I prefer to mash one volume of water, then sparge with the volume needed to hit my preboil quantity. If you’re not collecting enough first runnings to hit your target, just mash with enough water (subtracting for grain absorption and dead space in your mash tun) to get a mash runoff that’s ideally within a gallon of your sparge runoff. Easy peasy.
I remember from reading a lot when I started to brew that you want to get 50% of your wort from 1st runnings and 50% from 2nd runnings for optimum efficiency. Keeping that in mind, I keep my mash between 1.25 and 1.5qt./lb. and mash out with the amount of water needed to approximate the 50/50 ratio. My mash efficiency averages 75 to 78%, depending on grain bill and mash temperature.
In the past I have drained the first runnings and then double sparged with similar results. I conclude that as long as you get at least 50% of your runnings from the sparge and keep a reasonable water to grain ratio in the mash you will be OK.
Why do you get lower efficiency when mashing for a big beer? Because you’re getting so much of your wort from 1st runnings.
First, mash in is the act of adding grain to hot water and stirring to initiate the mash. Mash out is the act of raising the mash temp to denature the enzymes in the mash and stop conversion.
The 2 steps you are interested in are draining the tun and sparging.
Before draining you may add extra hot water to cause the mash out process. This may be part of your confusion.
Regarding your math; the first time you drain your tun you will not get back all the water you added. The grain absorbs water and this absorbed water will never come out. Grain absorption is usually about 0.96 fl. oz./oz. (fluid ounce absorbed per ounce of grain).
When sparging, the grain is saturated and cannot absorb more water. So, you get out the amount of sparge water you add.
Were you attempting to mash out and stop enzymatic action or to achieve a specific mouthfeel or head retention through stepping temperatures? If not, then I don’t think either way will dramatically affect your beer as compared to the other. I occasionally use the late addition of water at 180F or higher added to the initial mash to raise the temperature into the high 150’s or even 160’s to get a little better head retention and body in the beer.
Think backwards on it, i.e. think about the water to grist ratio first. Among other things, there’s a ton good info out there to help you make great beer. John Palmer summarizes as so:
A compromise of all factors yields the standard mash conditions for most homebrewers: a mash ratio of about 1.5 quarts of water per pound grain, pH of 5.3, temperature of 150-155°F and a time of about one hour. These conditions yield a wort with a nice maltiness and good fermentability.
In starting out with 1.55qts/lb, the argument is for you to use less mash water, and then get up-to-speed on water chemistry to get the pH you need. Martin Brungard’s “Bru’n Water” is a fantastic reference.
Shameless plug my mash/volumes/temps/efficiencies/gravities,etcetc calculator. It just wont stop growing! Priceless Brew in a Bag Calculator
If you’re batch* sparging (which you should be doing) and not fly sparging,(which is more effective ideally but much harder to get correct due to needed specific setup for drainage/mashtun geometery/lots of time etc), then don’t worry too much about your run off ratio. Yes, a 1:1 ratio is best but the difference between a 4:1 ratio and a 1:1 ratio is small. My standard simulation gives 84.6% mash efficiency with a 1:1 and a 83.2% with a 4:1 ratio. Don’t worry about it…
Pick your mash thickness first, I like 1.75 as it generally gives me a good conversion efficiency while leaving some water left over to do a good sparge.
If you’re not fly sparging, don’t bother with a mashout, it’s unnecessary. Keep your “mashout” temp below 171 regardless. In my mind, it’s not worth the extra effort and risk of tannin extraction.
*A well done batch sparge is quick, and very effective. Drain mash tun, add water, stir the crap out of it.
Thanks… I guess I’m a batch sparger…
Step 1: Mash in water to a temp for the beer style
add the 1st strike water at the ratio the calc gives me
Drain after 60 mins. I get less than what I put in…due to grain absrobtion etc…
2nd step: mash out 168F enzyme activity denaturing etc…
Heat required amount of water that I need and add to mashtun for 10 mins…
Drain and add this to my 1st mash running to equal my preboil.
Total: step 1 + Step 2 = preboil amount
I think if I’m understanding you I’m a batch sparger? I’ve never fly sparged and don’t plan too because of what I’ve read and the length of time…life too short to fly sparged…lol
Step 1 clarification, the mash temp isn’t specific to the beer style but rather to that specific recipe. You can take 6 different recipes for a belgian saison or american stout and while a couple might have the same, there’s probably a 3-4 degree range where they’re going to lie.
step 2, sounds good if that’s what you want to do.
Personal opinion on mash outs, again if you’re not fly sparging then a mashout isn’t going to really do anything for you. The purpose is to denature the mash enzymes in order to lock in the fermentability of the wort during a prolonged fly sparge. If you’re batch sparging then there’s not enough relevant time for the fermentability o change at all. Also if you’re mashing long enough, then there should be very little conversion, if any at all, to occur during the sparge. Sparge at whatever temp you want.
Step 2 (old way) - I totaly now get what your saying… Once you compared it to fly sparging ( takes a while so you need to lock in the enzymes activities because your 1st runnings aka mash in are just in a bucket waiting for the fly sparged to finish)…whala I get it!!! Woo woo
Step 2 (new way) sparge:
Just add water *F stir/ rinse any residual sugars left and collect required amount
Final: Add the 1st mash runnings + your Sparge out runnings = pre boil wort amount and brew this bad boy!
Thus saving me at least 10 mins if not more!
I’m understanding you correctly right…please please say yes! Oh and I’m gonna a stir that grain at sparge !
Hahaha, wanted to check Randy Mosher on batch sparging, and this is what he writes: “Unless you really have an attention span problem, I’d do the more conventional sparge.”
Just like step mashing or decoction versus single infusion…you can argue things either way for specific differences. I don’t fly sparge because I didn’t find it to yield sufficient differences to justify it, but I acknowledge that I could get a slightly higher efficiency with fly sparging - I’d rather just adjust the grain bill and stick with batch sparging, saving water. I say find the system and process you like and work that to get repeatable and acceptable results. Or try new methods once in a while to do something different (I did a direct fire step mash recently to see how the mash thinned out at various temperatures - stirring constantly - that was a tiring brew day!).
