[syncopadence]

Gotcha. Yeah I wish I could be of more help with the milling, but I can tell you I've never had a stuck sparge. My usual runoff is also about halfway open. Do you also have the sparge arm? I've had excellent results with it, and it also means you only need to vorlauf once.

[Phil_M]

I don't, I batch sparged. Due to the limitations of condo brewing, I don't see that changing. No way I can store a 3-leveled sculpture in the garage and still be able to maintain my vehicles.

[VictorBrew]

I ended up having a terrible time getting my runoff to the point that it didn't have grain bits in it.

The real key to voiding the pesky grain particles in the kettle is a good long recirc, but it does not sound like that is an option.  I assume you were using a SS braid in old MT previously?  Prior to incorporating a recirc, I solved the problem by using my SS braid(the one previous was using in the MT) on the end of hose used to drain from the MT to the Kettle.  Worked great.  I saw that others suggested a mesh bag on the outflow hose, but I found the SS braid simpler to use and clean.

[Phil_M]

Half the reason I went with a false bottom vs. another braid setup was that I do plan on incorporating recirculation at some point in time. I may try and step those plans up.

[goforthegusto]

I am thinking you just need to pull off and recirculate more volume than you are used to doing. As another mentioned, the false bottom has a lot more surface area and larger openings, so there will be more grain making it through. The braided set up has a much greater degree of filtering (smaller openings), and the grain will set around the smaller surface, creating increased filter effect. I personally do continuous recirc with a pump, and it really does take a few minutes of circulation before I notice that the grain bits are no longer present. A few minutes of pumping is easily a gallon or two, if not more, of volume that is recirculated. Then, its probably another 10 minutes before I notice a good degree of "clarity" in the wort being circulated from the filtering effect of the grain bed. When I start my recirculation, I start with slow flow, and gradually increase it until it is at a pretty good flow.
I recently switched to a Spike brewing kettle with their false bottom which covers the whole bottom of the kettle, and have had a huge increase in my mash efficiency.

[Phil_M]

So now that the semester is done, I've finally been able to brew a second batch with the SS Brewtech mash tun.

Still having a terrible time getting it to run clear, still plenty of grain bits. Again, when going to cleanup I found a lot of grain had passed through the holes in the false bottom. I don't know if they're getting through during the mash, and I'm just not running off fast enough to suck all those bits out fast enough, or if the runoff is pulling them through the false bottom.

I'd really love to just recirculate and be done with it, but I'm not sure I'll have the funds to implement that this year.

[zwiller]

I used a false bottom a long time before switching to bazooka tube and it's an entirely different technique.  I'd say it's not suited to batch sparging at all.  Some pros use a mash filter/pad over a false bottom.  Something like this might help.  http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=24071  Might have to cut one out of the 55G size.  That said, using a fly sparge technique should work fine on a false bottom. 

[Phil_M]

I've been thinking about moving to full volume mashes, or fly sparging stronger beers. But again, recirculation isn't likely happening soon, and I'd need to either build a sculpture or buy a pump to start fly sparging.

So I guess you can say I'm moving in that direction, but idk when I'll be able to spend the money and do that.

[narcout]

I just used mine for the first time last week, and the runoff seemed as clear as usual.  There was perhaps a bit more particulate in the hop bag.

[Phil_M]

Do you mill your own grains? What's your mill gap set to?

My issue may still be running too quickly before the grain bed has set. However, with a ball valve it's touchy trying to get it draining enough to do something, but slow enough to not pull grain through.

I've been thinking about getting some of those Blichmann G2 valves since they're easier to clean/sanitize, but the linear "throw" may be a help as well.

[narcout]

Do you mill your own grains? What's your mill gap set to?

Yes. I have  Barley Crusher that I keep set at the stock gap (though I installed new rollers on it last year and the stock gap may be different now).

My crush looks like this:



To be clear, the hop bag catches about a golf ball worth the finest grain particulate (same with my old mash tun which utilized a bazooka tube).  Maybe that could be avoided with enough recirculating, but this seems easier to me.