Different crushes from different suppliers

[SiHoltye]

VERY SORRY CHAPS, I'VE GIVEN THE WRONG INFO BELOW, WHEREVER IT SAYS WARMINSTER IT SHOULD READ TUCKERS

Hello,

Until now I've always bought my pale malt crushed in 25kg sacks from H&G (can't remember their supplier). I've just bought 25kg of crushed from Hop Shop and noticed the malt is from Warminster Maltings, but moreover that the crush is a lot less severe. Some grains are halved rather than previously they'd be smashed. The speciality grains from Hop Shop are more completely crushed/smashed like I am used to and suspect the looser crush is a product of the maltings rather than Hop Shop. My efficency dropped tonight in the first batch on the new malt by 15% from 75ish to 60ish%. I wondered if anyone else had noticed differing crushes from different suppliers. Am a bit disgruntled mainly because I've resorted to adding sugar post boil to boost OG on this first brew. I missed by 7or8 gravity points which makes a lot of difference in an attempted 1.043 brew

[Parva]

Funnilly enough, I have a contact that gets me 25Kg sacks of pre-crushed M.O. direct from Fawcetts. I've had no problems at all with the first few sacks but the one I'm using now is giving me stuck sparges on every single brew so far and it's being a royal pain in the backside. This has come direct from the maltsters and not via a 3rd party that may have bought it uncrushed and crushed it to order so it seems that there are variations in the crush from the maltsters themselves. However, the stuck sparges appear to have improved my efficiency somewhat, horses for courses and all that.

[RabMaxwell]

I used to crush my own malt but have been buying crushed from Warminster for the last few years & never had a problem. Warminster MO is one of the best malts flavour wise i have used must just be a poorly crushed batch.

[SiHoltye]

The malt on the left is the Warminster, and on the right is some caramalt that's crushed close to how my previous supply of MO was (I've used it all so have none left as an example). Quite a difference I thought.

[RabMaxwell]

The Warminster MO is poorly crushed mine doesn't look like that are you sure Warminster crushed it wouldn't think they would crush it as poorly as that is crushed.

[SiHoltye]

VERY SORRY CHAPS, I'VE GIVEN THE WRONG INFO ABOVE, WHEREVER IT SAYS WARMINSTER IT SHOULD READ TUCKERS



That small issue aside ( a thousand apologies) and now having spoken to the HBS they say it is crushed at the maltings, that they at the shop regularly split the 25kg sacks for smaller orders and don't recognize any crush issue, and they've not had any negative feedback about crush before. They suggest it may be crushed less than others possibly, and this might be a commercial level. Perhaps , you sure shouldn't expect too many stuck sparges with it

I'm hankering for a grain mill, a large hopper barley crusher from the US most likely...now where's that credit card...

[SiHoltye]

I have used up my Tuckers Maltings sack of MO, and today I'm back on Fawcetts from H&G. Mash ph bang on again rather than low, will be interesting to see if mash efficiency jumps back up , I expect it will and have put recent innefficient extraction rates at the door of Tuckers.

[Jim]

I'm pretty sure that H&G crush it themselves, though that might just be for smaller quantities than 25kg sacks.

[J_P]

What year and variety was the bag of malt that gave you the bad efficiency?

The Halcyon form Fawcetts was rubbish late last year, I was getting 80%+ efficiency normally and then this dropped to below 70% with the new bag, it was possibly something to do with the rubbish summer.

I changed to Lager malt and my efficiency is back up over 80%

[SiHoltye]

What year and variety was the bag of malt that gave you the bad efficiency?

It's Maris Otter, dunno what year, I'l have a look on the bag later to see if it says. Recently brewed with LC MO from Fawcetts and efficiency back up to usual and mash ph back in range, so maybe that grain could've been more acid thus lower ph in the mash and so efficiency??? Without a scientific study of the malt I can't say for certain what happened, only can talk about the results compared to the previous countless brews with Fawcetts at 80% efficiency.

[J_P]

Without a scientific study of the malt I can't say for certain what happened

Did you not get a chit with your malt with the scientific analysis of it? Whenever we buy malt from Fawcetts we always get a chit with a breakdown of what the malt will yield and other bumf

[SiHoltye]

I've never bought direct from maltsters, always through a HBS. No paperwork. I'd be after a crushed single 25kg sack at a time and delivered to me so haven't bothered direct assuming through a third party would be cheaper and crushed for me.

[iowalad]

My efficiency has tanked of late with Crisps MO - I suspect my bag o malt is from last year when many others were reporting drops in eff.

I changed mash tuns at the same time as I got the new bag of malt so I am not 100% sure it is the malt.

[johnmac]

I'm using Munton's Cocktail at the moment. Great taste and efficiency as high as I've ever had. Not floor malted, but I can live without the traditional hint of dead rat in my ale