Me again with another question. I brewed a hefeweizen today (Weldwerks recipe) and the target OG was 1055. I nailed it at 1054... at 4 gallons instead of 5. Using a grain bill ABV calculator this means my efficiency is 60%. How can I improve this? It was mentioned before that I should get a bigger kettle (I am using a 5 gallon one), which I have not done yet - They are over 100 euros where I live, and I just upgraded a lot of equipment. I milled the grain at the second-finest setting. Anything else I can do? Thanks in advance for your patience!
It would help if you could describe your process and equipment. Then folks could give you some ideas. Also, you could take a look at a presentation on mash and brewhouse efficiency here: http://sonsofalchemy.org/library/
Hmmm. I guess fly, but with my setup I take the brew bag out of the kettle and pour 154º water through it to get the mash up to about 4.5 gallons in the kettle.
It's pretty hard to do an efficient fly sparge by manually pouring water though the grains. IMO it's impossible to dilute evenly that way. My guess is that you're leaving behind some pretty undiluted, high gravity wort in the grains. Since your kettle space is limited... do you have another kettle/pot big enough that you could use to hold sparge water and do a "dunk" sparge in? Normally, a batch sparge (which a dunk is a variant of) would not be as efficient as a properly executed fly sparge, but in your case I think it could be an improvement.
Your currency is in euros but the kettle is gals. That can be confusing. You want a 15 gal kettle when boiling because a 5 gal batch should start at 5.75/6 gals. Add .15 of water for each 1lb of grain and .10 for each ounce of hops. They absorb a lot. Mill the grain so it looks like sea salt.
American living in Europe. Most recipes and tips are in gallons and grams. Thanks for the formula. I will definitely put it to use next time.
Sounds like you might be using a Brew In A Bag method (BIAB)? If so, there are several members here that can help you out.
Don’t worry about efficiency at the homebrew level. Add more grain and water next time and figure out what works on your system. To me it’s easier to add 1-3 pounds of grain to make up for my lack of efficiency and make an overall better beer. Sparging works but also comes with risks. I average about 60-65% efficiency not sparging and that’s good enough for me.
Not mentioned above (I think) and maybe you are already doing this, but I believe when doing BIAB it is not uncommon to put the squeeze on the grain bag in order to extract as much liquid as possible from the mash. Heavy rubber gloves are recommended for doing this. Also in my experience grain crush can have a huge effect on mash efficiency. For example, my LHBS crush typically resulted in 65 - 70% mash efficiency, while my at-home milling yields 85 - 88%. One feature that is often touted regarding BIAB is that one can crush very fine in order to extract as much as possible (because there is no chance of a stuck sparge). Cheers!
Will second both of these suggestions for BIAB. I double-mill the grains (LHBS mill, not my own, so can't set it to an extremely fine setting) and give the bag a good drain and hefty squeeze each time. Last brew was a clone of Double Sunshine and I hit ~80% efficiency.
Thanks, Brewed a really good hefeweizen a week ago that was right on the OG. This Sunday I will try IPA part 4, and I will definitely incorporate all these suggestions.
