I meant - how many pounds of grain did you use, and how much water was used? And when was the water added - mash, sparge, or afterwards?
Also, do I see an Anvil Foundry being used?
anvil - i wish. its my chinese knockoff klarstein mundschenk ( aka brewdevil, brew monk, guten ace hopcat beer torrent and prolly a few other names.)
which btw is working awesome so far no glitches on my second brew. a little bit of build up on the bottom after using only the 1800 watt power setting . but a few drops of vinegar and a paper towel and it came right off without any scrubbing.
here she is keeping my mash temps within 0.5 degrees
i was very impressed but i think the reflectex def helps.
i stole it for $230 with tax and shipping. if it lasts me 2 years im good.
All Grain Zamba Lager
6 gallons
1048 sg 1008 fg 5.19 abv 25.92 ibu 3.41 srm
8.5 lbs of briess 2 row
1 lb vienna ( the crush was super fine on this basically flour)
1 lb flaked corn
.5 lbs carapils
2 oz rice hulls
,5 oz galena at 60
.25 os galena at 15
1 oz zamba at flame out (in hind sight i think i should have used 2, the airlock doesnt smell as hoppy as im used to)
the last time i used my aio i got a great tip online and it worked better than i thought. i dont have a seperate sparge water heater so as long as im not brewing more than 5-6 gallons i use my aio to heat the mash and sparge together then drain off the sparge and keep it warm while i mash.
process :
so i brought 6 gallons of water to 174 degrees then drained off 2.5 gallons to keep warm in the oven. left with 3.5 in the kettle i added 1 gallon of cool water to bring the temp down to mash temp and the volume up to 4.5 gallons. the level in the pipe was very low. my dead space is a whopping 7 liters. it didnt look like icould fit all the grain in there so i added another .5 gallons to have 5 gallons in the kettle. and fill the pipe up about half way. i figured i could just borrow that from the sparge and sparge less to get to my preboil of 7.25. i completely neglected grain absorption at this point.
the mash was very thick with all the dead space under the pipe like porridge.
anyway i mashed lowish 154 for 75 mins to try to get at the corn. (maybe some evaporation?). i completely forgot to mash out in my haste to sparge. btw there was a "tunnel" in the grain bed right under where my pump outlet was which also scared me thinking i didnt get the sugar out of the grain at the sides of the tun. i need a longer return tube i think so it circulates alittel arount instead shooting straight down into the sparge pan.
anyway back to the sparge. i took out my 2.5 gallons of sparge water that was still perfect 170 degrees. i figured i would add 2.25 gallons of it to get back to 7.25. i sparged about 2 gallons and took the basket out becasue thats the only way i can see the level (i hate that its on the inside and the pipe blocks the markings - i know 2 workarounds and am thinking about it. one is to replace with brewzilla sight glass which fits. the other is to attach a clear tube to the spigot and run it up the side to see the level in the kettle while the spigot is open. ) . to my surprise the level in the kettle was very low like 5 gallons maybe a little more. i had to add 2 gallons of spring water. to get preboil 7.25. i think a gallon was left in the grain i lost some to evaporation i guess.
im convinced beer gremlins drank the difference.
the beer is bubbling away it smells great. hoping i get the zamba melon punch
thanks for any pointers !