Grain conditioning ruined my efficiency?

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Hi all
Fairly new to brewing but I’m now producing some consistent and good brews on my grainfather.
However in my eternal quest to ‘improve’ my technique I seem to have tacken a couple of steps back.

I have been consistently getting between 85% and 89% mash efficiency but decided to try a couple of additions to today’s brew day which resulted in a mash efficiency of 67% aheadbutt

Firstly I used a Campden tablet to remove any chlorine and chloramine from the water. I don’t see this was the cause but mension it as it’s something I haven’t done before. I used half a tablet in the 18.5l of mash water and half a tablet in the 15l of sparge water.

Secondly I tried grain conditioning.
I used 112g of water for my 6.5Kg of grain, finely misted over while giving a good mix.
Left it for 15 minutes then milled it on at my usual spacing, it’s here I think I may have messed up. Should the grain be milled finer after it’s been conditioned?

Grain came out like this
2ileycm.jpg


And looked like this after mashing
34fd83o.jpg


Any thoughts?

I must add the flow was awesome, even with the valve for the pump fully open it didn’t reach the top of the overflow attachment.
 
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The campden tablet won'[t have effected efficiency in the slightest. Just looked at this site to see what grain conditioning is supposed to be:
https://www.homebrewsupply.com/learn/wet-milling-conditioning-grain.html
Seems a mighty faff for little return to me! If you're a big brewery trying to maximise potential then I suppose it's worth the effort- especially if it's mechanised.
I can only suggest that improved run through means you need a much slower sparge, but how to do that with an all-in-one is beyond my ken.
Anybody else tried this?
 
It was more for to reduce slow/stuck mash than the boost in efficiency.
It took maybe 5 minutes, really very little effort so thought I’d give it a go given the potential benefits
 
Reading this and I was getting a feeling of dejavu. Tried conditioning my grain for the first time last weekend just to give it a try and the same happened, although my efficiency dropped to about 78% from the high 80’s. Ended up undershooting my target gravity by 3 points.

Did wonder if the grain needed milling a bit finer if it’s been conditioned.

Will be going back to my crushing the dry grain again next brew.
 
I've tried grain conditioning, was quite pleased with the results. The husk stays intact so you can mill finer. Results in a good filter bed and helps with recirculation and sparging. I reckon you haven't milled fine enough
 
It does look like you have unbroken grain in the mash, why did you decide to condition? Have you had problems milling the grain dry?
 
From Brewers Friend:

"Why would a brewer care to leave their grain husks more intact during the milling process? There are several reasons that would lead one to consider malt conditioning:

  • Pulverized husks can lead to tanning [sic] astringency in beer
  • Intact husks will create a more free flowing grain bed (fewer stuck sparges)
  • You can crush finer to increase conversion efficiency without shredding husks"
 
Certainly there's got to be something that makes it worthwhile if some commercial breweries do it! I see that step of the homebrew supplies.com method (link above) says crush like normal- this is clearly wrong based on what Oneflower and others are saying.
As a matter of interest, 90% of my malt comes pre-crushed (only Brouwland don't mill the grain) and I rarely, if ever get a stuck mash. I wonder if you're milling too fine.
 
In the first picture there is definitely grain which hasn't broken which explains the loss of efficiency, maybe you should have adjusted your mill for a finer crush. Grain with to much moisture content will simply just go through the mill without cracking and releasing the fermentable sugar trapped inside.
 
You're hitting similar mash efficiencies as I am, and this brew hit similar to a recent brew where my grain didn't mill properly and I had a bunch of uncrushed grains. Like you said, great circulation and run off, but terrible efficiency. Never tried conditioning myself but I guess a finer mill setting would be helpful. Good luck.
 
What crush sizes is everyone using with GF? I am currently at 0.9mm and getting better efficiency. With a big grain bill I am getting very slow sparge but this is to be expected.
 
Probably about the same but haven't measured it, originally credit card width to start with then went a touch finer then a touch coarser. I slide a kitchen knife into the gap and have an idea where it should start to catch.
 
Just bought some feeler gauges to measure properly (used a card before).
Turns out I was 1.0mm one side and 1.1mm the other.
I assume this is much too big for conditioned grain. Have gapped it to 0.85mm, will give that a crack on the next one and report back.

Shouln’t have tried something new with such a nice beer really, was looking forward to it. ‘big smoke’s Underworld Milk Stout’ https://www.bigsmokebrew.co.uk/new-page
 
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Just bought some feeler gauges to measure properly (used a card before).
Turns out I was 1.0mm one side and 1.1mm the other.
I assume this is much too big for conditioned grain. Have gapped it to 0.85mm, will give that a crack on the next one and report back.

Shouln’t have tried something new with such a nice beer really, was looking forward to it. ‘big smoke’s Underworld Milk Stout’ https://www.bigsmokebrew.co.uk/new-page
Just try a couple of hand fulls first, just in case.
 

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