24 replies to this topic

[DaBearSox]

So last week I got my grains bills for a Hefe and a Dunkel. Both were supposed to end up with an OG of 1.051, however they got me to 1.034. On my system I get consistent efficiency at 74-76%, nothing was out of the ordinary for either of these brew days and the only thing I did differently is that I had to add a glass of cold water (in the Hefe) to bring my mash temp down a little. Both bills were double crushed, I mashed both at 152 for an hour, the water amounts were the same 1.11 lb/qts and the sparge amounts were the same. I used a few handfuls of rice hulls to avoid a stuck sparge. Below are the grain bills if that would help any...Hefe:4.5 lbs Weyermann Wheat4 lbs Rahr 2-row.5 lb Weyermann MunichDunkel:5 lbs Weyermann Wheat4 lbs Global Dark Munich.25 lb Carafa II When I first completed the Hefe I thought I must have done something wrong in the mash for it to end so low...(I threw in a pound of light DME to salvage it and let it ferment) then a few days later I brewed the Dunkel, when i wound up with another very low OG (exact same numbers as the first) I thought something must have been up. It's depressing that they will turn out very light and very watery I guess I can call them mild wheats....I emailed the owner of the LHBS to ask if his scales have been calibrated recently b/c it was the only thing I could think of that could have went wrong. He replied back saying that it must have been something that I did to have such a low amount of sugar in the wort. Basically he said that I shouldn't have double crushed and since I did I should have used hulls (which i didnt mention to him that I did), and that that must have been the reason. That was all, no mention that his scales could have been off..I have been double crushing at his store for awhile, it gets me a few extra points and never hinders my mash...So could it have been anything else other then that the LHBS scale was off?

[ThroatwobblerMangrove]

Maybe your water recently changed? Did you check your mash pH?

[DaBearSox]

Maybe your water recently changed? Did you check your mash pH?

Forgot to add that I use 5.2 buffer in my mash, and when testing with a strip it looked dead on...

[MakeMeHoppy]

so the problem only occurs when you use wheat in the mash? Wondering if the size of the wheat kernal is smaller than typical 2-row barley and maybe you really didn't crush it very well. The only hefes I did were from extract so I'll follow this thread before I attempt an all grain hefe.

[consumptionjunction]

Are you confident with your hydrometer or refractometer calibration?

[DaBearSox]

Are you confident with your hydrometer or refractometer calibration?

I checked the hydro with 60 degree RO water and it was on...

[DaBearSox]

so the problem only occurs when you use wheat in the mash? Wondering if the size of the wheat kernal is smaller than typical 2-row barley and maybe you really didn't crush it very well. The only hefes I did were from extract so I'll follow this thread before I attempt an all grain hefe.

yea...i guess that is a difference from brews this year...however I did double crush and by looks it was fine...i believe last time I did Hefes I was still doing extract

[Deerslyr]

I emailed the owner of the LHBS to ask if his scales have been calibrated recently b/c it was the only thing I could think of that could have went wrong. He replied back saying that it must have been something that I did to have such a low amount of sugar in the wort. Basically he said that I shouldn't have double crushed and since I did I should have used hulls (which i didnt mention to him that I did), and that that must have been the reason. That was all, no mention that his scales could have been off..I have been double crushing at his store for awhile, it gets me a few extra points and never hinders my mash...So could it have been anything else other then that the LHBS scale was off?

I think it is ignorant of your LHBS to say something like that. I'll be honest, I only crush mine once, but the gap is set pretty tight. My crush produces some flour, but for the most part the grains are completely broken down. I don't have any problem with it. My buddy does a double crush and his efficiency is spot on too.Here's what I'm thinking, next time crush some wheat in the same manner and find out how well it crushed. The wheat is a much smaller grain than the barley and can slip through the gap that you set for the barley without being touched. It's possible that this was part of the problem. What was your barley to wheat ratio? If that isn't the problem, then the next time you buy from this LHBS, weigh your grains when you get home to make sure he gave you the proper amount.

[DaBearSox]

I think it is ignorant of your LHBS to say something like that. What was your barley to wheat ratio? If that isn't the problem, then the next time you buy from this LHBS, weigh your grains when you get home to make sure he gave you the proper amount.

See, his reply email did piss me off a little...he didn't even mention anything about his scale or that that could have been the problem at all. Barley to wheat ratio was something like 50-55% wheat to 50-45% barley I am pretty confident the crush was fine...i always check it before I leave the store, plus when i mix in the hulls before i mash in I mix it around with my hand examining the crush to make sure there are not a lot of grain that seem to be uncrushed...At this particular LHBS you weigh out the grains yourself on their digi scale. Since it is a large digi scale I could see that being more of a problem than if it was just a non electrical scale. If it would have been just one batch I would have chalked it up to something in my own process, but since it was 2 batches with the same amount of grain and ended up with the same OG I had to look somewhere else. I drop a lot of money in that store so I was expected him to be oh sorry to hear that we'll check our scales and give you a few pounds of grain next time you come in. Since he decided to not even think about the fact it could have been something wrong with his scale I just made a nice big order from brewmasters warehouse rather than buy all that stuff from him.

[consumptionjunction]

I remember hearing somewhere - I believe in a Brewing Network podcast - that efficiency decreases if the grain has a high moisture content, and if it's stored in high humidity atmospheres. Here's something published by none other than Greg Noonan that discusses malt analysis sheets. Pertinently, he writes:

The brewer needs to take into account the moisture content of each lot and calculate the real extract potential of each lot or suffer the consequences of varying wort color, density, and beer flavor.

Just a thought, but maybe your LHBS has some bad grains...

[DaBearSox]

I remember hearing somewhere - I believe in a Brewing Network podcast - that efficiency decreases if the grain has a high moisture content, and if it's stored in high humidity atmospheres. Here's something published by none other than Greg Noonan that discusses malt analysis sheets. Pertinently, he writes: Just a thought, but maybe your LHBS has some bad grains...

heh...great point...they actually just made a move accross town so maybe something happened in the move...i will probably be staying away from them for alittle while

[Pseudolus]

It makes sense that grain with higher moisture content will yield less in the way of PPPPG - water weight isn't going to give you any sugars. But enough to decrease efficiency from ~75% to ~50%? That seems unlikely to me. Very odd.You've probably done all this already, but if it were me I'd be focused on making sure I didn't leave out some ingredient, or mismeasured a volume or temp, etc. (I see you've already checked the hydro.)You say that you weighed out the grain yourself. Any chance you, um, messed that up and bought significantly less grain than you thought you did? (Not casting aspersions, just trying to think of the kinds of things I do sometimes. )

[DaBearSox]

You say that you weighed out the grain yourself. Any chance you, um, messed that up and bought significantly less grain than you thought you did? (Not casting aspersions, just trying to think of the kinds of things I do sometimes. )

That is possible...but that means I would have read the numbers wrong twice...I have the sheet at home that my recipes were on when i brought them in to get my grain. Both were basically 9 lbs of grain that would give me fermentable/unfermentable sugar...I could see if this just happened to one of my grain bills that it would more than likely be my fault...but since it was two bills, weighed the same day, supposed to give me an OG of 1.051, that both ended up at 1.034....something is fishey

[Slainte]

Have you brewed these recipes before?

[DaBearSox]

Have you brewed these recipes before?

No, I haven't brewed these before, but that goes for most of my recipes...I have set pro mash up for my specific system and it is mostly 100% reliable...

[cavman]

My first thought is buy your own mill and be happy when I see these threads. Is that 100% definitley the problem, but it might be as LHBS Mills will loosen up as they have a higher usage rate than most home mills.

[DaBearSox]

My first thought is buy your own mill and be happy when I see these threads. Is that 100% definitley the problem, but it might be as LHBS Mills will loosen up as they have a higher usage rate than most home mills.

to clear some things up here is the email i sent and the email I recieved:Mine:

I was wondering if you guys have calibrated your scale in awhile? I came in about a week ago and got two grain bills, one for a Hefe, and one for a dunkel....I brewed up the Hefe last weekend and the dunkel tonight...I have been brewing all grain for awhile now and my efficiency is usually spot on at 75%. I base my grain bills off of promash with that efficiency. Each of these last two brews were supposed to come out with an FG of 1.051 however both of the ended up with an OG of 1.034. When the Hefe came out real short I figured that I must have done something detrimental in the mash. However after this 2nd failure the only thing I can think of is that my weights were wrong. I always double crush at the store and there was nothing out of the ordinary when looking at the crush. Let me know what you find b/c these last two brews have pissed me off a good bit. Thanks

Reply:

It is probable that double-crushing is producing too fine a grist, thus interfering with lauter-out and sparging. The mill unit in our milling station is set to factory specification, is not adjustable and thus cannot 'creep' under extended use. It receives heavy use, and is therefore systematicaly replaced every 6 months. Programs like Pro-Mash assume perfect mashing conditions when they spit out weights. Perhaps loosening up a bit on the quantities of malt you're using might also be of help in maintaining acceptable efficiencies with your mashes. As Charlie put it, 'Relax, ...' If you feel that for some reason you must continue double-crushing, please consider mixing in 1 lb. of rice hulls for each 5 lb. of malt being 'floured' in this way. The husk material in your grist is intended to provide 'lift' in your grain bed to encourage efficient passage of your sparge water. Unfortunately, milling to a powdery grist is counterintuitively inefficient in the end.

as i said before i did not mention in my first email that I had used hulls as he suggested in his reply...

[cavman]

to clear some things up here is the email i sent and the email I recieved:Mine:Reply:as i said before i did not mention in my first email that I had used hulls as he suggested in his reply...

Double crushing on a loose mill doesn't make it better is my point. His point of sparge issues was ridiculous or you would have been complaining of a stuck sparge if the grist was too fine. Seems a mill and bulk grain buys are in your near future.

[ChefLamont]

(I am just grasping at ideas to be helpful here so take it for what it is worth).Did you stir well before and after the mash to make sure doughballs or thick spots werent a problem? The rice hulls should help to prevent that somewhat, but that sort of clumping/thickening could explain such a dramatic decrease in efficiency.

[DaBearSox]

(I am just grasping at ideas to be helpful here so take it for what it is worth).Did you stir well before and after the mash to make sure doughballs or thick spots werent a problem? The rice hulls should help to prevent that somewhat, but that sort of clumping/thickening could explain such a dramatic decrease in efficiency.

another valid reason...BUT ALAS this is part of my normal process. it basically looks like I got shafted...but whatever he has lost business