Grain Efficiency?

[Pale Ales and Such]

Hello,

I’m going to be making the jump from extract to all grain with the BIAB method. I’m going to start small with a 1 gallon batch and I get my grains from a local brew supply that crush it for me. With that, I’ve been reading about grain efficiency. What I don’t understand is how to measure it.

I currently use brewers friend as my software and I see that efficiency does affect OG, but it’s not clear to what I want for my efficiency. I am going to try a custom recipe where I’m expecting the ABV to be about 6.5%, OG of 1.062 but this is with a 75% grain efficiency. If I update the program to 100% efficiency, the ABV jumps to over 8% with a OG of 1.083.

My questions are:

1. when I use the software and build my recipes, should I keep the grain efficiency at 100% or should I leave it at maybe 75%?

2. For measuring grain efficiency, when should I measure the gravity? It seems to
me that when I take the measurement of the OG, this will also determine my grain efficiency.

3. If I find my grain efficiency is low (let’s say 60% at OG reading), what can I do to increase it at that time?

4. Any other advice around Grain efficiency I should be aware about?

thanks for any help inadvance!

 

[doug293cz]

Start here. If you have questions after understanding what's in the link, ask them here.

Brew on

 

[Miraculix]

The efficiency you are looking at is the efficiency describing how many percent of the grain sugar will end up in your wort.

This varies between systems and between the desired ogs. The higher the og, the lower the efficiency gets.

The only way to figure this out for your system is to brew
a beer and to measure the gravity of the resulting wort. You hack the volume of the wort and the og of it into the software and it will tell you the efficiency.

75% is a good point to start with as a guesstimation. For biab you can start with 80%.

 

[RM-MN]

3. If I find my grain efficiency is low (let’s say 60% at OG reading), what can I do to increase it at that time?

The quality of the milling of the grain is the biggest factor in mash efficiency. If you only get 60% with BIAB, get your own mill and buy grains unmilled in bulk. A cheap Corona style mill will quickly pay for itself with the savings in the cost of the grain and the amount of grains needed as your efficiency goes up. Here is one that is identical to what I use:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Ktaxon-G...r6xFn2dgo-joZPEJvzRoCo8cQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

 

[madscientist451]

I’m going to be making the jump from extract to all grain with the BIAB method. I’m going to start small with a 1 gallon batch and I get my grains from a local brew supply that crush it for me.

1. when I use the software and build my recipes, should I keep the grain efficiency at 100% or should I leave it at maybe 75%?

2. For measuring grain efficiency, when should I measure the gravity? It seems to
me that when I take the measurement of the OG, this will also determine my grain efficiency.

3. If I find my grain efficiency is low (let’s say 60% at OG reading), what can I do to increase it at that time?

4. Any other advice around Grain efficiency I should be aware about?

thanks for any help inadvance!

One of the issues you may have with 1 gallon BIAB batches is maintaining your mash temperature. I would suggest going to 2.5 gallon batches, you can just cut 5 gallon recipes in half and you'll have enough thermal mass to hold your mash temp.
Answers:
1. Leave the software efficiency at 75%
2. Don't worry about efficiency numbers when you are brewing, keep it simple and focus on your gravity reading, use a hydrometer to measure the gravity. Pull a sample with about 5 minutes left in the boil, chill it down in an ice bath and get your reading.
3. Keep some DME on hand to toss in if your gravity is low. Use brewing software to determine how much to add. You can also use sugar/honey or a comination of DME and sugar, but note that using sugar will change the body and mouthfeel of the beer somewhat. I've added honey to a low gravity batch and the beer came out better! So sometimes mistakes work out for you in the end.
After you get a few brews done, you'll be confident about hitting your numbers and can skip this step, but you should still take a gravity reading when you put the wort in the fermentor.
4. Go ahead and brew a simple batch, don't worry about it too much, make notes and adjust your grain/fermentables for the next batch.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Maintaining mash temperature for a 1 gal batch is pretty much a "solved problem" with multiple solutions (preheat an oven to around 160F and put the mash in the oven; wrap the sides of the kettle in reflectix & cover the lid with with a towel; use a sleeping bag for insulation, ...).

 

[Pale Ales and Such]

Wow, all this information is amazing! Thank you all for your wisdom here!