double infusion mash....what did I do wrong?

Hi, I was planning on making 5gal of a huge Russian Imperial Stout today, but due to a misconfiguration in Berrsmith I made 10gal or regular stout instead.  Here's the deal: I have a 10gal mash tun (cooler) and the recipe called for 23lbs of grain.  I plugged everything into Beersmith and selected "double infusion, medium body"  I looked at the mash schedule it gave he and it says: 5.4gal at 122f for 30min, then saccarification rest with 4.8gal at 152, then Mash out w/ 4.2gal at 168.  So I did the protein rest fine, but then I added 4.8 to get it to 152 and the grain to water ratio was way high.  That's when I realized something was wrong.  I batch sparged and ended up with 10gal of 1.068 wort.  It was supposed to be 6gal at 1.130 or so.  How do I configure Beersmith to do a protein rest before saccarification rest, then mash out and end up with 6gal?  Maybe it's not possible with that much grain? 

I would suggest decoction over infusion for stepping up the temp. In addition to not adding more water, there are other benefits like caramelization and increased efficiency due to "bursting" the grain.

Thanks for the reply.  Yeah I should have done a decoction instead.  Interestingly, I tried to create a 5gal recipe in Beersmith with a typical OG (1.069) and selected double infusion, medium body and it provided proper water volumes to end up with 6gal.  So it seems like beersmith calculated based on the amount of grain I was using (huge amount) and didn't keep the final boil amount in mind (6gal).  Is that a bug?

Agreed.  Have never had luck when trying multiple infusions in a cooler....can never get close to temps and you will only end up overflowing your mash tun trying then boiling till you run out of propane.  A lot of people knock decoctions as difficult but its really not.  And it does great things to your beer.  Just ask the folks at Pilsner Urquell. 

Will 23 pounds of grain plus water fit in a 10-gallon mash tun?    I have that size Polarware and don't think I could do more than ~16 pounds with the false bottom and a sparge arm for lautering.  And that is single infusion.

MaltLicker said:

Will 23 pounds of grain plus water fit in a 10-gallon mash tun?

Click to expand...

Good point!  Actually my mash tun is 62qt (15.5 gal) After I added the water for the saccarification rest, there was 24lbs of grain and ~10gal of water...something like that.  That wouldn't fit in a 10 gal. mash tun.