Will my mash tun drain correctly?

[Brewmex41]

So I had a 5 gallon igloo mlt, and I recently bought a 70 qt Coleman Xtreme cooler. The igloo water cooler could only fit a 9" false bottom, so that's what I have. I'm curious if I should leave my false bottom in the center of the cooler, or move it a little closer to the ball valve.
I cut some 3/8" plastic tube and wrapped that around the false bottom to help keep grain from getting under the FB.

 

[Brewmex41]

Stupid Android app. Not sure why the pic posted twice, now I can't delete one of them.

 

[dmashl]

you could buy a water supply hose, pull the SS braid off, and use that as a filter.

 

[Brewmex41]

But I already have the false bottom lol. I realize the owner of my LHBS probably wanted me to spend more money at the store, but I havent had issues with it before.

 

[jmichaeldesign]

I assume you're batch sparging. It should work fine. Maybe not the best. But it will work.

Fly sparging it may not work great but I'm not sure as I've never tried it.

 

[estricklin]

I assume you're batch sparging. It should work fine. Maybe not the best. But it will work.

Fly sparging it may not work great but I'm not sure as I've never tried it.

Totally agree with this, it's a point many people miss. If you have a GREAT false bottom, by all means fly sparge. If you don't have the ideal setup, you can still get good efficiency but you may need to batch sparge to get it. Your setup is good enough you probably could fly sparge, but I'm kinda doubt it. I think it's a lot better than a stainless braid or a pvc manifold that's for sure.

 

[Brewmex41]

I'm not comfy fly sparging yet, I typically batch sparge with two sparge additions. I just up my grain bill to counteract the lower efficiency.
This will be a new setup, however. I traded some metal fab work for a full keg, that I plasma cut the top off. So I'm not sure how the larger MLT/BK will effect brewhouse efficientcy. I guess we will see in a couple of days lol.

 

[MedicMang]

I have this cooler as a mash tun. I use a SS braid though. Because of the weird dip in the plastic by the drain, I wouldn't think your false bottom would be effective. You may have to place it in the middle, where it is flat, to get it off of that cavern near the drain port (ball valve).

 

[Brewmex41]

Right now its in the middle of the cooler. I wrapped the edges in 3/8" plastic tubing to help keep the FB snug against the mash tun floor, so grain couldn't get under the FB.

 

[mikescooling]

Yes the shorter the better. You could even prop one side of the cooler a little higher to get better drainage. The air in the tubing may make it and the false bottom float up. I started brewing fly sparging, then moved to batch sparging. Batch sparging is so much faster and gives you the chance to mix the mash again. If you have a keggle why don't you set it up for use? IMHO keggle MLT is much better than a cooler.

 

[Brewmex41]

If I ever get my hands on another keg, I will, but all I have now is a 30 qt turkey fryer and i don't think I've had a brew day where I didn't boil over at least a tiny bit.

 

[birdley123]

Brewmex,

FWIW, I have very close to the same setup; I started with a bazooka screen, but like you I thought I'd be leaving alot behind/below, so I went out and spent $10 on 1/2"cpvc and made a manifold. SWEET! Took awhile to make the zillions of cuts, then to clean em up, but it leave nothing behind, because it sits ON the bottom. Best thing I've made yet, DIY speaking... Good luck

 

[Brewmex41]

Brewmex,

FWIW, I have very close to the same setup; I started with a bazooka screen, but like you I thought I'd be leaving alot behind/below, so I went out and spent $10 on 1/2"cpvc and made a manifold. SWEET! Took awhile to make the zillions of cuts, then to clean em up, but it leave nothing behind, because it sits ON the bottom. Best thing I've made yet, DIY speaking... Good luck

Ok so I'm going to give the false bottom a try, and if my efficiency goes to hell, I'll try a pipe manifold, I just like the idea of the FB

So if I do that, should I plumb the false bottom into my keggle? I know I'd need the high heat resiatant tubing to run from the FB to the ball valve.