What do you mash in?

[MacStill]

Like many people here I'm keen to get into all grain. 
After countless hours reading up on it, i feel like I'm only just starting to get my head around it all. Anywho
Trying to decide on what to buy to mash in? 
I'll be using BIAB so it's between an esky or an urn.
Anyone here use An urn? Are they worth the money...
Do they futz up
Wash sizes will be around 20 litres.
What do mash in, and how does it work for you?

Cheers markus

Hey Markus.
I brew in a bag for all my All Grain beers. I am an active member of Australia's largest home brew forum ( not sure if I'm allowed to link or mention the site )
I brew in a Crown exposed element urn, brew 20lt batches & no chill my beers. I keg my beers & have a 4 tap kegerator.
I'm looking at switching camps & focusing on this great hobby.

Hi Crusty,

You can link to AHB here but it's not much use because you cant use the site properly unless you're a paid up member that's logged in, however we really do like beer brewers sharing their mashing knowledge here :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Cheers.

[Crusty]

Like many people here I'm keen to get into all grain. 
After countless hours reading up on it, i feel like I'm only just starting to get my head around it all. Anywho
Trying to decide on what to buy to mash in? 
I'll be using BIAB so it's between an esky or an urn.
Anyone here use An urn? Are they worth the money...
Do they futz up
Wash sizes will be around 20 litres.
What do mash in, and how does it work for you?

Cheers markus

Hey Markus.
I brew in a bag for all my All Grain beers. I am an active member of Australia's largest home brew forum ( not sure if I'm allowed to link or mention the site )
I brew in a Crown exposed element urn, brew 20lt batches & no chill my beers. I keg my beers & have a 4 tap kegerator.
I'm looking at switching camps & focusing on this great hobby.

Hi Crusty,

You can link to AHB here but it's not much use because you cant use the site properly unless you're a paid up member that's logged in, however we really do like beer brewers sharing their mashing knowledge here :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Cheers.

Cheers mate.

[wedwards]

See,that's what gets me :angry-banghead: All my fermenters are 200l,and I don't want smaller ones :snooty: :snooty:
What I can't get my head around is,do your mash,keep the wort,rinse your grains again,done.But surely,there must still be a shitload of sugars and gear left in the grains,I just can't seem to get past that :angry-banghead:
Should be finished "how to Brew" in the next day or so,maybe the light will switch on before the end of the book :scared-eek: :scared-eek:

To be honest, it probably seems like there might be more sugars left in the spent grains, but if you take a hydrometer reading of what's coming off the grains after you have rinsed them a few times, there really is only a negligible amount of sugars left. For making beer, we just chuck the spent grains, but with spirits, you might want the grains to stay in your ferment to add some extra stuff that you really don't want in your beer. That's why a lot of spirit makers ferment with grains after completing the mash - I don't do this, but I know of lots who do. Try both ways and see what you like best.

[Kimbo]

See,that's what gets me :angry-banghead: All my fermenters are 200l,and I don't want smaller ones :snooty: :snooty:
What I can't get my head around is,do your mash,keep the wort,rinse your grains again,done.But surely,there must still be a shitload of sugars and gear left in the grains,I just can't seem to get past that :angry-banghead:
Should be finished "how to Brew" in the next day or so,maybe the light will switch on before the end of the book :scared-eek: :scared-eek:

Thats what I thought too.
Then If you taste the Wort, its quite sweet, you taste the sparged grains, their very bland and tasteless.
So, all the grains are then doing is taking up valuable room in your fermenter :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[MacStill]

So, all the grains are then doing is taking up valuable room in your fermenter :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Hey! that's exactly what Doc said to me too :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[crow]

yeah! ok well how valuable is that room . Sparging is a lot of work if ya don't have da shit and true there is probably less then 25% of the sugar left in the grain but probably more than 50% of the flavour which interests me more than a higher yield I will also get. If I was going commercial it would be sparge all the way but i will stick to fermenting on the grain at this stage :handgestures-thumbupleft: (no offence to the Doc as I fully understand why he does it)

[wedwards]

By fermenting on the grain, you should get some more tannin type flavours, although if you don't bring the mash to the boil (or at least over about 80 degrees) they will be minimal. For sparging a brew in a bag mash, I just get a 5 litre jug of hot (not boiling) water, hold the grains up over the pot you mashed in, and get someone to pour the hot water evenly over the grains and you are done.

[crow]

Ok I've said this before but I will say it again :roll: . There is No circumstance ever that a distiller would want or need to mash out. We are making spirit not beer here peeps , Dont not not not mash out, all ex and currant brewers got that don't do it. You should not exceed 72 degress after such time as the malt or enzymes have been added , before that boil the living hell out of it no probs :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[tipsy]

Ok I've said this before but I will say it again :roll: . There is No circumstance ever that a distiller would want or need to mash out. We are making spirit not beer here peeps , Dont not not not mash out, all ex and currant brewers got that don't do it. You should not exceed 72 degress after such time as the malt or enzymes have been added , before that boil the living hell out of it no probs :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Thinking as a brewer, there might be one circumstance to do it, and that it when sparging.
Because your not fermenting on the grain you have pretty much got out all the fermentables your going to get.
By doing a mash out would you increase the the amount of fermentable sugars washed out with the sparge?

[scarecrow]

This is mine. Holds 40 litres. :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Strainer is a SS water hose with the guts pulled out.
Loses 1 degree C aver 3 hours.

mashtun.jpg

I don't strain my rye wash (too goopy), but my single malt drains like a trooper. First sparge goes into the fermenter. The second sparge goes into the freezer for next time. :dance:
Sparge water is always 70C (to keep tannins down to a minimum).

scarecrow

[DaveZ]

I'd like to see some more peoples mash tuns, I think I'm going to have to set to building something fairly soon.

This is where 'efficiency' of your equipment comes in. Most beer brewers are happy with a 75% brewhouse efficiency, anything 80 and above and you get to brag about how awesome our brewery is.

However, my immediate question is, with this talk of brewhouse efficiency, is that the total efficiency of turning starches to sugars then extracting those sugars? Or just the efficiancy of extracting the already converted sugars? If it's the former then you would have to know what starches were present at the beginning so is there some sort of table available that shows the available starches of different grains and what the expected sugar returns would be from them?

Cheers,
Dave.

[OzKev]

Most brewing software has the 'potential' built in and will do it for you. Also where you source your grain from will have a spec sheet on it, that way yo can get an exact value for that batch. Although I've found it does not vary that greatly per batch.

Here's a list
http://beersmith.com/grain-list/