Pre-heating mashtun

[quote=“zwiller”]I try to save money as much as the next guy, but $20 for brewing software is a no brainer…

You measure thermal mass once and plug into your defaults. That’s it. No more guessing, no more math. Do it right first time and forget about it. I have.

If you are not hitting your temps with software, the thermal mass figure is off. There are a few rare exceptions for brewing outside in 99F vs. 20F weather, but .

Thermal mass figures for the rubbermaid/gott products are known as well as others. IE - My 50qt Igloo Ice Cube is (.23). It is a little high but it IS WHITE…[/quote]

no its my lazyness to figure out the exact temp of grain and mash tun. Tun sits in my garage which fluctuates like crazy, same with grain once I have it crushed sitting in different places it is a different temp
SO I just go a little hotter than what it says stir or add ice(rarely) and I hit my temp 99% of the time

but +1 to software, whatever I can do to make my brew day quicker easier and 20 bucks is a no brainer

BPB, that’s cool if you want to roll your own… You’re right, I too made great beers with the old 11 degree rule for years before brewing software or the internet. Still have the notes in a binder to prove it.

Use your favorite tool to hit your strike. Whether it be software, manual calcs, or previous batch notes. Bottom line: Too many great tools and resources out there than to pre-heat.

[quote=“zwiller”]BPB, that’s cool if you want to roll your own… You’re right, I too made great beers with the old 11 degree rule for years before brewing software or the internet. Still have the notes in a binder to prove it.

Use your favorite tool to hit your strike. Whether it be software, manual calcs, or previous batch notes. Bottom line: Too many great tools and resources out there than to pre-heat.[/quote]

+1 to no pre-heating, life’s too short and too many beers to brew :wink:

So wait…I noticed the thermal box on ProMash. How does that work? Because I’ve been getting it calculated that I need 168F of water, but I go ahead and go to 172F to get the actual temp I need (like 152).

That why I always got hotter. You need exact temp of grain mash tun and thermal mass of tun.
Any little discrpepency will throw your temp off.
How I keep my grain and tun makes no sense to run around getting all these different temps when I can just go a little hot and stir or add ice

Bucket Heater on a timer. Brings the entire mass of water and cooler to the desired temp slowly over time. Mash in just minutes after waking up.

I dont have any fancy calculations for it but it works.

Bucket Heater? Is that something you made or did you buy it?

CAUTION: The bucket heater has to be fully immersed to the top of the heating element, so it may not work well for rectangular coolers as mash tuns - unless you fill it with more water than needed and drain down to level desired.

any got a link to the bucket heaters your using

[quote=“grainbelt”][quote=“zwiller”]Thermal mass of tun + promash = FTW

willharden, chances are the thermal mass for your cooler is already known. There’s also freeware for this stuff.[/quote]

thats in beersmith to, although it gets me close I have found heating a little bit warmer than what is says fro strike water alwasy got me better results[/quote]

You can adjust the thermal constant for your mashtun in Beersmith. I’ve done that after a bit of trial & error, and now it is within a degree, and that’s probably attributable to my grain/tun “room temperature” setting being off.

Commercially available:

http://www.amazon.com/MARSHALLTOWN-Prem ... B000BDB4UG

Homemade:

http://www.cedarcreeknetworks.com/heatstick.htm http://hbd.org/pcalinsk/HeatStk3.htm

[quote=“Silentknyght”][quote=“grainbelt”][quote=“zwiller”]Thermal mass of tun + promash = FTW

willharden, chances are the thermal mass for your cooler is already known. There’s also freeware for this stuff.[/quote]

thats in beersmith to, although it gets me close I have found heating a little bit warmer than what is says fro strike water alwasy got me better results[/quote]

You can adjust the thermal constant for your mashtun in Beersmith. I’ve done that after a bit of trial & error, and now it is within a degree, and that’s probably attributable to my grain/tun “room temperature” setting being off.[/quote]

yeah, Just to much of a pain for me to then find the exact temperature of grain and tun when I can just go a little hot and hit my temp. Run into the garage get temp of tun, run to where ever my grain is sitting get that temp and redo all my calculations