Split AG Brew Day?

[SGTSparty]

Relatively inexperienced AG brewer here. My biggest problem on brew day is that I have a 12 mo old that requires constant supervision and SWMBO gets a bit testy if I try and brew before his bedtime and thus can't help w/ him as much. This means starting brew day at 7 pm which means I don't end up pitching my yeast about 11 or so w/ my current setup which is a bit of a drag when the little on is up at 6 am.

So my question is this: Does anyone/has anyone ever broken brew day into two days with Mashing on Day one and Boiling/cooling/pitching on Day two?

Alternatively does anyone see this being a problem? Being able to Mash on Friday and Boil/Cool/Pitch on Saturday would make my life much easier and allow me to brew more often.

 

[didinho]

overnight mash:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=525551

 

[Brewenstein]

Tell us what your equipment set up is - that may help with some suggestions.

What about getting everything ready the night before (after the little one is in bed)? Formulate recipe, calculate how much water you will need and set it out, weigh out grain and crush it, weight out hops, etc. Do anything that can be done ahead of time. Then come home from work and heat your strike water and dough it. Do a full volume mash so that there will be no sparging (again, depends on equipment). Then take care of whatever you need to do until Jr. is in bed. Then drain off the wort, boil, hop, cool and pitch. Or go no chill and pitch in the morning. In the end you still use up the same amount of time, but split it up around your family's schedule.

 

[AkBrew907]

Like mentioned knowing your equipment will be a big help. Might be able to suggest some shortcuts.

 

[Aristotelian]

I did this recently with no noticeable effect. Mashed after kids bedtime Friday evening. Put boil pot in fridge (required cleaning a lot of space and temporarily removing a shelf). Boiled first thing Saturday morning. Go for it.

 

[AkBrew907]

I'm guessing you are using a stove top or propane burner. Your situation is the main reason I went electric and bought the GrainFather. Once the mash is going I can walk away and play with kiddos or do things around the house, set a timmer and come back when it's time to sparge. Same with boil, once it's going I can walk away and just come back when my timer goes off. It made my brew days a lot more relaxing and I can spend time with the kids while I brew.

 

[SGTSparty]

My Equipment and brew day routine are pretty rudimentary but my equipment is more or less 1 Stainless Steel 8 gal pot with a ball valve, false bottom and a thermo probe which serves as Mash Tun and BK, a 5 gallon canning pot for heating sparge water/HLT. I typically heat my strike water in the 8 gallon on our normal gas range, dough in, cover and wrap with towels (its not a very thick pot). while I'm mashing I heat up my sparge water on the range in the 5 gallon canning pot. Typically I mash for 60 min, then do a manual version of a fly sparge by draining my 8 gal into a bottling bucket while adding sprage water w/ a pitcher through a strainer at a similar rate. Once its completely drained I dump the grain, remove the false bottom, rinse the pot. Then I put it on an out door propane burner and return the wort to it from the bucket. I use a 25' copper immersion chiller hooked up to a hose (I live in MI so the ground water is pretty cold) which take I'd guess 20-30 min (never really timed it) then I drain the BK into the bucket I'm using as primary through a sanitized double mesh strainer to catch debris and help aerate. I'll typically whip it for a min or two with a sanitized whisk to aerate and then pitch my yeast and put it to bed in the basement.

I know I can save some time by using my propane burner (180,000 BTU's) instead of my indoor range but I've been worried about heat loss during mashing as my pot is pretty thin and its been pretty cold plus doing it inside means I'm inside and can help out SHMBO with whatever she needs/help watch the kid.

any suggestions would be welcomed.

 

[SGTSparty]

I'm guessing you are using a stove top or propane burner. Your situation is the main reason I went electric and bought the GrainFather. Once the mash is going I can walk away and play with kiddos or do things around the house, set a timmer and come back when it's time to sparge. Same with boil, once it's going I can walk away and just come back when my timer goes off. It made my brew days a lot more relaxing and I can spend time with the kids while I brew.

Yeah, that would be the ultimate answer but I don't have the cash to invest in that type of set up