I thought I knew what I was doing at the start then by the end of course I knew things would need perfecting
www.youtube.com/allgrainrookie
Hope you like it - comments very welcome
First AG brew
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Dennis King
- Telling everyone Your My Best Mate
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Re: First AG brew
Only watched the first 3 instalments, try and watch others later, 1 comment don`t keep opening the MT to check temp, you will lose a lot of heat that way. Get to know your tun so you know what to expect in temp drop. I never need to re heat.
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Kev888
- So far gone I'm on the way back again!
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Re: First AG brew
Hi, very well done on the first AG brew!
Just a few thoughts - purely meant constructively as you asked for comments: I agree with Dennis. You shouldn't need to add hotter water if things are pre-heated properly and the insulation is working (you may want a weight or something on the lid if the seal is letting any heat escape). But if you do need to add some (and you're far from alone!) then I'd suggest stirring as you add it, not just afterwards, to stop the hot water overheating any grains as it goes in - that could kill off enzymes in the grain it first hits and stop them converting properly.
I'm not a witbier expert but generally it may help to add the grain to the MT after the water, rather than before. You can then (when you know the characteristics of the MT) overheat the liquor initially to allow for temperature losses in warming up the MT before it ever sees the grain. With experience you can let it warm through and come to reach the correct strike temperature for the grain with a nice pre-warmed tun which won't then cool it further. Adding grain to water rather than visa versa 'may' also help avoid dry clumps as you mix/dough in the grain; a possible source of lower efficiency. Similarly it helps to get the planned liquor volume sorted beforehand, ready for the grain, rather than poking about for so long with the grain already in it - the MT lid was open for quite a long time there initially.
It looked like you were fly sparging, maybe with a bit of batch hybrid (sorry my attention wandered a bit), but if so I couldn't see if you protected the gain bed from direct jets from the HLT pipe or not - its advisable to have some water overlaying the grains and/or a bit of foil or something and/or use a gentle spray - to stop the sparge water creating channels through the grain. With fly sparging you need a well dispersed filtering through to wash out the goodness evenly and get the maximum yield/efficiency/gravity. Apologies if you did that, I just didn't notice. Similarly if you're fly sparging its a good idea to keep an eye on the gravity towards the end of the sparge, rather than just go by time and volume - if it gets too thin you can be washing out undesirable stuff as well as watering down the wort too much if the efficiency wasn't as high as expected. By that, I mean measure the gravity of the wort coming off the MT (you may have to pause the sparge to let the trial jar cool enough for measuring) rather than just measuring the final mixed up wort in the boiler..
Finally, just some minor points I thought of as the footage rolled: fast cooling of the wort is convenient (especially at that time of night!) rather than important as such, in fact it can be helpful to rest/steep at 80C in some cases. Also, those plastic boxes won't really deter rodents very much, I had one chew through a thick blue barrel once, so if you think it may be a problem some sort of metal cupboard or bin would be a lot better. Not sure if you quite understood efficiency from what you were saying: efficiency relates to the amount of goodness you've extracted from the grains (compared to theoretical maximums) not just the volume you get out of the mash tun - though that could be me just misinterpreting what you said.
Anyway, minor comments aside it looks like you've made a brew!! Okay maybe a little weaker than intended, but a brew non the less, which is something to be proud of for the firts attempt! I'd imagine getting the temperatures sorted and probably sorting the sparge will see the efficiencies rise. Hope it works out well and the very best of luck with AG #1 turning out nicely!
CHeers
kev
Just a few thoughts - purely meant constructively as you asked for comments: I agree with Dennis. You shouldn't need to add hotter water if things are pre-heated properly and the insulation is working (you may want a weight or something on the lid if the seal is letting any heat escape). But if you do need to add some (and you're far from alone!) then I'd suggest stirring as you add it, not just afterwards, to stop the hot water overheating any grains as it goes in - that could kill off enzymes in the grain it first hits and stop them converting properly.
I'm not a witbier expert but generally it may help to add the grain to the MT after the water, rather than before. You can then (when you know the characteristics of the MT) overheat the liquor initially to allow for temperature losses in warming up the MT before it ever sees the grain. With experience you can let it warm through and come to reach the correct strike temperature for the grain with a nice pre-warmed tun which won't then cool it further. Adding grain to water rather than visa versa 'may' also help avoid dry clumps as you mix/dough in the grain; a possible source of lower efficiency. Similarly it helps to get the planned liquor volume sorted beforehand, ready for the grain, rather than poking about for so long with the grain already in it - the MT lid was open for quite a long time there initially.
It looked like you were fly sparging, maybe with a bit of batch hybrid (sorry my attention wandered a bit), but if so I couldn't see if you protected the gain bed from direct jets from the HLT pipe or not - its advisable to have some water overlaying the grains and/or a bit of foil or something and/or use a gentle spray - to stop the sparge water creating channels through the grain. With fly sparging you need a well dispersed filtering through to wash out the goodness evenly and get the maximum yield/efficiency/gravity. Apologies if you did that, I just didn't notice. Similarly if you're fly sparging its a good idea to keep an eye on the gravity towards the end of the sparge, rather than just go by time and volume - if it gets too thin you can be washing out undesirable stuff as well as watering down the wort too much if the efficiency wasn't as high as expected. By that, I mean measure the gravity of the wort coming off the MT (you may have to pause the sparge to let the trial jar cool enough for measuring) rather than just measuring the final mixed up wort in the boiler..
Finally, just some minor points I thought of as the footage rolled: fast cooling of the wort is convenient (especially at that time of night!) rather than important as such, in fact it can be helpful to rest/steep at 80C in some cases. Also, those plastic boxes won't really deter rodents very much, I had one chew through a thick blue barrel once, so if you think it may be a problem some sort of metal cupboard or bin would be a lot better. Not sure if you quite understood efficiency from what you were saying: efficiency relates to the amount of goodness you've extracted from the grains (compared to theoretical maximums) not just the volume you get out of the mash tun - though that could be me just misinterpreting what you said.
Anyway, minor comments aside it looks like you've made a brew!! Okay maybe a little weaker than intended, but a brew non the less, which is something to be proud of for the firts attempt! I'd imagine getting the temperatures sorted and probably sorting the sparge will see the efficiencies rise. Hope it works out well and the very best of luck with AG #1 turning out nicely!
CHeers
kev
Kev
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greenxpaddy
Re: First AG brew
Hi Kev
Cheers for you input. you were bank g on with everything you have said. I have learnt so much in even the 4 days since this brew!
Yes I was concerned as an after thought that I could have been scorching the mash when I threw that boiling kettle of water in.
I didn't protect the mash from the jet of water when fly sparging, but the MT was full above the level of the grain.
I suppose I need to read up on sparging. Given the set up how would you do it? Would you empty the MT completely at 90 mins then rinse the grain. I was filling the MT as it fell so it never really went down. what I could do with is a homemade sprinkler end for the silicon tube feed so its a gentler rinse. Hmmm. Maybe I can get a shower head to work - got me thinking now.
Once the mash was the correct temp I didnt open the MT for 70mins. It had fallen by 6 degrees F. Not a lot. It was open a lot initially because as the first run I wasn't sure how much the temp would fall from the boiler temp. I will know better next time :O) Don't you need to stir the mash at all during the mash?
You said
"It looked like you were fly sparging, maybe with a bit of batch hybrid"
Sorry I don't really understand that terminology. Can you explain.
Next time I would keep an eye on the gravity towards the end of the sparge- take time with the more imprtant parts!
Not heard about the 80 degree steep what plus points does it give?
Lastly you were right I thought efficiency was water tloss to the grain. Soon worked out that wasn't the case!
Reaaly grateful for your comments.
Paddy
Cheers for you input. you were bank g on with everything you have said. I have learnt so much in even the 4 days since this brew!
Yes I was concerned as an after thought that I could have been scorching the mash when I threw that boiling kettle of water in.
I didn't protect the mash from the jet of water when fly sparging, but the MT was full above the level of the grain.
I suppose I need to read up on sparging. Given the set up how would you do it? Would you empty the MT completely at 90 mins then rinse the grain. I was filling the MT as it fell so it never really went down. what I could do with is a homemade sprinkler end for the silicon tube feed so its a gentler rinse. Hmmm. Maybe I can get a shower head to work - got me thinking now.
Once the mash was the correct temp I didnt open the MT for 70mins. It had fallen by 6 degrees F. Not a lot. It was open a lot initially because as the first run I wasn't sure how much the temp would fall from the boiler temp. I will know better next time :O) Don't you need to stir the mash at all during the mash?
You said
"It looked like you were fly sparging, maybe with a bit of batch hybrid"
Sorry I don't really understand that terminology. Can you explain.
Next time I would keep an eye on the gravity towards the end of the sparge- take time with the more imprtant parts!
Not heard about the 80 degree steep what plus points does it give?
Lastly you were right I thought efficiency was water tloss to the grain. Soon worked out that wasn't the case!
Reaaly grateful for your comments.
Paddy
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Kev888
- So far gone I'm on the way back again!
- Posts: 7701
- Joined: Fri Mar 19, 2010 6:22 pm
- Location: Derbyshire, UK
Re: First AG brew
Hi Paddy, good stuff - sounds like you're already on top of most of it then. It can take a while to get the hang of a new setup, I struggled recently when I even just changed my MT to a metal one, with different temperature characteristics.
Yes, your heat losses during the mash aren't huge and probably pre-heating would help reduce them more. If it still drops by more than a few degreesC over say 60 mins then maybe you could wrap it in a sleeping bag or something to help - sometimes people seem to find a bit of extra insulation is needed, or to add a strap or something to keep the lid more firmly closed. Opinions are divided on stirring the mash, certainly you wouldn't attack it like when douging in or between batch sparges but some people prefer to leave it alone whilst others may give it a gentle mix to even the heat out. I've tried both and haven't really noticed a difference so I tend to leave it alone but maybe stir it gently part way in if it was a bit higher or lower than I intended, just to even it up.
I think you have the fly sparging about right for your setup, just needs a few tweaks. If you've got water over the grains then a fine shower head should be great, essentially a sort of manual version of a sparge arm. All you need to achieve really is that the warm sparging liquor is distributed evenly over the grain and without disturbing it or drilling channels through, which would let it bypass much of the grain bed.
The hybrid thing was because at one point you seemed to be draining but not filling at the same time, so I thought you may be doing a sort of combined batch and fly sparge, but actually I think you may just have been recirculating the first runnings so thats just me misunderstanding the video. You could batch sparge - that would mean topping up the mash then emptying it completely before filling again for a second rinse, as you mentiion. But unless you had a very loose (thin) mash ratio there I suspect your cool box may be a bit too small for that as it already seemed quite full just with the mash (theres a calculator here if you want to check the volumes involved in batch sparging).
80c is a good time to steep late hops for a while in some recipies/beers; its less likely to extract bitterness or to boil away flavour and aroma at that point. I think there are other reasons for not necessarily cooling as fast as possible (which most of us ignore for the sake of convenience) but I can't remember what they were. The point I wanted to get across though is that rapid cooling is useful rather than important for the beer as such - it cuts my brew day down noticably but some people just seal their boilers to avoid infection and leave them sitting to cool over night.
Yes the efficiency is a tricky thing to predict. When you know what you typically get with your setup then you can guestimate and account for it if needed with extra grain or something to make sure all will be well at the volumes of wort you require, but until you've built up a picture of how it performs its wise to keep checking the gravity of the sparge - you may need to stop before you've collected as much wort as you wanted if the gravity becomes too low.
So basically it sounds like you know what the issues were and what to do about them - AG#1 went quite well as it was so I'll bet AG #2 will be smoother still!
Cheers
kev
Yes, your heat losses during the mash aren't huge and probably pre-heating would help reduce them more. If it still drops by more than a few degreesC over say 60 mins then maybe you could wrap it in a sleeping bag or something to help - sometimes people seem to find a bit of extra insulation is needed, or to add a strap or something to keep the lid more firmly closed. Opinions are divided on stirring the mash, certainly you wouldn't attack it like when douging in or between batch sparges but some people prefer to leave it alone whilst others may give it a gentle mix to even the heat out. I've tried both and haven't really noticed a difference so I tend to leave it alone but maybe stir it gently part way in if it was a bit higher or lower than I intended, just to even it up.
I think you have the fly sparging about right for your setup, just needs a few tweaks. If you've got water over the grains then a fine shower head should be great, essentially a sort of manual version of a sparge arm. All you need to achieve really is that the warm sparging liquor is distributed evenly over the grain and without disturbing it or drilling channels through, which would let it bypass much of the grain bed.
The hybrid thing was because at one point you seemed to be draining but not filling at the same time, so I thought you may be doing a sort of combined batch and fly sparge, but actually I think you may just have been recirculating the first runnings so thats just me misunderstanding the video. You could batch sparge - that would mean topping up the mash then emptying it completely before filling again for a second rinse, as you mentiion. But unless you had a very loose (thin) mash ratio there I suspect your cool box may be a bit too small for that as it already seemed quite full just with the mash (theres a calculator here if you want to check the volumes involved in batch sparging).
80c is a good time to steep late hops for a while in some recipies/beers; its less likely to extract bitterness or to boil away flavour and aroma at that point. I think there are other reasons for not necessarily cooling as fast as possible (which most of us ignore for the sake of convenience) but I can't remember what they were. The point I wanted to get across though is that rapid cooling is useful rather than important for the beer as such - it cuts my brew day down noticably but some people just seal their boilers to avoid infection and leave them sitting to cool over night.
Yes the efficiency is a tricky thing to predict. When you know what you typically get with your setup then you can guestimate and account for it if needed with extra grain or something to make sure all will be well at the volumes of wort you require, but until you've built up a picture of how it performs its wise to keep checking the gravity of the sparge - you may need to stop before you've collected as much wort as you wanted if the gravity becomes too low.
So basically it sounds like you know what the issues were and what to do about them - AG#1 went quite well as it was so I'll bet AG #2 will be smoother still!
Cheers
kev
Kev