All-grain brewing without an HLT?

bwarbiany · Post by **bwarbiany** » Mon May 19, 2008 4:12 pm

Hmm... Very interesting:

http://www.alenuts.com/brutus20.htm

It's a two-pot system where you simply recirculate wort and sparge water back through the mash until the gravities equalize, and then pump from the mash tun into the boil kettle until proper preboil volume is reached.

Advantages: Only needs two pots. Simple. Impossible to oversparge the grain. Don't need to worry about pH. Probably easier than fly sparging, as it's almost a "set it and forget it" system during the sparge-- with some monitor of flow rates, of course.

Disadvantages: Needs two pumps. Slight cost to efficiency. Like batch sparging, requires proper calculation of total (mash+sparge) water volume.

If he's hitting 74% efficiency with this system, I'm not worried about it. And it seems like it's probably a LOT easier to hit ones target consistently, as long as you are able to measure a proper starting amount of water.

backyard brewer · Post by **backyard brewer** » Mon May 19, 2008 4:24 pm

I read that before. I think the idea is pretty neat. It's also a great idea for larger volume system where the cost of large kettles is prohibitive.

kevinham · Post by **kevinham** » Mon May 19, 2008 4:48 pm

That is pretty awesome

bwarbiany · Post by **bwarbiany** » Tue May 20, 2008 9:43 pm

Hmm... One thing I thought of is potential hot-side aeration. Since you're dripping wort over the mash as sparge water, it's being slightly aerated the entire time you're recirculating. If there's a situation where hot-side aeration could occur, this seems almost like a worst-case scenario.

BrewMasterBrad · Post by **BrewMasterBrad** » Wed May 21, 2008 8:32 am

My only concern with that system would compacting the grain bed too much with all that recirculation and ending up with a stuck mash. Instead of pumping directly out of the mashtun, I would use a grant.

Hot side aeration? You still believe in that myth?

bwarbiany · Post by **bwarbiany** » Wed May 21, 2008 9:23 am

Brad,

I was doing some research and saw this, which discusses things like channeling as well as compaction. The theory they provide is that keeping a mash "supersaturated" and the flow rate minimal will keep the mash fluid enough that it won't be a problem.

All that being said, though, I know there are a lot of single-tier brewers who pull the wort out of the mash with a pump while fly sparging, and I haven't heard of them having a problem with stuck mashes. And I'm using a false bottom configuration, which is a little more difficult than a manifold to stick.

BrewMasterBrad · Post by **BrewMasterBrad** » Wed May 21, 2008 9:38 am

I think alot depends on the dimensions of your mashtun too. I have recently gone back to using gravity during my sparge rather than using my pump. Of course, I experience very slow flow rates when my mashtun is maxed out with grain also.

maltbarley · Post by **maltbarley** » Wed May 21, 2008 2:38 pm

I recirculate the entire time I'm mashing (to maintain mash temp or slightly increase) and just switch over the recirc. pump to the HLT for the gravity sparge. So far, I have not experienced a stuck sparge.