Scaling BIAB recipes

[stquinto]

G’day fellow brewers

I’ve done a few BIAB AG brews and am pretty happy with the results so far. 
My brew kettle only holds 23l liquid up to the maximum line. After boiling all I’ve got left is 14l wort. 
If I did a boil with the amount of malt for say a 23l brew, at the point when I put it in the FV can I just top it up to 23l with  old water, or will it end up a bit watery?

Bit of a dumb question perhaps, but it’s too late to get a bigger kettle

 

Cheers and happy brewing!

[Shamus O'Sean]

18 minutes ago, stquinto said:

G’day fellow brewers

I’ve done a few BIAB AG brews and am pretty happy with the results so far. 
My brew kettle only holds 23l liquid up to the maximum line. After boiling all I’ve got left is 14l wort. 
If I did a boil with the amount of malt for say a 23l brew, at the point when I put it in the FV can I just top it up to 23l with  old water, or will it end up a bit watery?

Bit of a dumb question perhaps, but it’s too late to get a bigger kettle

 

Cheers and happy brewing!

Hey Sainter,

23 litres to 14 litres sounds like a lot of boil off for a 60 minute boil.  Although, I am guessing you do not boil 23 litres.

I have done something like you describe a few times lately.  My Grainfather can only boil about 30 litres.  Boil off about 3 litres in 60 minutes, so I am left with 27 litres of wort.  But I want 32 litres of wort to ferment.  So I top up with water to make up the difference.  I use BrewFather brewing software to work this out for me.

Your issue will be about efficiencies.  Your brew going from 14 litres to 23 litres will mean you are starting with pretty high gravities in your 14 litres.  As I understand it, working at higher gravities usually reduces efficiencies.  Therefore, you might not be able to start with a standard 23 litre malt bill in your system that boils down to 14 litres, that you then dilute back up to a 23 litre fermenter brew.  

Software is your friend here.  You might need to add more grain due to less efficiency at higher gravities, so that when you dilute, you are fermenting a brew with the OG, IBU, EBC and BU:GU ratio that you want in your finished brew. 

[stquinto]

Thanks Shamus mate, much appreciated

A bit weird, because there were the figures I got from just boiling water:

Maximum 23 litres

1 litre per cm on ruler ( I stuck a metal ruler in to get the measurement and handily enough this is what I got)

23 litres at the beginning boil

20 litres at 60 minutes

19.5 litres at 70 minute

19 litres at 90 minutes

 

My boils have been 80 - 90 minutes so I should bring them down to 60. 
I signed up to Brewfather, I’ll what they say. I’m going to try the Coopers Pale later, will report back

[Aussiekraut]

On 12/18/2021 at 11:39 PM, stquinto said:

Thanks Shamus mate, much appreciated

A bit weird, because there were the figures I got from just boiling water:

Maximum 23 litres

1 litre per cm on ruler ( I stuck a metal ruler in to get the measurement and handily enough this is what I got)

23 litres at the beginning boil

20 litres at 60 minutes

19.5 litres at 70 minute

19 litres at 90 minutes

 

My boils have been 80 - 90 minutes so I should bring them down to 60. 
I signed up to Brewfather, I’ll what they say. I’m going to try the Coopers Pale later, will report back

Also take into account that more grain means more water absorption. In my case I lose about 0.6l/kg grain.

My formula for a "standard batch" is 25l mash, 8l sparge. This leaves me with 30l boil volume. 4l boil off in my case means I have a post bil volume of 26l and I lose about 4-5l beneath the tap. At the end, I get 21-22l into the FV, depending on how good the whirlpool was.

Why do you do such long boils? I tried 90min for a few batches to improve clarity but the result wasn't worth the extra 30 minutes boil and the additional 2l boil off.

What you are trying to achieve is essentially how FWKs work. They're 15l of wort made for a 20l ferment volume. But as @Shamus O'Sean said, efficiency might bite you and you may need to use more grain, leading to a higher absorption, etc. Software will help, the rest is trial and error  

[jamiek86]

reading this is good for me and made me start thinking of @Red devil 44 and him also going over to all grain. And wonder what he done with all the kegs of extract brew after went all grain?

[Aussiekraut]

2 hours ago, jamiek86 said:

reading this is good for me and made me start thinking of @Red devil 44 and him also going over to all grain. And wonder what he done with all the kegs of extract brew after went all grain?

I'd say he drank them but he has embraced the dark side as some people call it  But really, AG is a bit of a learning curve but it isn't rocket science. It's fairly easy at the end of the day, you just need to try it. A couple of dry runs with just water to get your liquids right and you're off on a flying start. I'm not the pro brewer or anything like that but I am more than happy to help out wherever I can. We all are. The people on this list have lead me onto the straight path and we will do that to all others willing to go down that road  Yeah alright, I'll shut up  

[jamiek86]

@Aussiekraut atm I'm more than happy with my partial mash. One day when I want bigger equipment and work on spread sheets etc I'll go to the dark side.

[stquinto]

@Shamus O'Sean @Aussiekraut thanks for your inputs fellas.

In the end I started off with 23l and after a 70 minute mash I had 19l left. I sparged with 2l of 70° water.

After a 60 minute boil I has 19l left. I covered it and left it to cool overnight as I was running out of time. The next day the OG was 1.055 so I put it in the FV with 3l of cold water (it was still 27° even after resting overnight in a cool cellar) and the OG went down to 1.048 which is what I was looking for.

I might have messed up AK: when I got to the stuff below the tap (hoppy gunk) I swirled it round and chucked it it. Might be a bit of a b*gger to clear, hopefully that will be all.

I put in half of a third-generation Coopers commercial yeast collection, and 7g from a recent APA kit I had kicking around.

After about 12 hours it was bubbling away. I also had to use different hops as I can't source PoR where I am (I used Cluster and Galena instead, with 10g of Northern Brewer in the end)

@jamiek86 give it a go mate, you know you want to

The only thing I would do different it I had to get a brew kettle now is that I'd get a bigger volume one, say 35l, and preferably one with a digital thermometer too. I might start saving for a new model Grainfather.  A few months of the child allowance should cover it, should run it by SWMBO....

[Red devil 44]

23 hours ago, jamiek86 said:

reading this is good for me and made me start thinking of @Red devil 44 and him also going over to all grain. And wonder what he done with all the kegs of extract brew after went all grain?

Hi @jamiek86

I used most of the extract up, so have 3 AG on tap currently, plus 3 extract kit & kilo.

‘I still have 1 x Coopers Pale Ale can & a Can of Wheat Malt to use up, and that will be the last of the extract kits.

‘By the way, the dark side is great, glad I made the jump to AG.

[stquinto]

2 hours ago, Red devil 44 said:

By the way, the dark side is great, glad I made the jump to AG.

yeah, me too

 

[jamiek86]

12 hours ago, Red devil 44 said:

Hi @jamiek86

I used most of the extract up, so have 3 AG on tap currently, plus 3 extract kit & kilo.

‘I still have 1 x Coopers Pale Ale can & a Can of Wheat Malt to use up, and that will be the last of the extract kits.

‘By the way, the dark side is great, glad I made the jump to AG.

If I lived closer I would take those extract kegs off your hands to help you concentrate on the all grain.  You wouldn't have been down to only 6 kegs for a while? 

[Red devil 44]

5 hours ago, jamiek86 said:

If I lived closer I would take those extract kegs off your hands to help you concentrate on the all grain.  You wouldn't have been down to only 6 kegs for a while? 

@jamiek86 I have 6 on tap, plus 6 kegs full in my cellar & 3 empties currently.

‘Although on Xmas break now for 2 weeks so they will get a fair workout