Faires, Welcome to the Forum. The BIAB process is the Easiest and Best way to brew Great Beer.

The equations used for the Mash, based on temperature, Time, Ph an Grain bill, are very involved. You should Look in BIABACUS to see the easy way to Calculated your Recipes. You can Download "BIABACUS" at viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1869

and get "The BIABacus - Help" at http://biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=1863" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and You should read the "Clear Brewing Terminology (CBT)" viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2685

to understand the terms in BIABACUS.

faires1470 wrote:... people keep talking about efficiency, I understand that this is how much fermentable you get out of the grains during the mash stage, but how do you put a percentage on this, is there a calculation you do? There is probably a very simple answer to this but I've not been able to find it, can anyone advise?

Great site by the way, the brewing community seems to be the friendliest group ever, proof that beer is good.

Welcome faires, very good question and really pleased to see you are finding the community friendly as that is really important.

Down to business now

It looks as though you have already read Josh's link to Clear Brewing Terminology and, within that, it explains efficiency to a degree. The interesting thing is that, if an all-grain brewer is given the right tools, efficiency should not even be a question, but, as you say, you hear the term everywhere.

I've spent years trying to find a good way of explaining it* and the first thing I would say is that the first thing you need to know about efficiency is nothing - you only need to know you are using tools that will tell you if you have a problem with it. The only tool that will let you know if you do have a problem with efficiency is the BIABacus which Joshua gave a link to above. It looks daunting at first as there is a lot on one page, however, there is very little you need to know on that one sheet so have a beer and spend twenty minutes looking at it from Section A to K. Most of those sections you don't even need to know.

All you need to know is how much to put into a beer (water, hops, malt) to get what you want. The BIABacus will tell you that very well. If you didn't get out what the BIABacus tells you that you would, then there is a process to determine where you might be going wrong.

If you do have a problem, then you need to discover what is causing it. If you don't have a problem, there is nothing to worry about - keep putting in what the BIABacus tells you.

So, don't even think on efficiency now, spend a bit of time on the BIABacus and ask any questions you have. Also plan your first brew and start a thread on it. You might even be able to post up a BIABacus file or, let us know what beer style you like, what size kettle you have, how much beer you want to end up with and someone might be able post up a BIABacus file and tell you what ingredients you need to buy and how much water to use.

That's the key, knowing what to put into your brew to ensure you get out what you want. It's far less complicated than what you will be lead to believe.


PP

* My latest attempt is here but, as mentioned above, it is not an area you need to know about if you start with the right tools.

Hi again Pilch . A mod will try and merge the above post with your old account as I see you have remembered it now .

faires1470 wrote:Hi PistolPatch,

Basically the proof of the pudding is in the eating.
I have ordered a pre weighed beer kit...

That's all cool faires and thanks for reading my long-winded post above . Here's what you need to do...

The BIABacus works on the assumption that you are the brewer who is designing (or scaling) a recipe. In other words, you tell it what you want and it will tell you what ingredients to buy.

In your case, you have the ingredients so, fill out Sections A, B C and D as best as you can. Once you have done that, you will need to play with the Desired Volume into Fermentor (VIF)' field in Section B until the bottom right of Section C matches the weight of grain in your kit. This will differ from what the kit tells you you'll get as they work on generic assumptions. Once you have the right hand side matching, Section K will tell you how much water to start with.

Any problems, just start a new thread on the board as your questions might get lost in this thread .

PP

Welcome to the site, jheeley8.

Can you give us any more info on yourself and what you're hoping to do...? Was your first brew BIAB all grain? Let us know how we can help.

Hello Rocbrewguy, welcome to the site!

A lot of us have taken similar journeys... Whole grain is definitely the way to go for better beer. And BIAB is the simplest and least amount of equipment way to brew great whole grain beer.

Let us know what questions you have and one of us will be along to help.

Kyle, welcome aboard ! Familiarize yourself with the BiaBacus, it's a great tool to use with your recipes. Don't hesitate to ask any questions.....Remember , the only dumb ones are the one not asked .
Joe

Welcome to the site, Ron and Anthony!

There is a lot of helpful info here. You're already caught onto the BIABacus. Also the helpful BIAB terminologies link will help things make sense. Clear Brewing Terminology: http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2685.

You have me interested in trying one (or more) of your NZ beers. Likely multiple... The testing and evaluation phase...

Anyhow, welcome to the site and let us know if you have any questions.

Hello Oskarlid, and welcome to the site!

You are going to like using the BIABacus file. Works great. And don't forget to download the terminologies help. Links are a few posts up this thread.

Let us know if there are any questions.

I'm not welcoming Oldgit above as I just keep laughing at his pseudonym . (Mind you, he is into wine as is a recent new member. Wouldn't mind learning a bit about that!)

Hold on, was going to welcome the below but the pseudonym is in Chinese or something . I'll have a crack anyway...

BwanaMdogo wrote:3. What you think of it so far?
Looks like just the thing… lot's of info, simplified system, helpful folks

Welcome Bhagwan (whatever ). I'm reading your post as though it says info here is simple to find, or, did you mean the BIAB system is simple? BIAB is easy, but, info here is not as easy to find as any member would like, so, just ask questions when you can't find an answer easily.

As for the kit brew you did years ago, kits are super weird. I never brewed a good one - ever! But, two of the best beers I have had were kits brewed with no temperature control in hot sheds. Figure that one out? It gets better though; one of those two cold extract (liquid malt extract) beers was one of the best lagers I have ever tasted. The kit it was made from though, was an American IPA .

Those two beers, to this day, still have me bewildered.


PP

you Oldgit,

I am interested in your 70 L kettle. (I'm an idiot and have two of them). It's a good size in the way that you can do a single or double batch assuming a single batch is a 19L (5 gal) keg or 2 cartons of stubbies (48 x 375 ml)... what am I meant to say for US and UK???

Just don't buy two of them - it's too much!!!

A proper welcome aboard,
PP