Working out brewhouse effeciency from fly sparging

[BrewStew]

Ok i think the time has come to work out my brewhouse effeciency as i think i've been winging it for far too long now haha.

but how do i do it when i've only ever fly sparged? i've always stopped when i hit 1.008 on the runnings, and it's always been short on wort collected and put in the boiler, but i've then just topped up the resulting boiled stuff with water to final volume and still hit my target gravity.

i know i should probably keep topping up my boiler with water instead of adding it to the cooled wort but it's not got the volume to hold 5 gals safely at boiling point.

cheers

 

[brewzone]

I calculate My brewhouse efficiency once I've collected the cooled wort in My FV just before pitching the yeast.

If I was using 8Kg of nothing other than pale malt with a potential extract of 300 points per KG

and I had collected 45L at 1.044 measured at 20C in the FV.

Then 44*45=1980 degrees of extract total.

We need to divide this by the theoretical maximum extract as measured in the lab at the maltsters which is usually quoted for a given malt on their data pages.

300*8=2400

So 1980/2400*100=82.5% brewhouse efficiency which would be a pretty good figure for most homebrewers.

If I had an OG of say 1.039

then 39*45=1755

and 1755/2400*100=73.125%

 

[BrewStew]

is that for a batch or fly sparge? and with or without adding water?

 

[Wez]

Hi Guys, going to move this to the Brewing Beer forum :)

 

[BrewStew]

whoops sorry wez

thanks! :)

 

[brewzone]

is that for a batch or fly sparge? and with or without adding water?

I batch sparged with three runnings of approx 15L each

No added water.

I could have added 5 more liters to dilute to 50L and would have still got an efficiency of 82.5% with an OG of 1.0396

 

[BrewStew]

ah okeydoke... any tips on how i can work it out when i'm always fly sparging?

 

[brewzone]

It does not matter whether You fly or batch sparge You are just comparing the total amount of extracted sugar in a given amount of wort to the theoretical maximum in the same volume of wort.

 

[BrewStew]

ahh kk so even though i'm always short on wort (usually about 15-20L collected, but super high in gravity (1.055+) i can still work out my extraction rate? so would i measure is before i dump it in the boiler, or when it's in my fermenter? as i have to top up with water

 

[brewzone]

If You want to measure Your mashing efficiency then measure before the boil.

Brewhouse efficiency is measured in the FV.

Deduct the latter from the former and You have the amount lost to hops and deadspace in the boiler.