BIAB

I get 77% efficiency on my BIAB setup. I crush pretty fine because there isn't an issue of stuck sparge with BIAB. I mash for 60 min and Mash Out at 168 for ten min. After Mash Out, I raise the bag and let the majority "drip" out. Then place the bag full of wet grains in another pot/bucket and squeeze the snot out of it. Bring to a boil and then add the "additional wort" I squeezed out of the bag, discard grains and boil as usual.

Here are a couple of helpful calculators for the process:
Amount of water to start with: http://classist.net/biab-calculator/
Temperature of water before mashing in: http://www.brewheads.com/strike.php


Good luck.

 

I've tried the BIAB method and the efficiency is pretty crappy. I spend a lot of time trying to get the wort out of the bag and it kind of made a mess. Of course, that could be me being really pissed off while trying to brew that way and screwing things up... but yeah there's something about a real mash tun and a good sparge...

 

If your OG comes out a little low, don't sweat it. Obvious if it comes out 30 points low, there's an issue, but "a little" low isn't a big deal. TBH most of my all grain batches are coming out a little low, and I haven't figured out why yet. The beers taste just fine tho.

 

I find this statement interesting. Perhaps, instead, your calculations are coming out a little high? That is, perhaps your system and/or process are doing what they do, but your calculations aren't yet dialed in?

 

Well beersmith II is doing my calculations. I haven't dialed into my system perfectly yet. I'm working on it.

I don't know what the grind is on my grains. I've been getting them ground at the LHBS where I'm ordering them. I suspect they could go a little finer on their grind but I base that on a rather inaccurate estimation performed by my eye.

Sooner or later I'll have my own grinder and can set it how I like it.

 

What's you assumed Mash Efficiency set to in Beersmith?

 

WOW, Est Mash Eff 83.6% ???

That's gotta be wrong. I am not getting that much efficiency, and I know this even tho I haven't even measured it yet!

I have beersmith on two different computers, and they don't quite match on identical recipes (they are very close tho). Not sure what the other computer says, but I bet it's high too.

They're both set on whatever "default" setting the software set for the hardware setup I'm using.

The "measured mash eff" is 53.4%, and is a calculated field (not measured, I didn't put that in there).

Perhaps if I can figure out how to change it, I can dial things in closer...

Beersmith can be a pain tho.

 

And quite honestly, 1.052 seems to be a very common OG on my system, regardless of recipe (I'd say half of them are 1.052, a couple higher, a couple lower). Not sure why that is, perhaps coincidence. Recipes vary but haven't been more than 11-12 lbs grain yet.

 

It's coincidence, because you're brewing recipes with about the same amount of grains. No system both increases and decreases otherwise natural OG's to hit some arbitrary target.

But if you have been getting OGs around 1.052 with 11-12 lbs of grain into 5 gallons of wort, that's higher than the 53% efficiency you mentioned.

 

This would basically sum up my experience.

 

Well I admit I've been lazy adjusting the parameters on beersmith. It's a pain in the ass, and the program has basically allowed me to brew great beers without having to learn manual calculations. I get enough manual calculations in engineering school, which I'm well into already.

And yes, my recipes have all been around the same amounts of grains. at 12 lbs with 4 gallons strike water, my mash tun is full to the top. It's only five gallons. I think I'm close to my limit for five gallon batches unless I reduce the water/grain ratios (which I'd rather not, at least not by much). I'm going to upgrade soon, but the beer shed/man cave/brewhaus has to be completed first.

Mind you I'm quite happy with my beers. I've refined my process quite a bit (next batch will be batch 12 of all grain). I haven't been brewing highly hopped beers, and yet they still come out tasting good, without glaring faults or obvious flaws. Thus, I can see that hiding behind a lot of hops to cover flaws isn't necessary using the system I have now, which I consider to mean that I'm doing something right.

Not that there's not room for improvement. I doubt I've brewed a medal winner yet. A couple have probably been pretty close to contending for at least a bronze in a small show. The "best" beer I've brewed yet, IMO, is still the cascade/willamette IPA that was actually partial mash, not all grain.

Soon we'll have a bigger mash tun. I am planning a PtE clone soon, that will probably test the upgrade when it happens. Money's not the issue on such small infrastructure, it's the time and effort of finishing the brewhaus

I will work on the beersmith thing.

 

Keep in mind when calculating your water volumes if you are squeezing the bag to set the volume of water absorbed by grain very low. The wort you are squeezing out of the bag is the water that would normally stay soaked into the grain when using a traditional mash tun set up. This is probably not a big deal if you are making five gallon or larger batches but on smaller batches it will have a greater effect on post-boil volume (and as a result gravity and hop character). It is easily adjusted in your set up configuration either way.

 

Adjust your pre-boil volume if needed, take a gravity reading at that point and adjust with some dme. Other than that, biab is pretty easy. Like others have said, the finer the crush and sparging, squeezing and doing a "mash out" will help increase your eff.