Thinking of starting biab

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Chrissparky

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After a couple of partial mashes, I'm thinking of going down the biab method due to being able to do cheap all grain recipes easier with less gear. I'm thinking of buying an ace boiler off eBay. Any advice on how I would need to tweek all gain recipes to biab brew them instead? Thanks in advance
 
Not sure there's much tweaking to be done. I use Brewer's Friend for recipes and BIAB in my ACE and I end up with pretty much exactly as predicted in my FV in terms of gravities and the like.

Only qualification to that is I make smaller than 23L batches. but the principle's the same.
 
I don't believe any grain amounts have to change.

For true biab you mash in the listed mash AND sparge water if your boiler is big enough, this can lower the efficiency and require extra Base malt to balance it out.

Lots of people on here (myself included) use either geterbreweds or the home brew company's biab starter kit/peco boiler. Not sure how it compares price wise (are there still forum discounts have checked recently) to your intended purchase but they both include a grain kit (I think).

Using this I mash in 20-24litres and then dunk/batch sparge with another 12 to get full volume for boiling.

If you have a Large stock pot for your partial mashes you can try a simple 5litre smash as detailed in the simple ag thread.
 
Just do them as written. I seem to get better efficiency at the moment than the recipes I use (Greg Hughes) seem to suggest.
I use a 30L ace boiler which is a bit too small for a full 23L BIAB so I mash in a smaller amount (about 4 gallons) then dunk sparge in an FV with some hot water in it which I use to top the boiler up.
The beers I've been producing are usually better than an equivalent you'd buy from a pub/supermarket. So go for it.
 
Thanks
I'll try this, the ace boiler on eBay looks a good buy. With hop strainer, false bottom and a grain bag. Have a look I might order one tonight. Let me know what you think and if it's good value before I buy
 
Just do them as written. I seem to get better efficiency at the moment than the recipes I use (Greg Hughes) seem to suggest.
I use a 30L ace boiler which is a bit too small for a full 23L BIAB so I mash in a smaller amount (about 4 gallons) then dunk sparge in an FV with some hot water in it which I use to top the boiler up.
I do the same but my last 3 brews have had horrendous efficiencies. My first brew in the Ace I managed 75%, which is what I was getting with my old boiler before it blew up(Greg Hughes American Wheat); 2nd was 65% (DIY Dog Santa Paws); and 3rd 60% (own recipe steam beer). For my next brew (Greg Hughes Belgian Pale with CaraBelge instead of Caramunich) I'm going to mash and boil for an extra 15 minutes to see if it helps.

The only other things I can think of is that the GEB custom grain kits are giving me my poor efficiency (but the fact I did so well with the wheat beer suggests otherwise), that the DIY Dog recipes specify a higher efficiency than they give (but I plugged it into Brewers Friend and it wasn't a million miles away), or that my last brew day was rushed because 1) I had a brew buddy, and 2) I needed to get out of the house by 1:30pm because I had to drop my Mrs off at the cinema.
 
I do the same but my last 3 brews have had horrendous efficiencies. My first brew in the Ace I managed 75%, which is what I was getting with my old boiler before it blew up(Greg Hughes American Wheat); 2nd was 65% (DIY Dog Santa Paws); and 3rd 60% (own recipe steam beer). For my next brew (Greg Hughes Belgian Pale with CaraBelge instead of Caramunich) I'm going to mash and boil for an extra 15 minutes to see if it helps.

The only other things I can think of is that the GEB custom grain kits are giving me my poor efficiency (but the fact I did so well with the wheat beer suggests otherwise), that the DIY Dog recipes specify a higher efficiency than they give (but I plugged it into Brewers Friend and it wasn't a million miles away), or that my last brew day was rushed because 1) I had a brew buddy, and 2) I needed to get out of the house by 1:30pm because I had to drop my Mrs off at the cinema.

I'm guessing these kits come with their grain pre milled. If i am correct BIAB benefits from a finer mill that 3 vessel so it could be that the mill from the kits is too coarse for decent efficiency for BIAB.
 
I do the same but my last 3 brews have had horrendous efficiencies. My first brew in the Ace I managed 75%, which is what I was getting with my old boiler before it blew up(Greg Hughes American Wheat); 2nd was 65% (DIY Dog Santa Paws); and 3rd 60% (own recipe steam beer). For my next brew (Greg Hughes Belgian Pale with CaraBelge instead of Caramunich) I'm going to mash and boil for an extra 15 minutes to see if it helps.

The only other things I can think of is that the GEB custom grain kits are giving me my poor efficiency (but the fact I did so well with the wheat beer suggests otherwise), that the DIY Dog recipes specify a higher efficiency than they give (but I plugged it into Brewers Friend and it wasn't a million miles away), or that my last brew day was rushed because 1) I had a brew buddy, and 2) I needed to get out of the house by 1:30pm because I had to drop my Mrs off at the cinema.

My efficiencies were very variable to start with - buying crushed pale malt in 25Kg bags, first bag had good efficiency, second bag was terrible, third was back to pretty good. But it became noticeable that the first brew from a bag had much much better efficiency than the later ones, so obviously the crushed grain was just going stale and losing it's enzymes.
Then I made a mistake with my order and got whole grain instead of crushed. It may seem a bit illogical but I bought a grain mill (even though the grain mill cost more than the 25Kg of grain!) so I could use the stuff. It's one of those little hand opperated ones like a big mincer and was about £40 if I remember correctly. My efficiencies went through the roof. Also my final gravities dropped from about 1014-1015 down to 1010 and depending on the yeast even 1008. So I'm never going back to crushed grain. These days I'm using about 8Lb of pale malt to get the same OG as when the recipe calls for 10 or more. So I now get 7 brews from a 25Kg bag rather than the 5 that I used to get.
Even with this little grinder I find that I can grind all the malt in the same time my boiler takes to get the water up to mash temperature so it doesn't add to the length of the brew day - though it takes 110 turns of the handle to grind 1Lb of grain...

Northern brown 26-4-16 - 2.jpg
 
My efficiencies were very variable to start with - buying crushed pale malt in 25Kg bags, first bag had good efficiency, second bag was terrible, third was back to pretty good. But it became noticeable that the first brew from a bag had much much better efficiency than the later ones, so obviously the crushed grain was just going stale and losing it's enzymes.
Then I made a mistake with my order and got whole grain instead of crushed. It may seem a bit illogical but I bought a grain mill (even though the grain mill cost more than the 25Kg of grain!) so I could use the stuff. It's one of those little hand opperated ones like a big mincer and was about ��£40 if I remember correctly. My efficiencies went through the roof. Also my final gravities dropped from about 1014-1015 down to 1010 and depending on the yeast even 1008. So I'm never going back to crushed grain. These days I'm using about 8Lb of pale malt to get the same OG as when the recipe calls for 10 or more. So I now get 7 brews from a 25Kg bag rather than the 5 that I used to get.
Even with this little grinder I find that I can grind all the malt in the same time my boiler takes to get the water up to mash temperature so it doesn't add to the length of the brew day - though it takes 110 turns of the handle to grind 1Lb of grain...

Good info this, thank you. It's just what I'd read sometime ago that BIAB requires a finer milled grain. I have been using all grain kits from Worcester hop shop and getting various efficiency results from poor to just about acceptable ie 60 to 72% using the true BIAB method, as in 34 litres to mash and boil in a 50 litre pot on a gas burner, and no sparged, this gets me approx 22L in the FV . I've tried much stirring during the mash, mashing out to 80 deg for ten minutes and extended boil times , all to little avail.
Of course, as others have suggested, you can always add more grain to start with (I typically add an extra 500g to achieve desired og) and it's cheap enough I guess but having properly crushed grain to start obviously makes all the difference !
Which mill did you buy ? I'm figuring it's the way forward....
 
I'm guessing these kits come with their grain pre milled. If i am correct BIAB benefits from a finer mill that 3 vessel so it could be that the mill from the kits is too coarse for decent efficiency for BIAB.

Possibly. GEB are usually pretty good, might throw in a message next time I order asking if they can give me a finer crush and see what happens.

Due to the fact I try to cut out as much "extra" work as possible on a brewday (as much about my own laziness as it is about my official excuse of wanting to spend as much time with my kids as possible), I'm not too keen on getting a grain mill so I'll just persevere for now until I crack it - I've only done 3 brews with my Ace now so I'm still finding my rhythm with it a bit.
 

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