Maximum OG on a Mash?

[Haputanlas]

Hey Guys,

I was listening to Brew Strong the other day about High Gravity beers. They brought up a point about not getting any higher OG than 1.075 - 1.080 (I think that was the range). This is the first time I have heard about the MAXIMUM gravity you can get from a mash. John/Jamil said that the only way to increase the OG to 1.100+ is to add DME or boil longer. What is the deal with this maximum, or am I just hearing this wrong?

I have seen plenty of All-Grain recipes for beers with an OG of 1.100+ on this forum that is All-Grain only (No DME or Malt addition). Are there special techniques being used to extract the proper OG, or what is it that I am missing?

TIA

 

[maida7]

I think supplementing with extract and/or sugar is the most practical way to go

You can mash thicker and maybe get it up to 1.085 for the first runnings but that's the limits. To avoid using extracts you will have a very inefficient mash and / or a looooong boil.

 

[Haputanlas]

Are you saying that the theoretical max is 1.085?

And how are most commercial breweries getting their extremely high gravities? Are they adding DME as well?

Lastly, how does one even attempt to try the following recipe with the grain bill listed (No DME or instructions about boiling off a ton of water)?
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f68/dark-night-soul-russian-imperial-stout-21088/

 

[maida7]

What is the theoretical max OG you can get?

And how are most commercial breweries getting their extremely high gravities? Are they adding DME as well?

Lastly, how does one even attempt to try the following recipe with the grain bill listed (No DME or instructions about boiling off a ton of water)?
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f68/dark-night-soul-russian-imperial-stout-21088/

Max OG will depend on your methods. You could boil the crap out of it and eventually end up with a sugary sludge.

Many commercial brewers use sugar to not only boost gravity but to thin out the body. Practically all belgian beers use sugar. Lots of double IPAs also use sugar.

Another method is partigyle. Brewers do a huge mash and then use only the first runnings. The second runnings are used to for a lower gravity beer. This is an economically way to make 2 beers and is popular with English breweries.

Trust me, that recipe need a long sparge and then a long hard boil to reach that gravity.

 

[david_42]

The highest first runnings I've seen was 1.078. That measurement was for 1.5 gallons off of 9.5 lbs of grain. I do tend to mash thin.

 

[indigi]

Using DME is the easiest way to go about it, but another choice is a double mash. Do one mash and collect enough runoff to use that to mash a second set of grain. I've no idea what kind of efficiency that produces or what such a long mash would do to body (which is usually important in a huge beer), but I suppose if you mash on the high end both times it wouldn't be a big deal.

 

[DrawTap88]

To ask the same question another way: Is there a max amount of sugar solution that a mash will give? (kinda like the total amount of IBUs can saturate a wort.) Does that make sense?

 

[prosper]

it's actually pretty simple math, and the theoretical maximum OG depends mainly on how thick you mash:

Base malt has an extract potential of about 36 points per pound of malt, in 1 gallon of water. So, if you had 10 lbs of grain in your mash tun and 2.5 gallons of water (~1qt/lb) and an 80% efficiency, you would have a theoretical maximum first running gravity: 10x36ppg/2.5*80% = max OG of 1.115

If you mashed at 2qt/lb, it would be 10lb*36ppg/5G*80% = 1.057

In both cases, you'd have exactly the same amount of sugar in the solution, but you'd have a lot more liquid in the last case that you'd need to boil off. Because of this exact reason, your overall brew efficiency will be much higher, because the wort left behind in your mashtun and spent grains would also be 1.057, instead of 1.115 - so you're throwing away less sugar

 

[babalu87]

This is the second thread like this today................... I think there are too many sub categories on this forum

 

[Got Trub?]

The other factor that likely plays a role is end product inhibition. This is a common mechanism for regulating biochemical reactions in which the product of the reaction inhibits the enzyme creating it. The strength of the inhibition is concentration dependant thus once a lot of the product is around, and it no longer makes sense to keep producing it, the enzyme is shut down.

GT

 

[Haputanlas]

This is the second thread like this today................... I think there are too many sub categories on this forum

What other forum would be more appropriate for this question?

 

[Tom]

Don't know where they got that. The thicker the mash, the higher the o.g.
Kai has a chart on his site of gravity vs mash thickness. http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/File:First_wort_gravity.gif
If you batch sparge you can check your own gravities for future parti-gyle brews.
On my last barleywine my first runnings were 23B or about 1.096 s.g.

 

[Haputanlas]

Don't know where they got that. The thicker the mash, the higher the o.g.
Kai has a chart on his site of gravity vs mash thickness. http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/File:First_wort_gravity.gif
If you batch sparge you can check your own gravities for future parti-gyle brews.
On my last barleywine my first runnings were 23B or about 1.096 s.g.

Most people seem to be in agreement that you are only going to get between 1.075 and 1.085 as your max. Obviously seeing all of these conflicting responses still confuses me.

 

[babalu87]

What other forum would be more appropriate for this question?

Actually, this one is in the right place. The other was in General techniques or some ****

Most people seem to be in agreement that you are only going to get between 1.075 and 1.085 as your max. Obviously seeing all of these conflicting responses still confuses me.

Proving that most people dont know what the hell they are talking about

 

[Haputanlas]

Actually, this one is in the right place. The other was in General techniques or some ****



Proving that most people dont know what the hell they are talking about

Wow, obviously I'll have to wait a while to do my first first AG high gravity batch . This is a great example unreliable information on the internet. Either that, or a few of us are talking about something different. Not that I don't believe everyone,i just don't know what to trust.

Kind of weird that no one is agreeing

 

[babalu87]

Wow, obviously I'll have to wait a while to do my first first AG high gravity batch . This is a great example unreliable information on the internet. Either that, or a few of us are talking about something different. Not that I don't believe everyone,i just don't know what to trust.

Kind of weird that no one is agreeing

The only people not agreeing are people who havent brewed a few high gravity beers.

 

[hibbleton]

Don't know where they got that. The thicker the mash, the higher the o.g.
Kai has a chart on his site of gravity vs mash thickness. http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/File:First_wort_gravity.gif
If you batch sparge you can check your own gravities for future parti-gyle brews.
On my last barleywine my first runnings were 23B or about 1.096 s.g.

D'oh! Wish I would've seen that before brewing yesterday. I attempted an all-grain imperial stout with 9.5 lbs of grain for a 2.5 gallon batch. I mashed thinner (2qt/lb) because I read on here that water can only hold so much sugar and you'd need more. Well what was supposed to be 1.100 OG was 1.074 after a 90 minute boil. I even collected more from the sparge (6 gal vs planned 4) to boil more off and up the OG. Was that counterproductive to a high OG? The runnings were still dark so I thought "why not, must still have lots of sugar."

 

[novafire]

D'oh! Wish I would've seen that before brewing yesterday. I attempted an all-grain imperial stout with 9.5 lbs of grain for a 2.5 gallon batch. I mashed thinner (2qt/lb) because I read on here that water can only hold so much sugar and you'd need more. Well what was supposed to be 1.100 OG was 1.074 after a 90 minute boil. I even collected more from the sparge (6 gal vs planned 4) to boil more off and up the OG. Was that counterproductive to a high OG? The runnings were still dark so I thought "why not, must still have lots of sugar."

You added more water with a thinner mash and by using 2 more gallons of sparge water. Of course that is going to be counterproductive to a high OG.

More water = more water. If you still wanted a 4 gal batch at 1.100, you would have to boil more of that water off, so you should have extended that boil to 2-3 hours.
Or mashed thicker and only used first runnings. Spage gravities will always be lower gravity than first runnings, so the more you sparge, the lower your overall SG will be.

 

[carp]

I brew 10 gallon batches (actually I aim for about 12 gallons post boil) and batch sparge. My first runnings are usually in the mid 1.080s, with 1.093 once. Volume of the first runnings is typically just under 5 gallons.