My first AG brew day - Foldings Guggle!

[OldThumper]

Hi all,

Today I performed my first All Grain brew, making a recipe called Foldings Guggle which I decided on at this post: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=19557

Folding's Guggle

4KG Pale malt
300g Crystal Malt (7%)
20 IBUs Fuggles (55g if 4.2%) 90 mins
15 IBUs Goldings (45g if 4.3%) 90 mins
15g Fuggles 15 mins
10g Goldings 15 mins
S04 Yeast

Firstly, I new to AG but using the best of my limited knowledge I am pleased with my efforts but it did not go totally plan. My main issue was that I only managed to obtain about 4.5 gallons of wort from the mash tun before my hydrometer read about 1.0. I think you are meant to stop retrieving wort from the mash tun when the SG of a sample drops below 1.10 or 1.06 (not sure which one and I don't know if it depends on the beer type) arn't you? I did carry on fly sparging a bit longer to get up to 5.5 gallons as there was no way i was going to start the boil with only 4.5 gallons of wort and end up with about 4.5 gallons. Or was I wrong to?

I can only think of 2 things that may have caused this:

1. Inefficient mash process (I don't think so unless my themometer is not reading correctly)
2. Poor fly sparging of grains

Anyway, here are the notes of what i did. Please make comments which may help me to improve next time, especially any tips on the fly sparging process. Thanks very much

Step 1: I preheated my mash tun with boiling water and weighed my grain. Next, emptied the water form the mash tun and added 12 litres of water which was at about 72C. Added the grist and stirred well and the recorded water was 67C. I was happy with this so closed the mash tun lid.

mash tun being preheated

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Grist is weighed and ready

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Step 2: After 90 mins of mashing the temperature was 65/66C. Set sparg water to 77C in boiler and set up 3 tier fly sparg system

3 tier sparg

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[OldThumper]

Step 3: Opened tap on mash tun and collected about 3 pints of wort in a large jug. Closed the tap and gently poured the wort in to mash tun. Next, I opened the mash tun tap again to start collecting the wort in a bucket. I immediately turned on the sparg water and started spraying the top of the grains with the hose, often having to restrict the flow of the sparg water The water in the mash tun was mainly above the level of the grain so i occasionally turned off the sparg water to give the mash tun chance to drain a bit. Took a quick sip of the wort and it tasted very sweet! Very nice indeed

mash waiting to be sparged

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first wort

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Sparging the grain and collecting the wort

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Took samples of the wort draining from the mash tun quite frequently (noticing thr colour was turning much paler all the time) and when the SG got to about 1.0 I was dissapointed as I only managed to collect about 4.5 to 5 gallons of wort and I was aiming for 6 gallons (believing 1 gallon would be lost during boiling). I continued to collect wort with a low SG until 5.5 gallons was hit.

[OldThumper]

Step 4: The SG of the 5.5 of wort at this stage was now 1.033, not taking in to account the adjustment for temperature of the wort (which I did not record but around 60C I would guess).

collected about 5.5 gallons of wort

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Step 5: Poured the wort in to my boiler and boiled for 90 mins with lid on, adding necessary hops and irish moss 15 mins before the end. Also at T - 15 mins I inserted my immersion chiller in to the boiler which immediately slowed down the boil a bit due to the drop in temperature caused.

Boiling away for 90 mins

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immersion chiller ready for action

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[OldThumper]

Step 6: Turned boiler off at 90mins and then turned on tap for immersion chiller. After about 20 mins the wort had cooled to about 24C so I turned off the water and started emptying the wort in to my 5 gallon fementing bucket. Unfortunately I only managed to get about 4.1 gallons of wort and this included tipping the boiler alittle to get every bit of wort out. Is this ok to do? I know you are not meant to tilt the mash tun as you get cr*p coming through but I think it is ok to do after boiling?

transferring wort to fermenter

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Step 7: I now had about 4.1 gallons of wort which I moved in to the house, took the SG and this read 1045 without any temperature adjustments (wort was about 22C I would say). Does 1045 sound about right considering it was 1033 before the boil? Is this normal?
I then added my activated S04 yeast. The yeast was actually activated about 5 hours previously so had a good start. Brewing day over and seemed to go well apart from the reduced amount of wort retrieved from the sparg process. I plan to leave it in the primary for about 7-10 days and then move it to my king keg for a few days of seconday.

SG prior to fermentation = 1045

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The whole process took just over 5 hours, including cleaning up afterwards so not too bad for a first attempt I though. Thank god I have a twin element boiler to get to boiling point asap!

Two final questions guys:

1. How much irish moss should I add to 5 gallons? The instruction say 1 tsp but that does not sound like much to me.
2. Is it recommended to add some yeast nutrient like I always would with my country wines? Obviously it does no harm but it is quite expensive stuff so should I bother?


Finally, a big thanks to jdt199. I used his post to build my mash tun and boiler following his instructions (viewtopic.php?f=6&t=17728&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=15) and it worked a treat today. No blockages, leaking, spillages etc! Thanks a lot!

Phew! Fingers crossed for a hassle free fermentation + maturing process.

[delboy]

Well done

No need to add the nutrient, keep that for your wine. The wort being freshly made will have all the necessary elements required for a good fermentation.

[Stonechat]

Regards the Irish Moss....one teaspoon is plenty and will do the job.

When your Irish Moss is near to being used up, consider trying Protafloc or Whirlfloc tablets which are a refined version of Irish Moss and are even more effective IMHO.

[kevthebootboy]

Welcome to the dark side!
ha! thats the first time ive been able to say that well done our kid,

[b.all]

i think it's the free amino nitrogen which malt provides but is not present in fruits for instance. the yeast needs that to feed on so if you're brewing something without malt then you need it.

[OldThumper]

Thanks for the encouragement folks!

So, does anybody have any ideas on why I failed to collect 6 decent gallons of wort from my mash tun? e.g. at around 4.5 gallons the wort was very pale and the SG was around 1.0 (no more sugar being run off from the grains or has it really all be obtained?) and not above 1.10 which I was hoping for. Poor sparg technique may be? Is it best to fly sparg with the water level below the grains or a little bit above? I was disturbing the top of the grain a little as the watering can rose I was using gives quite a hard spray, if that matters at all

[jdt199]

Looks Great OldThumper! I wouldn't worry that you didn't hit the final volume you wanted as your OG of 1.045 seems good, what OG were you aiming for?. Much more and I would have thought your OG would be a bit low. I would check your calculations. You had the opposite problem to me as I collected too much (due to my inaccurate scale I added to the boiler to work out volumes) but hit the OG spot on as I think my efficiency was more than 70%. Have you thought about batch sparging? I did and using the batch sparge calulator on this site It seemed an easier way to be certain of the volumes (if you have marked the scale on your boiler correctly) for beginners like us. Also its easier to leave unattended (no contant measuring with the hydrometer). Something to bear in mind next time.

Your finished wort looks lovely though. Keep us informed on the progress! Oh and did I read your post incorrectly or did you say you perfomed the boil with the lid on? I think the boil should be done with the lid off, but I'm no expert having only done 1 brew myself which isn't even ready to drink yet.

Nice one!

[OldThumper]

thanks jdt199. You did not read incorrectly as I did leave the lid on the boiler. Well, a little bit was left open to stop it blowing off under pressure. I don't know which is correct but i was trying not to lose too much liquid via evaporation (or whatever you want to call it)!

I am aware of batch sparging but at a glance it looked a bit complicated so I opted for fly sparging. I will however revisit batch sparging as it does sound easier once you know what you are doing.

Is it ok to tilt the boiler to try to get more of the boiled wort out because otherwise you lose a litre or something due to the hop strainer and tap height (a "no no" for the mash tun I know)

I will keep you posted on the brew!

BTW: I had a sneeky sip of the wort in the fermentation bin before adding the yast and it was not very nice

[jdt199]

I think tipping the boiler to get all the wort out is fine. All the crud you dont want should be left out if you had a good hot and cold break and the striner does the rest. I'm pretty sure however, next time you should leave the lid completely off for the boil as you want all the stuff that's evaporating off to be taken away as it take off a lot of nasties you dont want, but I dont think it will affect your brew too much. Also the loss from the boil should be taken into consideration from your calculations. But as I said I'm no expert so maybe someone could correct / confirm?

With regards to the batch sparging i think its a lot easier to do once you have made all the calculations as once your quantaties are written down you just pour leave for 5 mins or so and run off again and if your calculations are correct then you have exactly the right amount before the boil. I may move to fly sparging when I get better at this lark and perhaps a spinny thing. Dont worry about the taste before pitching, I tasted mine too. Very sweet and malty but not really beer!

[aceuass]

you quoted

`Took samples of the wort draining from the mash tun quite frequently (noticing thr colour was turning much paler all the time) and when the SG got to about 1.0 I was dissapointed as I only managed to collect about 4.5 to 5 gallons of wort and I was aiming for 6 gallons (believing 1 gallon would be lost during boiling). I continued to collect wort with a low SG until 5.5 gallons was hit.`

with temp adjustment for last sparge(I`m guessing your temp was about 160F) you would of been at about 1.022 so you still had a long way to go before you hit the advised 1.006 mark
I think your on your way to nice beer there
Cheers
Paul

[haz66]

I always boil with lid completely off, when i make my sparge water i always have more than what i need for sparging.
Then i put whats left into a big pan and get that upto boiling point and keep adding it to the boiler to make up what as
evaporated off in the boiler, you wont lower the original SG as the sugars dont evaporate.
The reason i dont just top up with normal water is that my sparge water is treated with a Campden tablet, and after having
a couple of batches of beer turn to TCP due to the chlorine i dont take any chances now.

[ChrisG]

Well done!

Your equipment looks a lot like mine.

Excellent work.