Movin' On Up.

[BM1]

Well I' been toolin' along at 63 - 65% mash efficiency on my batch sparges and could not get any better .Today I got 67% by paying closer attention to my grinding operations (Corona corn grinder thing) and following mash proceedures more closely (I got 72% + with BIAB but couldn't make a decent beer that way).I guess the next step is PH adjustments.Although I understand it I really don't know how to deal with it.I ordered some '5.2 Stablizer' today from LHBS.Anybody know how it works or if it does what it says?

[john mills]

5.2 magic powder is a buffer. Meaning if your mash is on either side of that magic # then it brings it back to 5.2. It locks your mash ph at 5.2. You will no longer have water styles that are hard for london ales, or soft for cheq pilsners, and the use of brewing salts is just fighting what 5.2 does, and you just may end up with a beer that tastes salty.
I'll use it if I remember to put it in. I'll basically get 1-2pts bump in efficiency when I use it.
But your brewing at 63-65 percent efficiency isn't bad. Pretty close to the 65-68 percent batch sparge norm. I think consistency is better than a batch to batch variance of efficiency across the spectrum. If you consistently are getting that range, great. You've got your process down and are good at repeatability. Now just adjust your mash bill accordingly for specific recipies and start having fun making beers of your own recipie discovering what different grains taste like.

[sirgiovanni]

You need to step mash if you want better.

[BREWsmith]

5.2 magic powder is a buffer. Meaning if your mash is on either side of that magic # then it brings it back to 5.2. It locks your mash ph at 5.2. You will no longer have water styles that are hard for london ales, or soft for cheq pilsners, and the use of brewing salts is just fighting what 5.2 does, and you just may end up with a beer that tastes salty.
I'll use it if I remember to put it in. I'll basically get 1-2pts bump in efficiency when I use it.
But your brewing at 63-65 percent efficiency isn't bad. Pretty close to the 65-68 percent batch sparge norm. I think consistency is better than a batch to batch variance of efficiency across the spectrum. If you consistently are getting that range, great. You've got your process down and are good at repeatability. Now just adjust your mash bill accordingly for specific recipies and start having fun making beers of your own recipie discovering what different grains taste like.

I've been putting 1/2 tsp of gypsum in each of my strike water and sparge water, just because. I have German Twp water which gets its water from Evansville municipal water. Would the 5.2 stabilizer be a better option?

[BM1]

Thank you for your response.I had heard about the 'salty' and it was my main concern.Looks like I need a bigger tun;I like my ales around 1.055 - 1.060 and it is hard to get enough grain and strike water in my 5 gal,round water cooler to get 6 1/2 - 7 gal. runoff.This is what suspected anyway.Maybe I can use my rectangular picnic cooler.Just was hoping that better eficiencey would mean less grain but,even if I bump it up 3 - 4%,I stiil would have trouble.
Always good answers/confermations here.Thanxalot.

[john mills]

I've never reviewed a water quality report from Evansville, but I'm sure it would only give averages. I would believe the quality would also vary greatly according to river levels. So I'm not sure what good the report would do anyway. As far as your gypsum additions, if your happy with the results, keep it up. Gypsum provides hardness that will decrease efficiency if overutilized, and could promote tanin leaching if you over fly sparge.

I don't make any water adjusents other than charcoal filtering and occasionally using 5.2 magic powder. But true beer styles are made from the water available in their areas. So I just use what's available, and brew to the Ohio Valley style.

[sirgiovanni]

I use Evansville water with Gypsum and lean toward a finer grind.
I achieve 78% efficiency on almost all brew days (76% on a abnormally low day) but I can tell you with 20 years experience that this efficiency is almost entirely due to the step mash.

There are basic things like controlling your grind and Ph that must take place. But until you start experimenting with step mashes, you will never know how much you can get out of the limited space in your mash tun. I had the exact same space problems in my mash pot until I honed in on my steps and types/ratios of adjuncts.

The most important step which will gain you more efficiency than anything else is what is termed with some disagreement as the dough-in. The bottom line is that it allows the grains to fully absorb the water and for the grain to then make their own Ph balancing act before you start conversion or worry about what you need to do for Ph yourself. You are simply not fully converted your mash. That's all.

All I can tell you is that I gave step mashing up for nearly a year, determined to shorten my mash schedule, and I suffered a massive efficiency loss without the step (and in my opinion, an inferior ale). The day I began using it again, my beer fermeneted better and my mash efficiency increased back to normal. Your grains are fully modified so you can move from a dough-in to mash as quickly as you want or can. But you need that step if you're limited on space.

[Michael Erwin]

I found a huge 60-qt Igloo cooler on sale at Target last spring for $18, which is how I got into all-grain. I'm getting 73% pretty consistently now that I'm crushing the grains myself. I've set the barley crusher pretty tight, .25", but I'm batch sparging, so not as worried about stuck sparges. I use Evv water and 5.2.

If a step mash is used to bring the ph in line before conversion, what's the difference between using 5.2 and doing a step mash?

[sirgiovanni]

A step mash will help get Ph lined out without adding as much artificial stuff to your beer and you can manage body/attenuation, and mash efficiency better.

I kegged a blond last night that the yeast was rated for up to 80% attenuation and I hit 86.5%.

[BM1]

sirgiovanni said:
A step mash will help get Ph lined out without adding as much artificial stuff to your beer and you can manage body/attenuation, and mash efficiency better.

Ok,now I'm really upset.I did the step mash thing and even though it didn't chug along all that smoothly (calculating infusions was a 'B'),then I screwed up the mash out and it stuck .Well, I got through that without stinkin' too badly.The real kicker is that this was to be a partial mash (so's I wouldn't have so much grain to work with.Plus I wanted some brown sugar for flavor)and I hit my SG dead on without adding the pound of brown sugar.I was expecting 65 - 67% and got 71%. .

Anyway,just kidding about being upset.Thanks for the tip,wish I had tried that before.I might even do better after I get the hang of it.
but,then somebody'll say fly sparge and here we go again.

[sirgiovanni]

Stop by or call if you want to talk about it, I can try and help you better if you want to try it again. You should experience less of a stuck sparge if you do this right as well. What was your first temp? You want it to be between 100 and 115, depending on what you are trying to do with the first step. As you raise and pass through the protein rest stages, it will give you an added benefit for other things, including not needing rice hulls, which I have never had to use. Oh, and did I not mention that I fly sparge?

[BM1]

Gee,so soon?(you said fly sparge )I don't even have step mashing down yet,but when I do,I'll probably move on up to fly-ing.FYI,my 1st temperature was 108*f-15 min. rest,I skipped the protien rest because I flubbed the infusion.I hit my sacharification rest dead on at 150*-30 min. rest,then went to 156*-30 min.
The biggest trouble I had was keeping track of how much water was in the tun(measure better next time).Now that I got a taste of it...I believe I'll have a better go next time,I think I like it.
Also,thanks for the invitation.Mabe,next time you brew,I could come help out and you could show me that fly sparge.I'm sick of needing a dump truck load of grain to get a batch going .