[brewthru]

I have found thinner mashes will give me a few extra clicks in efficiency.  But since I full-volume, no-sparge BIAB, mash thickness is out of my hands.  Grain absorption and boil length essentially set my strike volume and water:grist ratio for me.

Now on some smaller beers, I'll shoot past my recipe's pre-boil gravity estimate and just reduce the length of my boil to compensate and hit target OG.

same, thinner gives better efficiency pretty reliably for me

unrelated sort of but it has been forever since i checked the gravity of the pre-boil wort.. it always feels like an additional hassle, especially just cooling down that small volume of wort to a temp you can check with a hydrometre... right?? any thoughts or methods?

I put the sample needed in a pyrex cup and then put the pyrex cup in a beverage center to cool.

[denny]

I have found thinner mashes will give me a few extra clicks in efficiency.  But since I full-volume, no-sparge BIAB, mash thickness is out of my hands.  Grain absorption and boil length essentially set my strike volume and water:grist ratio for me.

Now on some smaller beers, I'll shoot past my recipe's pre-boil gravity estimate and just reduce the length of my boil to compensate and hit target OG.

same, thinner gives better efficiency pretty reliably for me

unrelated sort of but it has been forever since i checked the gravity of the pre-boil wort.. it always feels like an additional hassle, especially just cooling down that small volume of wort to a temp you can check with a hydrometre... right?? any thoughts or methods?

I put the sample needed in a pyrex cup and then put the pyrex cup in a beverage center to cool.

I put the sample (4 oz) in a metal cocktail shaker and swirl it in a bowl of ice water. Down to temp in 60 seconds or less. And I wait til the wort has just reached a boil to be sure it's mixed well.

[brewthru]

"I put the sample (4 oz) in a metal cocktail shaker and swirl it in a bowl of ice water. Down to temp in 60 seconds or less. And I wait til the wort has just reached a boil to be sure it's mixed well."

Some software wants a gravity reading at first runnings and before boil for efficiency calculations.

[chumley]

I use 1.5 quarts of water per pound of grain as I can do the math in my head. I brew 10 gallon batches.

Say I am using 20 lbs. of malt. Heat up 30 qts aka 7.5 gallons of strike water. Malt absorbs 0.5 qt/lb., so I will collect 20 qts or 5 gallons. I want 13 gallons for the boil, so I heat 8 gallons of water for the batch sparge addition. It keeps things simple.