Beer Forum

I am going to do my first partial mash and I have the ability to do a full 5 gallon boil.
I am going to mash in a cooler with 2 gallons of water and 3.5 lbs of grain at 155 degrees. After mash, I will use 4 gallons of water already heated to 165 degrees in the brew kettle to rinse the spent grain for 20 minutes. After the twenty minutes is up, I will pour the first wort into the sparge water and continue as I would with any other all-extract brew day.

I have a couple of questions. Will my strike water be enough to allow for good conversion? Will 4 gallons of water be too much to use for the sparge? Am I way off on anything else?

Thanks for any input!

First of all, what are you making? What size cooler, what size pot?
What method are you using to drain your mash tun?
I know, I know. I answered a question with a question, but to be able to answer effectively, I need some details.
Cool?

snowcapt wrote:First of all, what are you making? What size cooler, what size pot?
What method are you using to drain your mash tun?
I know, I know. I answered a question with a question, but to be able to answer effectively, I need some details.
Cool?

Absolutely cool! I appreciate the feedback.
I am making a Citra Pale Ale from Austin Homebrew. The cooler is a 10 gallon cooler with no spigot. The kettle is a 7 gallon pot that came with my turkey fryer. I was planning on using an auto siphon and racking cane to move the wort to the kettle to keep the chance of oxygenation to a minimum.
Thanks!

Go get a stainless braid and a hose. You got the turey fryer turkey hanger onner thingy? Put the braid on the end of a hose with a hose clamp. "Weave" the braid through the turkey thing at the bottom. Just suck on the end and form a siphon. Just do it like a normal sparge and collect that way. Just do a regular batch sparge, in other words.
Gimme a few minutes and I will put up a photo of it.
Stay tuned....

That is a back up BLUE cooler, without a hole. I used the setup pictured for it, and it worked out pretty darn good. Almost 25 lbs in that sucker, as you see.
Just remember to preheat the mash tun with boiling water.
Anything else?

That is genius! I can definitely get that done.
So now can I do a bit of "real" sparging with this setup? Should I still have the majority of my boil water already in the kettle or should I mash with the two gallons and then run the other four gallons through the mash tun and into the kettle through the siphon?

Thanks for the help and great tip!

With that small amount of grain, I would probably use 2 gallons to mash and two gallons for batch sparging. Use the other 2 gallons to mix your extract in.
So, mash, stir, recirculate until clear, drain into kettle. Put in sparge water and repeat. Done deal.
You just went all-grain, bro!(gong)

Thanks again for your help. Brewing tonight so wish me luck!