Thinner Mash?

[BansheeRider]

Hey guys I have a quick question as I will be mashing in a couple hours. I am making the centennial blonde recipe which has 9 pounds total grain. Beersmith is telling me to mash with 3 gallons of strike water and sparge with 5.2 gallons. My problem is the pot I use to heat up strike/sparge water is only 5 gallons, not big enough to heat up sparge water. Soooo what if I mashed with more strike water, such as 4 gallons and then sparged with 4 gallons? How would a thinner mash affect my beer? I could always sparge in two steps or use 2 pots to heat up my sparge water, however, I am used to lower sparge volumes and batch sparging all in one step. Any suggestions would be great.

 

[masskrug]

I usually mash with more than I sparge with. I don't think it makes a difference as long as you get your predicted boil volume and sugars out.

 

[BansheeRider]

I usually mash with more than I sparge with. I don't think it makes a difference as long as you get your predicted boil volume and sugars out.

I normally have a higher volume mash too. This time beersmith is saying otherwise. Basically I just want to add an extra gallon to the mash so I can use one pot to heat sparge water and sparge all in one step like I normally do.

 

[Cbaddad]

Adjust your grain to water ratio in the profile of beersmith to 1.5 fromt he default of 1.25 and it may get you close to what you are thinking about.

 

[BansheeRider]

Adjust your grain to water ratio in the profile of beersmith to 1.5 fromt he default of 1.25 and it may get you close to what you are thinking about.

I like it set at 1.25. But never before has it recommended a higher volume sparge. Maybe it's because the grain bill is so low.

So if adding an extra gallon to the mash won't hurt anything then that's what I'll do.

 

[miguy96b]

I personally always adjust my ratio to get an equal (or close to equal) mash and sparge amount. I think Palmer and some others recommend trying to get those equal for a better extraction. I could be wrong though since I'm still newish to AG brewing.

 

[BansheeRider]

I personally always adjust my ratio to get an equal (or close to equal) mash and sparge amount. I think Palmer and some others recommend trying to get those equal for a better extraction. I could be wrong though since I'm still newish to AG brewing.

Cool. I am new to AG too, this will be my 4th batch. I am also only 1/4 way through Palmers book. I still have lots to learn

 

[Cbaddad]

You can go up to 1.5 and actually get even better efficiency a lot of times. Batch or fly?

 

[BansheeRider]

You can go up to 1.5 and actually get even better efficiency a lot of times. Batch or fly?

Batch....

 

[BansheeRider]

I ended up doing a 4 gallon mash and getting 3 gallons first runnings. Then I batched sparged with 4 gallons and ended up with 6.75 total pre-boil volume. I got 85% efficiency so I'm happy.

 

[RM-MN]

I ended up doing a 4 gallon mash and getting 3 gallons first runnings. Then I batched sparged with 4 gallons and ended up with 6.75 total pre-boil volume. I got 85% efficiency so I'm happy.

Whoohooo! You did great. Just for a little thought, people have tried different temperature of sparge water and guess what? You could have used cold water and gotten nearly that same efficiency. Shocked yet? You also could have used more water in the mash and less in the sparge and done nearly as well. Most of what we "know" about beer is being challenged with all the homebrewers trying things. The only real certainty is the mash temperature because that is a physical requirement for the action of the enzymes.:rockin:

 

[unionrdr]

I typically mash at 152-153F for light colored beers,& 155-156F for darker ones. bigger flavors seem to like slightly higher mash temps. But I use 2 gallons of water to 5-6lbs of grains for my PM beers. It gives a soup or stew-like consistency. Then I sparge with 1.5 gallons of 170F water to get my 3.5 gallon boil volume. You have to set mash & sparge volumes in Beersmith. I had to play around with that stuff for a while though. I guess it's not too hard,but it is rather in-depth.