Mash only - No Sparge

[Crispy Hedgehog]

Just been thinking - I know it's a dangerous thing!!

If you had the right size MT, would it be possible to do a mash only, so that you obtained the required amount of wort and not have to sparge???

Like I say was just thinking..................

[steamedbeech]

You can do it I guess , but it wouldn't be a very ecconomic use of grain , by sparging your rinsing off the last of the sugars ,why would you want to , apart from saving time ? Whats lead you to this train of thought Crispy ?

[Crispy Hedgehog]

I was looking through old posts about sparging etc. Just doing a bit of research. However noticed that people were saying they only sparged once, some say twice, some even said 3 times. So got thinking, if you had the MT size to do it, why not just mash and obtain all the wort you need for pre-boil?

[steamedbeech]

Like I say , I think its about economics , your just trying to utilize the grains as best you can by sparging .

[liquidman]

I don't sparge when doing BIAB and am getting good efficiency.

I've been wondering for a while of it would be possible to do away with the bag, mash as per my normal scedule then just drain the wort into the boiler. In my head it would work but it takes a one vessel system and makes it in to a two vessel system -which I suppose still requires less storage than a full three vessel system.

Am I missing something obvious?

A

[guypettigrew]

Interesting question!

If you mash, then just take the run off to the boiler with no sparging, you'd end up with a really strong beer.

For example. Let's say you want to end up with 23 litres of wort. You might boil 30 litres and then, assuming a loss in the hops, add a bit of water to get back to your desired 23 litres.

To run 30 litres off your mash you'd probably need about 35 litres of liquor in the tun. To get the proper grain:liquor ratio, you'd need about 14Kg of grain. Running the wort from 14 Kg of grain, without sparging, would possibly give you a wort of SG about 1.100. Guessing here. I don't know how to do the calculation!!

Whatever, your wort would be incredibly strong.

No technical reason why you couldn't do it though.

IIRC, in the (very) old days this used to be standard practice in commercial breweries. The grain was then batch sparged to give the second runnings for a second ale. This was much lower gravity, of course, but still perfectly acceptable.

Guy

[keith1664]

The proper liquid to grain ratio isn't set in stone so no you wouldn't end up with a really strong beer, you'd end up with a very thin mash instead.
In fact I did post a link to an article about the effects of changing the ratio somewhere....I'll look for it in a bit.

[keith1664]

here you go

[guypettigrew]

Fascinating! The author clearly likes hot rooms. He quotes room temperatur as 29C. Most of us go abroad to achieve this!

However, the essential point is about mash thickness. A thinner mash would, indeed, avoid having a super strength beer. No idea if it would work, though. Perhaps the OP should give it a go and let us know?

Guy

[Crispy Hedgehog]

Just read the link. Like I say I was just thinking what if.....

[keith1664]

It'll work, I suggest you google "no sparge brewing" (198,000 hits!)

[Aleman]

Even Better Google No Sparge Brewing and restrict the site to Jims Beer Kit, you'll get a lot less hits.

It produces a really high quality wort, what I do is use 3.5L/kg of grain with an estimated mash efficiency of 55%, when I run the sweet wort off (normally at 1.075), I then dilute it before the boil so that after the boil I hit the OG for the beer I want.

[guypettigrew]

Hi Aleman

Do you reckon doing it this way produces a better beer than sparging like normal?

Guy

[Aleman]

For certain styles of beer it produces a significantly better beer (I love the additional maltiness you get with mild for example) some beers it appears to make very little difference too . . .light gravity beers seem to benefit most. . . . but really it is a case of experimentation.