Second brew day report; request feedback!

jphussey · Joined: 17 Oct 2012 Posts: 171

Hey everyone, this is a follow-up to my first brew day here:

I did a 5G batch of Janet's Brown Ale that I had purchased for my ~60% brewhouse efficiency propane setup. Like my last beer, I expected the higher-efficiency electric brewery to result in a higher S.G. at all phases of the brew. Not really an issue, just wanted to use up the ingredients. I had the grain bill put into one huge bag, so I couldn't effectively scale the base malt back...

Overall this brew went more smoothly, but I still had a few issues I'd like to share. My MLT out hose seems to get air bubbles in it after the grain bed settles down and increases flow-restriction in the MLT. I'm working on swapping out some parts and am documenting the experience in another thread in this forum.

The grind seemed to go better this time, but the husks still look tore up. Here is a video of my grind. Does the revolutions per second seem ok?

The result:

Aside from that, my biggest issue seemed to be with numbers/efficiency. Here is the grain bill for reference:

12 lbs 12.0 oz Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 76.1 %
1 lbs 4.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 7.5 %
1 lbs 4.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 3 7.5 %
1 lbs White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) Grain 4 6.0 %
8.0 oz Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 5 3.0 %

I mashed at 154 with a 1.25 qt/lb ratio for 90 minutes. I didn't have a good method to do the post mash gravity, so I sparged and collected 8 gallons of wort in the BK. The S.G. was 1.054, which was less than then 1.061 S.G. that BeerSmith predicted. I have programmed in a 77% Brewhouse efficiency based on my first batch on the electric brewery.

What is the 'post mash' gravity vs. the 'pre-boil' gravity? My guess is that the post mash is the full volume of mash liquid and the pre-boil is post sparge? How does one measure the post mash then? Just collect the first runnings?

I'm also a little confused on the O.G measurement. Does the volume make a difference for S.G. readings? If I finished with 6 gallons but only take 5.5 into the fermentor, does that somehow change the gravity?

Again, BeerSmith thought I was going to have 1.084 but I ended up with only 1.073. This works out to a brewhouse efficiency of 67 percent. That seems very low for this system.

Any thoughts on where I might have messed up? Can someone else plug this grain bill into their software of choice and tell me what they think the O.G. should be? This recipe uses WLP0001.

On the bright side, I think my hop stopper woes were fixed. I backed down the flow rate to a VERY slow trickle:

This is what I had left behind:

Does that seem normal?

Thanks!
-Jason

**kal**

jphussey · Joined: 17 Oct 2012 Posts: 171

Thanks, Kal. So the flow into the fermentor looks about right for the last few gallons once the hop stopper is exposed to air?

How about the crush?

**kal** · Posted: Wed Dec 28, 2016 4:55 am Post subject:

jphussey · Joined: 17 Oct 2012 Posts: 171

**kal**