Preparing equipment for first brew.

[Rhyno]

I've finally made the jump to all grain brewing and have purchased my first all grain ingredient kit.

In preparation for this I've started to test my equipment. The boiler works like a charm and got up to the strike water temperature within good time. However when I attempted to put 12 litres into the mash tun to check it would hold temperature for 90 minutes as the recipie would require. Upon doing this I started at 70 degrees out of the boiler, this dropped to 64 in the mash tun. Left for 90 minutes and lost 8 degrees.

I was wondering if anyone had any advice or other things to test before making the kit?

 

[Ciaran12s]

With the grain in there it'll hold temperature much better. If its cold I'll put a kettle of water first to let it heat the mash tun up a bit before adding grain or water.
Did you wrap it in blankets, coats etc?

Is it a cool box mash tun?

 

[Rhyno]

Yeah it's a cool box mash tun. I didn't use towels this time but I'm wanting to re test tomorrow. I warmed it up with a kettle full of boiling water first.

I was thinking it could be down to the grains not being in the mash tun.

 

[ACBEV]

Upon doing this I started at 70 degrees out of the boiler, this dropped to 64 in the mash tun. Left for 90 minutes and lost 8 degrees.

Two things to note... 1. Hot water and grain will hold heat better than just hot water. 2. I heat my strike water to 80-85c before adding to mash tun, then wait until water reaches strike temp., then mash in. Some heat will be lost when tranfering water.

 

[Ciaran12s]

The thermal mass of the grain does help to hold temperature. Are you working inside or outside?

There's a strike temperature calculator on brewers friend and I find it's usually pretty spot on. Always worth having some hot and cold on hand just in case you miss temperature.

I wrap mine up in a couple of old blankets/throws and it does help. It's a cool box type as well but it does need that extra little bit of help.

 

[ACBEV]

Yeah it's a cool box mash tun.

I built a frame and added 100mm insulation board to top, bottom and sides. I lose 1c at most over an hour.