Batch Sparging + No Sparging

[crazymonkey15]

There, I just explained no-sparge, batch sparge and fly sparge with a shower reference.

Okay, now I get it! All you had to do was take me to the bathroom and show me what you were talking about. That makes it so much clearer, thanks.

[SoCal Surfer]

When you shampoo your hair, if you have any, if you were to lather it all up and stick your head in a bucket of water and put it out once would all the soap be out of it? No. If you did it twice would most of it be out of it? Probably. If you stand under the shower head does it rinse it completely out? Yes. There, I just explained no-sparge, batch sparge and fly sparge with a shower reference.

I love that example. IThat is a bit oversimplified in terms of diffusion but still beautiful. I hope I can use that for my friends. There are differences in solubility depending on water temp and concentration of sugar in solution. AND concentration affects osmotic potential. Diffusion in a batch sparge would be greater in the 2nd running because you are adding water with zero concentration of sugar. The potential would be higher and you would get more sugars out. If you do what they are calling a no sparge here (whatever it is), then you might see a drop in extraction because the additional water still has a higher concentration of sugar than zero. I'm guessing.

I have to do that if I want a 10 gallon batch. I fill the mash tun before draining and then batch sparge. I never thought that I was doing a combo batch sparge/no-sparge deal.

To add to the debate above, I've read about what Pro-Mash is calling PURE no sparge and that is to add no additional water to the mash tun. You drain the mash tun and then dilute to your desired gravity. I'm not calling Denny or Palmer wrong, I'm just saying that we might might have a new sparge technique to name here.

No sparge, batch sparge, fly sparge and the new semi-no sparge. LOL Whatever! If it works, do it. My efficiency sucks no matter what I do.

[J.Brew]

You'd have to start with an shit load of grain or that would be one hell of a session beer!!

[crazymonkey15]

My efficiency sucks no matter what I do.

Mine only sucks when I do anything dark. I started trying to take a pH reading with the crappy (and inaccurate) papers; my last batch was an imperial porter that had a nice good 4.6 pH so instead of my usual 70% efficiency I got 61%. That's part of what got me started thinking about sparging.

[Thirsty Boy]

Here's a somewhat edited post that I made to another forum talking about efficiency and no sparge / batch sparge lautering. I thought it might add to the general info here and I'd already written it so...

BTW. The definitions I am using are

No-sparge = mash as per normal, top up with sparge temp water to the point where when you drain you will hit your kettle volume, stir, vorlauf, drain once.

Batch sparge = Mash as per normal, top up the mash tun so that draining will give approximately half your desired kettle volume, stir vorlauf drain. Repeat with sparge temp water to give the second half of your kettle volume. Or maybe the same thing in three batches.

Thirsty Boy wrote (on another forum):

No sparge brewing isn't exactly unusual in its own right. Lots of people do it. Some do it because its believed that the less sparging a mash gets, the maltier and smoother the flavour of the beer. No sparging being at one end of the scale and oversparged harsh watery astringent beers at the other. Other people do it simply because it saves time and effort and just costs a few more $$ for the increased amount of grain/litre of finished beer. The no sparge method is simply to mash at a traditional L:G and at the end of the mash add all the remaining liquor required for your volumes to the mash tun, stir the bejeezuz out of it, recirc till it clears and drain to the kettle.

.....

In no-sparge and batch sparge, the sugars aren't gently rinsed out by a flow of water. They are bashed out into solution by a vigorous stirring, then just drained off. This is why these methods cant hope to be as efficient as a properly running fly-sparge set up. Any liquid that stays trapped in the grain, should contain the same concentration of sugar as the wort being run off. So some sugar gets left behind no matter what you do. With fly sparging, ultimately you could have it so the liquid trapped by the grain was pure water, with all the sugar rinsed out and run off. Nothing left behind. Of course, by then you would have a kettle full of tannins, but it would be 100% efficient.

Lets think about the numbers here. Take a 20 litre batch of No-Sparge, with 5kg of grain. Allowing for evap you want around 24 litres in the kettle. So you need to allow around 29 litres of liquor because the grain will absorb about 1litre/kg of your liquid. Near enough. So you dough in, mash for the hour, topit up with 76C water, stir, vorlauf, drain.... and you hit your numbers perfectly. 24litres in the kettle. But the liquid absorbed by your grain has just as much sugar in it as the liquid in the kettle!!! So... that means that 5/29 x 100 = 17.24% of your sugar is still in the mash tun. Your best case scenario is 82.76% efficiency.

Do the numbers again with a 10kg grist and you get 10/29 x 100 = 34.48% left in the Mash Tun with a maximum possible efficiency of 65.52%

If you give the mash a bit of a squeeze (please do, I dont see ANY reason why it should extract tanins) and adjust your calculations for less absorbtion by the grain; it will improve the numbers a bit, but it still wont stop the incremental decrease in efficiency as the amount of grain goes up.

Anyway, it seemed relevant. You can actually get quite good efficiency no sparging a smaller beer, but things start to suck big time when you up the grain bill.

Thirsty

[JMUBrew]

Yeah, I've been thinking about this myself as well when it comes to the upping of the grain. Going to do a 10 Gallon batch of the 21A IPA, usually I batch sparge, but I might instead just go with the fly sparging. #28 lbs of grain...hrmm...