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New AG Brewer, 1 quick question

Mashing
#1

Recently my wife overheard me comment to a friend that I was thinking about building a MT and taking the AG plunge.

I have about a dozen successful extract batches under my belt.

Low and behold, last week for my birthday, I have a NB 5 gallon deluxe all grain system at my house, along with a Sweet Stout Kit, Denny’s Rye IPA, a Cream Ale kit and a 10g brew pot with ball valve. (I have a great wife)

I brewed the Cream Ale kit last night and it went smoothly, there are some process areas that I need to streamline but I think I have the gist.

I am reviewing the Denny’s kit instructions and is this possible to batch sparge in the 5 gallon cooler. I will not be able to get the grain and 1.5 qts/lb of strike water into the cooler. Would fly sparging work for this batch? I do not want to hurt her feelings and get a bigger cooler. Does anyone have any suggestions.

Thanks in Advance.

#2

Mash with as much water as you can comfortably fit in the MT, then split the sparge volume in half - you’ll get a little efficiency boost, too.

#3

Unfortunatly, with this recipe having a grain bill of 16lbs you would need to mash at 0.9qts/Lb, which is a little low. I am not saying you can’t do it, but you will need to make sure you hit your strike temp right on, as you will not have any room to add more water. I would also suggest fly sparging, although that could cause problems with such a thick mash, although I think you may have the same problem batch sprging also. If you do batch sparge this batch, with such a full mash tun, you would need to do 3 sparges after draining the first running to get to a 6 gallon preboil amount.

Mash in with 14.4qts
then fly sparge to your preboil volume

OR add an addition 7 qts sparge water, wait 10 minutes and drain, repeat 2 more times to reach your preboil volume.

Here is a very helpful calculator BTW.
Mash Volume Calculator
http://rackers.org/calcs.shtml/

#4

Thanks for the quick replies. I think that I will do one more batch to get my process down and then tackle the Rye IPA.

#5

I’ll say! The big question is, was she a great wife before this, or did this push her over the goal line?

Kidding.

Enjoy the new gear. With a little adaptation and innovation, you’ll be brewing terrific beers with your AG kit.

FT

#6

Remembered another technique you can use if the grain bill is too big - do a “reiterated mash”. Mash half the grain as normal, then use the resulting wort to mash the second half of the grain. Adds maybe 90 minutes but you get to mash twice in one day! :wink:

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