Horrible Efficiency Drop

[nickhorvath12]

Last night I brewed this Belgian styled recipe that I threw together at the LHBS:

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Batch size: 3.5 gallons Boil size: 4.01 gallons

6.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) Bel (3.0 SRM) Grain 69.5 %
1.00 lb Munich (Dingemans) (5.0 SRM) Grain 11.6 %
1.00 lb Wheat, Torrified (2.0 SRM) Grain 11.6 %
0.13 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 1.5 %

1.00 oz Goldings, East Kent [6.90%] (60 min) Hops 30.9 IBU
0.50 oz Hallertauer [4.00%] (20 min) Hops 5.4 IBU
0.50 oz Saaz [3.40%] (20 min) Hops 4.6 IBU
0.25 oz Hallertauer [4.00%] (7 min) Hops 1.2 IBU
0.25 oz Saaz [3.40%] (7 min) Hops 1.0 IBU
0.25 oz Hallertauer [4.00%] (0 min) Hops -
0.25 oz Saaz [3.40%] (0 min) Hops -

0.50 lb Candi Sugar, Clear (0.5 SRM) Sugar 5.8 %

1 Pkgs SafBrew Ale (DCL Yeast #S-33) Yeast-Ale
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Last week I brewed my Pilsner-Ale and hit 72% efficiency while making a mistake that I realized to late - I sparged with more water than I could fit in the kettle for the boil. Last night I brewed the above recepie and when all was said and done, I missed my OG by 20 points!!!

Nothing in my general procedure had changed, although I missed my strike temp by 2 degrees but I came in at 152 and thought that would be fine. My mashout only made it to the low 160s, but I can't see how this alone caused my efficiency to drop to 50%. Luckily I was going for a strong beer, otherwise I'd be drinking 3 gallons of Belgian O'Douls in a month.

Any ideas on what could have went wrong?? The only thing I can think of is that there could have been something wrong with the crush, which I had never had done before at this LHBS, but could that have had such a powerful effect on my efficiency?

[Mad Scientist]

What was the expected O.G., and the actual O.G.?

[nickhorvath12]

According to beersmith:

Estimated Original Gravity: 1.069 SG (1.055-1.080 SG) Measured Original Gravity: 1.048 SG

I'm still at a loss for ideas as to where all of my sugars went. I checked for conversion at 30 minutes and the iodine didn't change colors, so I assumed full conversion was done at 60 minutes. I stirred at dough-in, mash-out, before draining the tun the first time, after adding the sparge water and before draining the sparge water.

[hooky]

I've found that my efficiency will nose dive on my system if I sparge with anything less than 190* water.

[nickhorvath12]

I'm going to have to try that, because on this batch my sparge water was 172 but only raised the temp in the tun to the low 160s. I'm about to do my 4th all grain this weekend, and I hope to get these problems ironed out so I can cut the brew time down a little.

[Vienna Lager]

What temp did you measure your gravity at?

[nickhorvath12]

Originally posted by Vienna Lager
What temp did you measure your gravity at?

It was 1.044 at 87 degrees, and I used beersmith to adjust for temperature, giving me 1.048. My pre-boil gravity was 1.044 (after adjustment) at around 4 gallons, so even if I boiled off a full gallon, I would still have missed the estimated OG by 10 points.

[hooky]

Originally posted by nickhorvath12
I'm going to have to try that, because on this batch my sparge water was 172 but only raised the temp in the tun to the low 160s. I'm about to do my 4th all grain this weekend, and I hope to get these problems ironed out so I can cut the brew time down a little.

I'll also mash a little thicker and add some of my hot sparge water and give it a good stir before I start the vorlauf. I've gone from around 50-53% to 71% on my last batch. I think it's just a matter of making incremental changes to your process until you have that Eureka moment.

Keep plugging away and you'll get there. I know I eventually will. :)

[nickhorvath12]

Well I successfully completed my 4th all grain batch last night (3rd in 2 weeks), and my efficiency problems have completely disappeared. I hit 75% even after diluting the final volume from 3.5 gallons to 3.75 gallons. My pre-boil gravity was much higher than I expected and predicted so I figured I'd stretch it out a little bit.

The only differences I can tell from this batch and the last was that I overshot my temps on this one, mashing at 158 - sparging with 180+ water. Also that the grain was from austinhomebrew and not from the LHBS. I'd like to hope that the crush at the LHBS was not the problem because of the convenience and the supporting local business factors, but it is hard to overlook. My next brew will be an american wheat that I will throw together at the store again and see if I can get similar extraction rates to last nights batch.

[Mad Scientist]

actually, the crush can be a problem. i had a extraction issue, b/c the brew store I used bought a new mill.

I bought my own mill and problem solved.

[BrewDog]

Just be careful mashing above 170. You will extract tannins and end up with an astringent beer.

[nickhorvath12]

Originally posted by Boerne Brew
I bought my own mill and problem solved.

I'm saving my pennies for a Barley Crusher, which seems to me to be the best deal when comparing cost with quality and features.


Originally posted by BrewDog
Just be careful mashing above 170. You will extract tannins and end up with an astringent beer.

Ive been having trouble getting my beersmith set up correctly to give me accurate strike water temps. This may be due to all of the different variables I have input into the program. I use a 5 gallon round plastic cooler and I pre-heat it with 100+ degree water - so I set beersmith to a 4 pound plastic cooler with .300 specific heat and set the tun temperature to 100 degrees and the grain temp to 72. I was shooting for a 154 mash temp, Beersmith told me strike water at 169.4, and I ended up with a 158-159 mash temp. But I guess now I know to aim for 3-5 degrees lower than it suggests.

[Mad Scientist]

I have never used beersmith for water temp calculations...after a couple of tries, I determined what I needed for my system (about 162 F)

BTW, I have a barleycrusher, and it works great, however, do not rule out crankandstein, they are also a quality product as good as the barleycrusher. If I had had the funding at the time, I would have gotten a three roller from them.

[hooky]

Originally posted by nickhorvath12

Ive been having trouble getting my beersmith set up correctly to give me accurate strike water temps. This may be due to all of the different variables I have input into the program. I use a 5 gallon round plastic cooler and I pre-heat it with 100+ degree water - so I set beersmith to a 4 pound plastic cooler with .300 specific heat and set the tun temperature to 100 degrees and the grain temp to 72. I was shooting for a 154 mash temp, Beersmith told me strike water at 169.4, and I ended up with a 158-159 mash temp. But I guess now I know to aim for 3-5 degrees lower than it suggests.

On my 12.5 gallon cooler, I have beersmith set to 9 lbs and .300 . I leave it at 72* grain temp and will preheat the tun with a gallon of boiling water. I goofed around with it quite a bit to finally get it to that point. It's not dead on, but it's within a degree now.

If you decrease the tun weight or raise your grain temps, your strike water temps will go down. I also found that I could get temp variances of up to 5 degrees from the middle to the corners if I didnt stir enough before taking temps. My tun is square, so I don't know if that would make a difference in your case or not.

[nickhorvath12]

Originally posted by hooky
I leave it at 72* grain temp and will preheat the tun with a gallon of boiling water.

I'm just curious if you set your mash tun temperature to 212 or do you leave it at room temp?

Originally posted by Boerne Brew
BTW, I have a barleycrusher, and it works great, however, do not rule out crankandstein, they are also a quality product as good as the barleycrusher.

Everywhere I see crankandsteins offered, the fully adjustable ones seem to be closer to 200 dollars than 100 dollars when factoring in the hopper and base and crank. I'm going through less than 10 pounds of grain per batch so as long as I can get a good crush for a cheap price I will be a happy man.

[hooky]

I'm not even sure where to find the mash tun temp setting. I haven't changed that.:confused:

[nickhorvath12]

It's in the mash profile section. You hit the details button and you are able to input the grain temperature and mash tun temperature, along with some other info.

[hooky]

duh! I'm losing my mind.

No. I keep it at 72 also.

[Mad Scientist]

Originally posted by nickhorvath12
I'm just curious if you set your mash tun temperature to 212 or do you leave it at room temp?



Everywhere I see crankandsteins offered, the fully adjustable ones seem to be closer to 200 dollars than 100 dollars when factoring in the hopper and base and crank. I'm going through less than 10 pounds of grain per batch so as long as I can get a good crush for a cheap price I will be a happy man.

I think that was for the 'detent' adjustable version. Their product, the adjustable version that you have to use feeler gauges to set the gap is a simiar price to the barley cruecher. (~150ish)

[BrewDog]

Originally posted by nickhorvath12
<snip/>. I use a 5 gallon round plastic cooler and I pre-heat it with 100+ degree water - so I set beersmith to a 4 pound plastic cooler with .300 specific heat and set the tun temperature to 100 degrees and the grain temp to 72. I was shooting for a 154 mash temp, Beersmith told me strike water at 169.4, and I ended up with a 158-159 mash temp. But I guess now I know to aim for 3-5 degrees lower than it suggests. Look for my comments and PCaravan's comments in this post (http://www.realbeer.com/discussions/showthread.php?s=&threadid=14741&highlight=preheat). They might help you dial in hitting your strike temp. Several of us here do it this way, and it works pretty well.

I set Promash up to have 0 for the mash tun heat value. Then when the water is exactly at the prescribed temp in the tun before adding the grist, the calculation comes out so that the mash is right at the desired temp.

HTH-

[hooky]

Brewdog, do you have a direct fired tun or are you using a cooler?

[BrewDog]

I'm using a 10 gal round cooler (Long story - I no longer have my single tier system - SWMBO says its too BIG, so a friend of Grog's now has it. Sigh.)

[hooky]

Sorry to throw salt.

[BrewDog]

No problem. I still have the pumps and 2 of the kegs. I built a small burner stand out of angle iron and it works well. SWMBO is also open to me building a 3 tier out of a ladder as was discussed here a month or 2 ago.