q2. Would fewer holes in the sparging foil and/or smaller than 4mm holes in mash plate, have improved sugar extraction? or should I have 'cracked' the tun tap slightly, thus slowing down the rate of wort extraction?
Q3. I relied on taste to determine if sparge extraction was successful. It tasted watery rather than sweet - is there another way of testing?

Boiling: The recipe suggests boiling for a full 90 mins-
Q4. Why is 90 minutes necessary?

Q5. I ended up with 20 litres of sweet wort (the recipe was for 19). How do I calculate this extra litre of dilution, will reduce the target SG?
If anyone can answer one or more of these questions, I would appreciate your help. Thanks Bertie

 

[Wendy1971]

Sounds like you have done a couple of things wrong you should stir your mash a while 2 seconds is not enough.
This is why maybe your gravity is low you have not extracted the sugar from the grain. Your temperatures sound ok. You could add more sugar to the fermenter by dissolving in boiling water try it and see what happens

 

[markp]

Your temperatures sound ok.

The mash temperature was not okay IMO.
77 degrees is almost a 'mash out' temperature and I would say at this high an initial temperature there is a great chance that a lot of the amylase has been denatured.
A good stir is also needed, but I think the main problem was the strike temperature.

ATB

 

[cutnrun]

I have to agree with Mark,

at 77 degrees the enzymes that convert the starch in the grain to sugar the yeast can use will be 'killed' or denatured.

I fly sparge and aim to only turn the tap open enough to allow 1L of wort out in a minite. you get more of the good stuff out that way

I take samples of the wort regularly and measure the gravity with my hydromiter as i am going, you do have to correct for the temperature but easier than guessing by taste

Have you looked at the how to guide Here

I have made 8 or 9 AGs now and still use it as my referance point

 

[hairybiker]

Yes 77 is WAY to HOT. If mine is even at 69 I add cold water to bring it down to 66-68.

You also need to STIR the grain in as you add it to the water, for at least 5 min to get it all wetted, otherwise you are only getting very little extraction, I am actually surprised you managed 1028 doing it they way you did.
When you removed the malt did you not notice that a lot of it was still dry or clumped together ?

 

[Hawks]

+1 to the temps issue.

Everyones kit varies in how much temp they lose, but I figure on strike temp of around 74C to mash at 66C ( varies a bit depending on grain temp ).

I would also use less water, for around 3.2 kg of grain I would use about 8 litres of water, and not 15. This thicker mash will also help keep the temperature more constant as you should lose less heat over the mash.

The how to guides on here are very helpful :thumb:

 

[Wendy1971]

sorry chaps i was on my mobile when i replied mash was too hot. The damn writing is so small

 

[kev]

There's so many things wrong with the original post I think its a fake post.

Surely nobody who has a book in front of them would make so many basic mistakes?

K

 

[StubbsPKS]

There's so many things wrong with the original post I think its a fake post.

Surely nobody who has a book in front of them would make so many basic mistakes?

K

I'm sure if you think back to your first brew you can remember making some mistakes that should have been super obvious when looking at your brew sheet. I know I did

But yea, temps are way too high for conversion to take place. Enjoy your super session beer and just lower the temp next time.

Homebrewing is all about experimentation and now you know first hand what high mash temps do :thumb:

 

[graysalchemy]

Firstly and most importantly welcome to the darkside and well done with you first attempt even if it hasn't turned out as expected.

Easy enough mistake to make when you are starting out. It sounds like our OP got his strike temps and sparge temps mixed up. I remember when I started I just couldn't get my head around sparging. It wasn't until I did it I understood the principle.

Have you considered bumping up your abv with some spray malt or liquid malt extract?

Alistair

 

[Bertie Doe]

Firstly and most importantly welcome to the darkside and well done with you first attempt even if it hasn't turned out as expected.

Easy enough mistake to make when you are starting out. It sounds like our OP got his strike temps and sparge temps mixed up. I remember when I started I just couldn't get my head around sparging. It wasn't until I did it I understood the principle.

Have you considered bumping up your abv with some spray malt or liquid malt extract?

Alistair

Many, many thanks Alistair, wendy, markp, cutnrun, hairybiker and stubbspks for your welcome to a full-mash newbie. I realy do appreciate the fact that experienced folk in the Homebrewforum, freely hand out their tips and knowledge - it's a great place to be.
Recap : 1) cutnrun, yep I should have followed the advice from the 'How to' as it uses 50% more grain. I'll reduce the run-off to 1L per minute, this'll help extraction, thanks.
2)More grain stirring required. Hairybiker, I didn't notice overdry or clumping in the spent grain, but when carrying it to the compost heap, I found it was quite heavy. Next time I'll allow the bed to drain (overnight) into the dead-space and maybe extract an extra litre or three of 'juice'?
3)Hawks, are you saying mash at 8L for (for 90 mins) then top up to target volume when hot sparging?
Alistair, I used 400g of sugar and this bumped the OG up to 1040 and it's all bubbling away nicely as I type. Once again, thank you all.

 

[markp]

Bertie - re: liquor (water) to grain ratio.
Most simple mashes use 2.5 litres of water per kg of grain. For example; if your grain bill is 4kg, you would use 10 litres of liquor for the mash.
Once the mash is complete; you then use more water at around 80 degrees to sparge the grain and rinse out further sugar.
For a typical brew length of 23-25 litres of finnished beer, you will be sparging to get 27-30 litres of wort to boil depending on the recipe used and your equipment. You will lose wort to your dead space, evaporation during the boil, hop absorbtion and trub.

It all seems very complex to start with, but persevere and it will fall in to place.

This thread here is an excellent guide for your first few brews viewtopic.php?f=30&t=493

good luck

 

[kev]

There's so many things wrong with the original post I think its a fake post.

Surely nobody who has a book in front of them would make so many basic mistakes?

K

I'm sure if you think back to your first brew you can remember making some mistakes that should have been super obvious when looking at your brew sheet. I know I did

But yea, temps are way too high for conversion to take place. Enjoy your super session beer and just lower the temp next time.

Homebrewing is all about experimentation and now you know first hand what high mash temps do :thumb:

Aye agreed - but I even stir a cup of tea for more than 2 seconds.

Yeh I know there's a lot to learn in brewing (especially AG) but common sense has to kick it in at some point doesn't it?? Drop 4kg of grain into a few litres of water and think that it'll be stirred completely in 2 seconds?! Come on! Then there's the temps - almost 20% more than it's supposed to be!? Agreed that getting the temps right is hard, but not knowing that doing something so far outwith the recipe will impact the end product is madness.

You don't need to know anything about brewing to know that if the recipe asks for 66c and you use almost 20% more temp, it will alter the product.

The good thing is that at least the guy had the nuts to post up what he did. Fair do's for that.

K

 

[Green Ninja]

I made one mistake Saturday on my first AG.

I put the grist in the mash tun first and then the water, luckily I stirred it up for about 2 minutes and got the whole grain bed wet with no clumps.
Pure luck really but I'll get it right next time.

AND I had even watched countless videos on mashing.

I was certainly not a little nervous when doing my first AG.

This could be the reason here as there's a heck of a lot to remember.

Well done for pulling it back though.


Terry.

 

[PhatFil]

There's so many things wrong with the original post I think its a fake post.

Surely nobody who has a book in front of them would make so many basic mistakes?

K

Kev with the book open in front of me, i made SO many mistakes on my first all grain brew :) attempted a 5gal brewlength mash in the bag in a 5gallon to the brim burco!! . OH the Humanity!!!

1) did it inside the kitchen!
2) spilt the mash grain
3) added all the vacum pack of both hops at start of boil.. spent 1/2 an hour with a teastrainer trying to get them back out
4) dropped thermometer and smashed it, tho i tend to do this at least once every brew.. Im a slow wet brewer hic...
n thats just waht i will admit to remembering....
still I was lucky enough not to set the mash temp too high, and did get a nice if dry n hazey batch of bottled beers and one hell of a kitchen clean up job the next day. been brewing on the patio since :)

OP-- bad luck.. you can augment your gravity with any sugar tho sprey malt would be best for an all grain brew.. there are tables out there on the interweb thingy, try this link for starters,


http://brewzor.com/gravity-correction-calculator/

your beer need not be wasted, tho might have a distinctive character:)

 

[Bertie Doe]

Bertie - re: liquor (water) to grain ratio.
Most simple mashes use 2.5 litres of water per kg of grain. For example; if your grain bill is 4kg, you would use 10 litres of liquor for the mash.
Once the mash is complete; you then use more water at around 80 degrees to sparge the grain and rinse out further sugar.
For a typical brew length of 23-25 litres of finnished beer, you will be sparging to get 27-30 litres of wort to boil depending on the recipe used and your equipment. You will lose wort to your dead space, evaporation during the boil, hop absorbtion and trub.

It all seems very complex to start with, but persevere and it will fall in to place.

This thread here is an excellent guide for your first few brews viewtopic.php?f=30&t=493

good luck

Thanks again Mark, I've taken your points onboard and thanks also to Phatfil, I've saved both your's and Phils links to favourites.

Incidently I did some research on Q4 above - Why boil and why for 90 minutes as per the instructions in Graham Wheeler's book. The following answers the why bit and states the boil length can be between 15 mins and 120 mins:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brewing#Boiling
Thinking aloud here .. would 90 mins be overkill for 5 gallons?

 

[Good Ed]

See here http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/v...278&hilit=60+minute+boil+vs+90+minute#p163278

 

[Bertie Doe]

See here http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/v...278&hilit=60+minute+boil+vs+90+minute#p163278

Thanks Ed that's a great link to a top post saved to favourites. I like the idea of sampling the boil at intervals, into a glass and comparing each sample. Thanks.