How long to sparge for.

[Polcho]

Having watched a few Brewzilla videos, I’m still unsure how long the sparge should be for.

It seems to range from just jugging the water in, in a few minutes, to half an hour, and from using water from the tap to a specific temperature.

What do people do?

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

what I’ve read you should do, and what I do myself (but not in an all-in-one, so I don’t know if it makes any difference) is to sparge until either (a) you‘ve collected the correct volume for your boil (eg for me, about 25-27 litres); OR (b) the SG of the runnings drops below 1010.
The trick is to sparge slowly and carefully, but to try to keep the temperature of the grain bed at about 77°C while you’re doing it

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

The reason you should stop if the runnings go below 1010 is just to reduce the risk of extracting bitter-tasting stuff from the grains; but don‘t worry overly if you can’t easily measure it - it’s very unlikely to be a problem.

 

[crowcrow]

Using my Klarstein all in one, I mash with 22 litres and then only sparge with 5 litres at about 78c, jugging on with a small 250ml jug and pouring through a colander sitting on top of the grain basket (while the boiler is switched to boil) - I'm sure this is to little and too quick, but it works for me and I seem to hit the planned og most of the time and brew beer I'm happy with. (I lose about 2 litres to the grain and lose about 5 more to the boil and to the slurry left in the boiler - ending with about 20 litres into the fv).

 

[sifty]

I've got a brewzilla and use brewfather recipes, so the sparge amount is quite precise (eg 9.48 litres).
I have a 15 litre urn with a thermostat so always have hot water available, and add a litre at a time, pouring evenly over the top screen on the mash. Then leave till it stops dripping, with the brewzilla set to 75 degs, and remove malt pipe when done. Takes some time, 30 mins to an hr depending on mash consistency, but the volume and numbers are always right...

 

[Cheshire Cat]

I batch sparge for 20 minutes at 75C with 14 litres.

 

[cushyno]

I batch sparge for 20 minutes at 75C with 14 litres.

Same here

 

[Stuart Wilson]

I use a klarstein all in one. Only done about 10 AG brews but getting the hang of it slowly. I start with 25 L of water.....have built things around recipes for a strong IPA with 6kg of grain.

I sparge with 7 L of water at about 70 degrees. I now pour this in using a pyrex jug, and aim to keep level of water just above grain bed as the grain basket drains. Once it's all gone in I let the grain basket drain for about 40 min, then bring to the boil. I end up with a post boil vol of 23 l.

When I started the gravity was very variable and often pretty low. However, as I've done more brews it the efficiency has risen and become a lot more consistent. In fact finished beer is now embarrasingly strong. Last brew the post boil gravity was 1.074 and with mangrove Jack's west coast yeast I got just on 8% ABV. When I started my brews were coming out at about 5.5%!

Just shows how things change with experience. Going to work out a new recipe to end up with something a bit more drinkable!

 

[crowcrow]

If I was doing a big bill like that I'd def need to up my sparge - I normally do 4 to 4.5kg of grain so easier to get the sugars out easily - bigger the bill harder you need to work to extract all the sugars.

 

[Stuart Wilson]

Have thought about reducing mash volume and upping sparge volume. At the moment every brew is giving me almost exactly 20L of beer to bottle, so volume issues are pretty well under control. I start with 25 L, sparge with 7 L and do a 90 min boil.

My last few brews have tasted great, friends really like it, but have been so strong you really can't have too much. For past 6 brews the OG has just got higher and higher with every brew so efficiency getting better the more I do. I used some software that I found on line, which suggested efficiency was now around 70%.

At the start I decided not to change too many things so I could monitor progress. Made lots of single hop / single malt ales, but have now experimented with different hops / malts. I now plan to really cut down amount of grain to try and produce something at about 4.4%.

The worst thing is if you go to pub....have a couple of drinks then come home and decide to have a bottle of home brew. This leads to another, next thing you wake up at 3 in the morning having dozed off in front of TV!!

 

[hoppyscotty]

I try to make it so there is an continuous flow of liquid through the grain from when you lift the malt pipe and the wort beings to flow out. I top up the level with sparge water so the top of the grain doesn't run dry. If you let it drain out completely then I think you run the risk of the grain bed becoming settled and slightly compacted and restricting flow or risking a stuck sparge.

How long it takes depends not he grain type and amount. If a heavy grain bill and especially if it contains oats it can be very slow, but if not then can flow through quite quickly. Todays brewery it was quite a slow one.

Also I give it a squeeze afterwards by gently pushing down on the top plate. I never used to and always had to top up with an additional litre of spare water to make volume but over a period of time after discarding the malt pipe into a bucket more wort would eventually drip out. So after adding all the Spare water I let it run till it stops dripping, or the drip rate becomes extremely slow, and give it a good squeeze. Not detected a hint of tannins at all in the resulting beer.

 

[RGeats]

Similar to others, I use brewfather software. Generally sparge is about 10l, which prob takes 15 mins or so. I set the brewzilla to boil when starting the sparge which saves time. When the dripping has slowed down I take the grain basket off and leave it in a bucket to continue dripping. Then when it stops dripping completely I tip the extra wort into the brewzilla.

 

[Clint]

Seems to be a vast difference between all in one,biab and 3v systems..
I use 3 vessel...my mash is usually about 13 litres and my sparge about 23 litres. I keep my sparge water at 75/76c and take "quite a while" sparging... probably an hour or so...

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Seems to be a vast difference between all in one,biab and 3v systems..
I use 3 vessel...my mash is usually about 13 litres and my sparge about 23 litres. I keep my sparge water at 75/76c and take "quite a while" sparging... probably an hour or so...

I'd come to the same conclusion @Clint ... different world...

 

[moto748]

I think the thing that confuses me about this issue is that people talk about sparging slowly, and/or using a relatively high volume of sparge water compared to strike water, with the object of improving efficiency.

But then you get 'no sparge' recipes, which often seem to manage pretty decent efficiencies themselves. Which makes sparging seem less important.

 

[Hanglow]

I no sparge, efficency is fine up to about an og of 1.052 or so, then gets progressively worse.

I don't use a brewzilla though but a 2 vessel system. If it has the space I'd just do no sparge for any normal gravity beers.

 

[hoppyscotty]

Wow, on my Brewzilla using the standard Brewfather Brewzilla profile I usually end up with a 19ltr mash vol and around 6ltr space for a 20ltr batch. Alway hit my numbers spot on. Sparge only takes 5 - 10 mins depending on malt type - if its a high gravity beer then flow will be quite slow and restricted and spare can take longer.
Doesn't seem to make sense to me to have more water volume in the spare than in the mash - maybe unless you batch sparge but I've never done that.