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Hello again and welcome back to Dudes Brews. Today we're tackling something every brewer deals with, efficiency.
We're going to explore mash efficiency and brew house efficiency. What they are, what factors affect them, and how to improve, and more importantly, get
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consistent numbers for both. So, if you're struggling with low or inconsistent efficiency and want to nail those target numbers more often, this one's for you.
[Applause] [Music]
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So let's start by quickly defining these two types of efficiency in simple terms. Mash efficiency is how effectively you extract fermentable sugars from your molted grains into work during the mash prior to the boil.
Brew House efficiency
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is how much of that extracted sugar actually ends up in the fermenttor after accounting for various losses through the boil and transfer. Mash efficiency is a key component and limiting factor for brew house efficiency which will always be the
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lower number after those system losses are factored in. Now before we get into the key factors that will affect efficiency, let's be clear on one thing.
Higher efficiency does not equal better beer. It can make your brewing marginally more cost effective or at
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least get you stronger beer for less grain. But if we push efficiency to the limit, we can actually end up with a negative impact in terms of off flavors related to tannin extraction from the grains.
So the point of this video is not to chase 90% plus efficiency. It is
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to give you the information necessary to control your efficiency and deliver consistent, predictable results which can improve your beer by making the planning and design of your recipes more reflective of the end result in the glass. Now, if you think that's good
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advice, smash that like button and subscribe if you haven't already done so. It really helps.
And remember, you can also follow me on the socials shown below to keep up to date with what's going on here on the channel. Right, let's get back to mash efficiency.
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Here's what affects it. Crush size.
This is probably the biggest dial you can control as a home brewer if you're milling your own grain. Otherwise, you are at the mercy of your supplers's milling consistency.
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I personally go with the often cited credit card size gap between the mill rollers, which seems to deliver the best results for my system. That's generally something between about 0.8 and 1 mm.
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In simple terms, a finer crush is going to equal more starch available to be converted to sugar. But you are running the risk of a stuck mash or sparge, which could ruin your efficiency completely if you go too far with that.
On the other hand, a coarser crush can
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equal better workflow and a more stable grain bed, but potentially lower extraction due to loss of starch being available. This is a trade-off and the best crush will depend on your system and process.
Brewing a bag, for example, can usually use a much finer crush uh
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because the way that system will work. So, experiment.
Basically, aim for the smallest crush size you can get while still maintaining a good flow of work through the grain bed. Also, be aware that certain grains may need to be treated differently.
Wheat, for example,
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can end up very flowery if it's crushed too fine. If this makes up a large proportion of your grist, so if you're doing a wheat beer, for example, you may want to adjust the overall crush size or mill the wheat separately on a different setting.
Once you are happy with your crush size, be consistent with it and do
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check your mill settings from time to time. On some equipment, rollers can shift slightly after use, and you may need to readjust them every once in a while.
Whatever your crush size, mashing ineffectively is imperative at the homebrew scale. I don't think you can beat a whisk for breaking up those dough
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balls at the beginning of the mash quickly and effectively. It's probably one of the most useful but simple tools that I use uh in the brewery.
Next, mash temperature. So, for mash temperature, really, we just need to make sure that we are staying within
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that temperature range for enzyatic activity for the full duration of the mash. Typically, the brewing window, which would be given as 64 to 70° C, that's 147 to 158 degrees Fahrenheit, is
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where you want to be. However, we may want to move a little outside of that range.
If you're looking for maximum fermentability at the lower end, think of super dry pills and that sort of thing, or more unfermentable dextrins at the higher end, thinking hazy beers or more body and lower ABV brews, for
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example. We just need to be aware that when we are at the extreme ends of the temperature range, that enzyme activity will start to drop off as shown in the graph on screen.
Now, and as such, complete conversion may take a little bit longer when you're operating in
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those temperature areas. As far as ensuring stable mash temperatures, make sure the mash ton is well insulated if that's an option for you.
Check the calibration of temperature and sensor controllers regularly as well. If you're using a ton that is heated in some way, it will almost always be a good idea to
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recirculate the work during the mash to ensure even heat distribution. You can check that with a probe thermometer as the mash is going on.
I'll put a link below to an example of one of those that I think is really good value uh in the description. So, mash time.
Generally
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speaking, the longer you mash, the more extract efficiency you gain. But most of the conversion does happen very early in the mash and may even be complete in some cases within 20 to 30 minutes.
Check out one of my older videos that explores that in a bit more detail
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above. Increases in efficiency will taper off quickly after this, if not stopping completely.
60 minutes is plenty for most modern well modified malts. Extending this out to 90 minutes may gain you a few more gravity points, but you're already well into the region
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of diminishing returns. By this point, it's up to you whether extending the brew day with a longer mash is worth the return.
And that will obviously depend on other factors like the strength of the beer you're making, size of the grain bill, and all that kind of stuff. We also need to consider mash recirculation and or stirring.
stirring
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and more recently recirculating using the Herm system that I've got have always increased mash efficiency for me, sometimes in quite a dramatic way. This can also increase the consistency of your efficiency as it will help to homogenize the mash, maintain stable
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temperatures if your ton is heated, and expose more of the starch to enzyatic activity as the work moves through the grain bed. Just be aware that with unheated mash tons, regularly opening and stirring will drop the temperature a bit.
So basically, don't do this so much
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that the enzymes actually stop working because you've dropped out of the effective temperature range for them. Water to grain ratio.
You will see a lot of conflicting views out there on this and lots of people that think that it's quite a big deal as far as efficiency,
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but the actual data seems to show that the difference between a thick and a thin mash when you're working within a fairly sensible range, so we're talking about 2 to 4 L per kilo uh will have a negligible effect on the yield. I would suggest from my own experience,
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however, that the main impact of doing a thinner mash in terms of efficiency will actually be you reducing your sparge volume because you're taking water away from the sparge and putting it into the main mash, which can potentially make a bigger difference in terms of the yield
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uh and efficiency because you're not having as much water to rinse out the sugars there. I use a water to grain ratio of 2.7 L per kilo which for me produces a mash thickness which is fairly easy to work with without reducing the sparge quantity too
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significantly. Mash pH again another one with a lot of information online that would suggest that mash pH will have a big impact on efficiency.
This is only really true if you're significantly outside of the typical mash pH range. So
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above six or below 4.5. According to the great John Palmer, and this is a quote from his book, How to Brew, total diastatic enzyme activity is robust for mash pH values ranging between 4.5 to six.
So basically, even
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if you aren't doing anything at all to control mash pH, this probably won't be an issue in terms of reducing your efficiency. Getting towards the end of the mash, sparging.
Your sparging method can have a big impact, but there's no right or wrong option here. Do whatever
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fits the system that you have and the time you have available and the process that you're most comfortable with. Most sources do agree that fly sparging can yield the highest efficiency uh out of the options that are available to us as home brewers, but it can also be the
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slowest method as well. So again, there's another trade-off here in terms of time versus yield.
Whether you batch sparge, fly sparge, or even do no sparge at all, just make sure that the process you use is consistent. Personally, I do a kind of hybrid of batch and fly
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sparging. And this will consistently deliver mash efficiency in excess of 80% for me with standard strength beers, and it doesn't take up too much time.
Certainly not as much time as a traditional fly sparge. What about the malt itself?
So the molster the malt
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variety and the age of it you will find some variation between molsters and malt varieties even if the published extract potentials are supposed to be the same. Just keep a record of any malts you find to give greater or lesser yields and account for this in your calculations.
Obviously
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on paper the fresher the malt the better the enzymes and therefore the better the extraction and conversion. However, I found that as long as your malt is stored cool, and dry uncrushed malt in particular will not suffer any significant deterioration even after
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several years of storage. And I've got plenty of pretty old malt that works absolutely fine for me.
What about the actual gravity of the work that you're producing? As the gravity of your beer increases, you're usually going to see a gradual reduction in efficiency.
This is
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partly down to the work becoming more saturated with sugars and partly down to less sparge water being available to rinse out the grain bed because you need more in the mash if you've got a bigger grain bill. Just keep a record and account for this in your calculations.
You could set up alternative equipment
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profiles for lower and higher gravity brews, for example. This would help you to avoid overshooting and undershooting your target numbers respectively when you're brewing different strength beers.
My usual efficiency numbers are based around beers that sit around 5% ABV
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because that's the typical kind of strength of beer that I make. But if I'm brewing a lower ABV, let ABV beer of 3 to 4% for example, that efficiency could go up by around 3 to 4%.
On the other hand, a big beer between 7 to 8% ABV
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might actually reduce the efficiency by maybe 5 to 8%. Very big beers like Imperial Stouts might see an even more drastic reduction.
So perhaps 20 to 25%. But bear in mind this can be mitigated to an extent if large quantities of simple sugars are being used to fortify
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the grist. So if we're throwing in lots of sugar or honey, for example.
So quite a few factors to be aware of, but nail those down and you'll be well on track to optimize your mash efficiency and achieve consistent predictable gravity numbers. But what about calculating the
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efficiency? So if we want to be consistent with efficiency, we need to calculate it.
measure it and then readjust if necessary. To do this, we need to make sure we're measuring ingredient weights and volumes from our recipe accurately and recording information on work gravity and yield as
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well. Now, the good news is if we plug all that info into most brewing software like Brew Father, then it will calculate it all for us.
But for anyone out there who has a fetish for equations, then here is the actual formula that you can use to work it out manually. So, we're
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going to need your pre- boil volume in liters. In the example, we're saying 25 L.
Your pre- boil gravity or points number. So, for 1045, that would be 45 points.
The weight of your grain in kilogram and the gravity potential in
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liter degrees per kilo, which is ppg multiplied by 8.3454. We then multiply volume by gravity points and divide this by the weight of the grain multiplied by gravity potential.
Multiply that result by 100
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to give you your mash efficiency. And you can see the worked example on the screen now as well as a version with imperial units.
Now brew house efficiency. This goes a step further.
It's not just what you got out of the mash. It's what actually made it into
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the fermenttor after all of your losses are accounted for. These losses will include boil off.
You lose water but not sugar to evaporation. Typical numbers are going to be between 10 to 15% uh per hour.
TRUB and hop absorption.
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Hops and brake material are going to trap work within them at the end of the boil. Dead space.
So that's any liquid that's left behind in the kettle or the mash ton which you can't get in to the fermenttor. Grain absorption.
So from the mash you're going to be absorbing
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approximately 0.4 4 L per kilogram which stays in the grain bed. Transfer losses.
Some of your W is probably going to end up stuck in the hoses, pumps, and chillers if it's passing through those Herms coils, that sort of thing. And finally, cooling shrinkage.
So, your W
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is going to shrink by approximately 4% as it cools down from boiling to fermentation temp. Now, some of these boil off absorption and shrinkage, we can't do much about.
They're just part of the process. But we can affect dead space and transfer losses.
If you're
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losing 5 lers of work, for example, to dead space in your ton or kettle, this can have a pretty huge impact on brew house efficiency at the home brew scale. But this can be a fairly easy fix in most cases.
Dead space losses could be
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reduced significantly or even eliminated with equipment alterations like bottom draining filters and pickup tubes. You can also take simple steps like tilting the vessel towards the outlet as it gets close to emptying if the equipment isn't too big and heavy.
Obviously,
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transfer losses can be reduced by simplifying and/or shortening pipe work and valve assemblies and also draining hoses, pumps and chillers as much as is possible and also hygienic particularly at the point where we're going into the fermenttor. filters becoming clogged
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with hops and tub can often lead to increased losses when you're unable to fully drain the kettle. Optimizing your filtering method or employing techniques like wellpooling can increase yield significantly.
In this case, I gave up on kettle filters completely and now
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wellpool then filter through a bag as it goes into the fe fermenttor or FV which is a bit unconventional but it's pretty effective and it works well with my setup. Now, one thing that can be a bit of a moving target is hop absorption.
Whole hops versus pellet hops versus hop
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extracts. They're all going to alter the level of losses due to the different amounts of absorption that they deliver for a given quantity.
And we also need to think about the style of beers that we're brewing as well. So, modern IPAs and hazy beers, which have got massive hopping rates,
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can lose much more work due to the sheer mass of the hop material that's going to be in the kettle. You might also be wanting to account for further fermenttoral losses later on due to the dry hop.
You could try and adjust for this on a brewby brew basis, but to be honest, I will just guesstimate the
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batch size required to make sure I get at least a full keg. And I'm happy with that.
I'm not too worried when it comes to those sorts of beers whether my brew house efficiency actually matches up to what I get at the end as long as I am hitting my numbers for gravity and so
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on. So brew house efficiency is a bit more straightforward to optimize once we have our mashing process in order.
Basically reduce the losses as much as you can to get the brew house efficiency as close to the mash efficiency as possible. So calculating brew house
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efficiency once again it's key to measure all of the losses and yields accurately so we can get an accurate number for the efficiency. Plug this all into your brewing software and it will work it out for you.
If the actual efficiency is different to what you started with, adjust this in your
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equipment profile for your next brew and you should start hitting those target numbers more consistently. So again, for the maths fans out there, here is how it's worked out.
Same formula, just use the quantity of sugar going into the fermenttor this time. So we need the
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yield or volume into the fermenttor and the gravity of the warts prefermentation. We need the grain bill potential, which is the same as before, worked out by the total weight of the grain bill multiplied by the extract potential.
In
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metric, we're looking for liter degrees per kilo for this. Then we're going to multiply the volume by points for the fermenttor and divide that by the grain build potential times the result by 100.
And that will give us our brew house
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efficiency which you can see in the example in the metric form that I've just done as well as imperial. So here's the bottom line.
Don't chase crazy high efficiency. What matters is consistency.
If you hit the same numbers
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every brew, you can design recipes that nail your target gravities and your other numbers every time. So, keep your processes repeatable, record everything, and adjust your calculations until the results start to match the recipe specs.
Then you can
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focus on the much more interesting parts of recipe design, like trying out new malts, hops, and yeast. Thanks for watching everyone.
If this helped you out, hit that like button, subscribe for more videos like this, and let me know in the comments if you have anything to add to the information that's been
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presented here. Cheers, guys.
See you on the next one. >> I'm the dude.
So that's what you call me. You know, uh that or his dudeness or duder or uh you know, eldorino if you're not into the whole brevity thing.