timbo41 wrote:Got to admit..biab is less farting about. As my only real interest is tasty beer,despite having made a mash tun + manifold, I will prob go back to one vessel,the old burco. Does the job,easy to clean,less space. Horses for courses of course, no insult intended to 3v brewers.
quick question if I may. Never understood the liquor back instructions on biab Brewer...is this just if your boiler isn't up there volume wise
Pretty much. Many people buy a 19L pan as they are quite cheap. So if you want to produce 19 - 23L of Wort you need to need to sparge/ top up during the boil/ top up after the boil or in the fermenter. This is Maxi-BIAB, producing a greater amount of wort from a smaller pot. Of course if you have a 35L /40L boiler you can just fill up to the brim from the beginning and by the time you have finished boiling the wort you are at approximately the volume of wort you want.
"Thanks for the info guys. Moving the free mashed grains from the boiler to the grain bag is messy and time consuming. If I mash with the grains inside the bag, will this not affect the brewing efficiency?"
Cheers
TenbobdaN1
I'm sorry bit I don't fully understand the question... You basically have the bag in the boiler over the rim of the pot. Then you add the grains, stir and leave for 60 - 90 min. Once the mash is over you pull the bag out, letting it drain into say a pot or fermenter (you can return this wort to the boiler for the boil. It's very quick and easy - quicker than 3V mashing.
Many people on here have efficiencies over 80 % for BIAB, although some have lower too. I sit the pulled grain bag on a colander in a large fermenter and sparge with 3 x 2.5 L water, but I am kind of doing Maxi-BIAB (see above). I have previously collected the sparged wort separately (about 7L) and find that it contains about 10 % of the total fermentables from my grain bill.