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Efficiency of equipment/procedures

Rep

Grandmaster Brewer
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Nov 23, 2007
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Location
Wisconsin
Hi

After having completed eight all grain brewing sessions I am averaging 65% efficiency.

Although I would like to get it higher, the beer tastes great and I am generally happy with my results.

Now that I know what both my procedures and the equipment provide, is it time for me to adjust my grain bill to gain a bump?

Or, do I continue as I am?
 
Hi Rep,

65% Eff is reasonably good, I think the most important thing is repeatability, if you have been consistently achieving 65% then I would say your doing well.

If you want to experiment and see if you can improve your process then I would be looking at:

Grain crush, perhaps adjusting the crush finer will increase your eff.
PH of the mash, achieving a mash ph of 5.2-5.4 will help improve your eff.
Sparging, if you fly sparge a slower sparge can help as well.
Mash out, if you don't mash out then your eff can suffer slightly. I usually mashout at 78°c

There are lots of things you can do to tweak your system, but like I said, repeatabilty is more important.
 
You can try to mill the grain a little more or double mill it to get a better crush or adjust your grain bill. In the long run you will still have beer but I would focus on brewing to style.



Happy Brewing
Chris
 
The most common reason for low efficiency is the crush.  Look there first to improve it. 

But consistancy is more important than high efficiency.

Brew well,

Fred
 
I appreciate the comments.

I and my brew partner are approaching this hobby in a systematic manner.  We are moving forward step by step, acquiring new equipment and procedures.  The main question we ask each other is, "Will this next thing we try/purchase make our beer taste better?"

It has been consistency we have aimed for and is our main goal.

With this post, I really sought advice on the importance of efficiency.  Your comments provided me an avenue concerning efficiency I will not at this time travel.  I am not going to get overly concerned about it but will work on some other procedures and refinements.

The efficiency will come as we dial in our new Barley Crusher, a piece of equipment we recently purchased.

Thanks for the feedback

 
Since you are attacking your brewing in a systematic way to make your beer taste better,  tackle the fermentation process.

First pitch a sufficient quantity of healthy yeast, and then control your fermentation temps.  These two items, more than anything else, will improve your brewing.  This is the BIG secret. 

PS: don't tell anyone else or I'll have to shoot you  ;) ;)

Fred
 
bonjour said:
Since you are attacking your brewing in a systematic way to make your beer taste better,  tackle the fermentation process.

First pitch a sufficient quantity of healthy yeast, and then control your fermentation temps.  These two items, more than anything else, will improve your brewing.  This is the BIG secret. 

PS: don't tell anyone else or I'll have to shoot you  ;) ;)

Fred

Hehe - Just read your post over at NB about you brewing beer for a wedding.

Yes, the fermentation process....I am in the process of washing yeast and heading toward storing slants.  Of course, growing them and figuring out the appropriate amount is part of that.

Temperatures, eh?  I will have to learn more about this.

I ferment in my basement at 68F.  Accept the Kolsch I have in a lagering tank in my garage finishing at around 64F.  I will then drop the temp on that.

I do not yet have a fermentation frig, that will come after I deal with stir plates.  I also want to move to ten gallon batches this summer.
 
I'll defer to Jamil and his yeast calculator at MrMalty.com for how much yeast to pitch.

I may have another wedding coming up,  nothing official yet.

Fred
 
I was running 60-65% until I had a chat with the guy at the local homebrew supply store, and he asked me if I mash-out.
I said "no" so he explained to me how sugars are more soluble in higher temperature water (dissolving sugar into hot coffee vs instant ice tea into cold water) and that ten or twenty degrees can make all the difference in the world.
So for my next batch I scooped half my 150 degree mash from its insulated happy place into a pot (after an iodine test showed it was mostly done) and put it on the stove, bringing it almost to a boil.  After mixing it back in entropy took over and my thermometer read 175 or so.
I then, on his advice, heated my sparge water to 200 instead of 180 since it will cool during the process, and let her rip.
Previously the best starting gravity I had gotten off 14# of pale plus some crystal was 1.058, with those temperature changes I got a whopping 1.072!

Efficiency is all about dissolving sugar into water, and the warmer the water the more sugar will to dissolve.

BTW I do a 90 minute boil because I'm taking 7.5-8 gallons down to 5.5, but since I like IPAs it just gives me more time to boil my bittering hops.

My equipment is quite welfare or do-it-yourself, depending on your point of view.  I filled a cardboard box with styrofoam scraps, then wrapped a bucket in a trash bag, and used Great Stuff foaming insulation to make a snug fit.  The bucket came out while the bag stayed in its tight insulated home.

For sparging I do the Papazian method of two buckets, one with a mess of holes drilled into it.

This is my first post in this forum, hope it is helpful.
 
Maine Homebrewer said:
My equipment is quite welfare or do-it-yourself, depending on your point of view.  I filled a cardboard box with styrofoam scraps, then wrapped a bucket in a trash bag, and used Great Stuff foaming insulation to make a snug fit.  The bucket came out while the bag stayed in its tight insulated home.

For sparging I do the Papazian method of two buckets, one with a mess of holes drilled into it.

I have an equally "welfare" setup but it's very easy to use and so far I've been getting 75% efficiency.

I mash AND boil in an aluminum turkey fryer (Alzheimer's, be damned) atop a 3/8" steel plate to avoid scorching. Wrapping a big thick towel around the pot after adding the grist keeps the temp within a degree for the 1 hour that I let the mash sit.

After the mash (single infusion at 150F), I transfer from the fryer/brewpot to a 5 gallon bucket with 3/16" holes drilled in the bottom. This bucket fits neatly in my bottling bucket with 2" of dead space below and makes a nifty lauter tun. I draw off the first running with a pitcher and return it to the grain bed until it's running fairly clear. Then I let it run directly into the brew pot (after a quick hot rinse) and sprinkle my sparge water with a Pyrex measuring cup poured over a big fork.

What the heck. It works.

- Hare
 
Hare

The setup you describe is almost identical to mine.
What's the point of a hobby without some homemade equipment? If it ain't broke...

Do you mash out?  I found heating the entire mash impractical which is why I do a decoction style method of raising the mash temp.
If you don't, try it sometime.  That was the key to raising my efficiency.

-MHB
 
Maine Homebrewer said:
Do you mash out?  I found heating the entire mash impractical which is why I do a decoction style method of raising the mash temp.
If you don't, try it sometime.  That was the key to raising my efficiency.

-MHB
No, I don't. I have a spreadsheet that calcualtes by grist weight and water volume, what strike temperature to heat the water to prior to mixing in the grist. (I think Beer Smith must use the same formula because it indicates the same temp if I create a mash profile.) Like I said, my mash stays within 1 deg F of my target temp for a 60 minute mash.

I do, however, use a bit hotter sparge temp than indicated per an article I saw somewhere on the web about efficiency. I'm getting a really good efficiency (around 70) and I've adjusted my crush to be more coarse which has cut my sparge time in half and still not changed the efficiency.

- Hare
 
Hare,
Just because I design computer programs for a living doesn't mean I know how to use them, how do you do the quote thing?

Anyway, a higher sparge temp does help things, but if you really want to wash all the sugars off your grain it really helps if their mash's starting temp is above 170.
What I do is pull half the mash from my bucket when an iodine test reads "close enough", 1 1/2 hrs into a 150 degree mash or 2hrs into a 145 degree mash, and heat it up while my sparge water is on the lobstah burner (I'm a Mainah).
Then I mix the heated mash back in and let entropy do its thing while I set up my sparge equipment.

If you're happy with 70% keep doing what you're doing, if you want 85% or more off your grain for minimal extra effort try mashing out.
I'll get the same starting gravity from 10lbs of grain compared to you using 11-12 lbs.

It's up to you.
 
Maine Homebrewer said:
Just because I design computer programs for a living doesn't mean I know how to use them, how do you do the quote thing?

OK. As a management consultant I can safely say, "Even a software engineer can do this." ;)

Look for the little button that says "quote." It will bring the entire post up in a reply, quoted. It doesn't take an HTML rocket scientist to figure out how to quote subsets of the set of all original text. 2 x ;)

With a little practice, you can even misquote people but that's for another thread...

Maine Homebrewer said:
Anyway, a higher sparge temp does help things, but if you really want to wash all the sugars off your grain it really helps if their mash's starting temp is above 170.

No can do. I'm trying to make really light, crisp, in-your-face, hoppy ales. See "Goose Island Honkers." See "Sierra Nevada Pale Ale." See (this makes me kinda stiff in a good way) "Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye!"

Mashing at higher temps produces more "body" which in my particular target style means "unwanted unfermentable sugars."

Besides, I've eaten (don't make fun) my spent grain from both the top and the bottom of the grain bed. If there's any sugar left in there, I sure can't taste it. If there's any sugar left over in my ales, I can detect it in ppm. I'm like the Princess and the Pea that way. 3 x ;)

Next batch (tomorrow am) I'm going to try a protien rest as suggested in another post. Stay tuned for the report.

Cheers,

- Hare
 
Mashing at higher temps produces more "body" which in my particular target style means "unwanted unfermentable sugars."

Very true, and I consistently brew light dry crispy IPAs where the vast majority of the calories are in the alcohol, not the body of the beer.

I mash out AFTER the enzymes have done their thing.  Notice had I said when an iodine test reads "close enough", which means the edges of the drop blacken after a minute or two, if at all.  The starches have already been broken down into fermentables and I'm raising the sugary mash to a temperature where the sugars will more readily unstick themselves from the grains.
Some people mash out because they're impatient and want to rid the mash of starches, I mash out after doing yard work for two hours because I want the mash to be near the same temp as the sparge water to ensure close to all the sugars (I got 1.051 off 10 lbs pale and .5 lbs crystal yesterday and expect a final gravity under 1.01) into the brewpot.
 
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