Batch Sparge and Temp

[av8er79]

I brew all grain with a 10 gallon water cooler mash tun mostly 5 gallon batches. This morning I decided to do a 10 gallon batch and two questions were raised. The first one I have had for some time. I batch sparge and brewsmith advises to wash with a water temp of 168 so my first question is:

• Can I wash with water hotter than that? All the way up to boiling? Why or why not.
  
• Secondly I ended up with not as much preboil volume as planned in my boil kettle and did not have some heated water so I simply used hot tap water (110F) for the last 1.5 gallons. Is this ok? why or why not?

 

[stpug]

1) Yes, you can sparge with hotter water than that in batch sparging. You should be safe up into the mid 180s, and potentially even up to boiling but your water chemistry becomes a little more important.

2) Plain tap water is probably okay; filtered is better; campden-treated filtered or tap is even better. The potential pitfalls of plain tap water is primarily chlorine and/or chloramines leading to off tastes in your finished beer.

 

[LLBrewer]

I brew all grain with a 10 gallon water cooler mash tun mostly 5 gallon batches. This morning I decided to do a 10 gallon batch and two questions were raised. The first one I have had for some time. I batch sparge and brewsmith advises to wash with a water temp of 168 so my first question is:

• Can I wash with water hotter than that? All the way up to boiling? Why or why not.
  
• Secondly I ended up with not as much preboil volume as planned in my boil kettle and did not have some heated water so I simply used hot tap water (110F) for the last 1.5 gallons. Is this ok? why or why not?

I've read somewhere in these forums that the temperature of your sparge water is not important when batch sparging. Of course as stpug pointed out, the water chemistry IS important.

 

[A2HB]

Hot tap water contains more TDS (total dissolved solids) than cold water so unless your water supply is already optimal I would stick to cold water when topping up if possible. The main problem you could potentially face is the water having too much sodium or other unwanted minerals in it. And of course the chlorine/chloramine levels. Always wanna top up with cold water (if you have to do that)

 

[av8er79]

So, what is the reason for batch sparging with warm (168F) water instead of simply pouring cold tap water on for the wash?

 

[revco]

So, what is the reason for batch sparging with warm (168F) water instead of simply pouring cold tap water on for the wash?

The warmer water is better at making sure the grains are fully cleared of the sugars we're looking for. Think about dissolving sugar into water...it works much better and more efficiently at higher temps than lower.

I've under and overshot my temps on the sparge a dozen times or more, it hasn't seemed to make a major difference to me. My mash efficiency might take a minor hit on an undershoot, but there are too many variables from batch to batch to say one way or the other. Being in the ballpark is usually good enough, at least for me.

 

[peterj]

Some people say warm water rinses more sugars out (though I remember reading about people doing tests that show no difference in efficiency). Also it reduces the time it takes to bring the wort to a boil.

I just googled it and found the test I was remembering: http://braukaiser.com/blog/blog/2009/05/12/cold-water-sparging/.

 

[Homercidal]

Yup, Kai did some experiments on that. 168 is considered safe to sparge with to not extract tannins, although I think time and pH are factors as well, so for batch sparging where you know your sparge water is low enough in pH, and you aren't letting it sit too long, you could be safe sparging hotter.

I've sparged at 150 ish because that's what my leftover water temp was, and it was fine, but I've never measured the efficiency to know how much of a difference it actually makes. I think stirring makes a bigger difference than water temp.

 

[doug293cz]

Think about dissolving sugar into water...it works much better and more efficiently at higher temps than lower.

It's a common misconception that the higher solubility of sugar at higher temperatures means that higher temperature sparging helps dissolve more sugars from the grain.

In mashing, the sugar is created by enzyme action on starch that has been dissolved in the wort. All sugar is in solution as it is created. There is no undissolved sugar that needs to be dissolved.

Someone else has already posted a link (but here it is again, anyway) in this thread to Kai's experiment that showed no significant difference in efficiency when batch sparging with hot water vs. cold water.

The most important thing in batch sparging is to stir the mash well before running off the wort.

Brew on

 

[av8er79]

great info! thanks guys and gals