Since starting all-grain brewing I’ve felt the hardest part of brewing alone is mashing-in without making dough balls or spilling milled grain on the floor. So I decided I needed to make some sort of hopper system so I could gradually add milled grain to the mash tun while continually stirring away. I repurposed a dog food dispenser into a milled grain hopper by hanging it in my brew shed over my mash tun. I had to screw strips of 1x1 inside and outside the plastic container so the hangers wouldn’t tear through the plastic. I mill the grain directly into the hopper, hang it up, pump my hot liquor into the mash tun and then pull the hopper shoot with one hand while mixing with the other. Worked perfectly the first time I used it.
Kai’s article linked in the other thread mentioned that the 133° rest is too low for dough balls to form. Never tried it, just thought it was an interesting method.
Just joined the forum. I typically do a protein rest in the 120s and have honestly never seen a “dough ball”. I’m usually adding 25+ lbs of grain to ~8 gallons of water. Then I stir it in, cover, and let it sit for impatiently long LOL.
I’m definitely in favor of rigging anything to help things along though! I do most of work outside on a raised brick pad I built up a bit to keep it level which also helps pour things into buckets when I bring it back into the basement. I do the sparging on a Blichmann stand in the basement. I couldn’t get the stand to fit through my shed do for doing the boil/etc. so actually use it for the sparging and then chilling which works pretty well with the utility sink. I’m likely going to get both Hot and cold hose hookups outside as soon as I can find a decently priced plumber.
Yup. Key word is prone. You probably can get doh balls with any of them, but some are almost guaranteed to ball up. Anymore though I dont worry about it. I just break them up while I’m doing my initial stir. Kind of motivation to do a thorough stir.