[denny]

Kai, I agree with you.  I tried the cold sparge both with and without raising the mash temp first.  I found that raising the temp provided an efficiency boost with the cold sparge, but not raising the temp didn't.

That nice. Did you post about this experiment. It seems more comprehensive than what I did.

Kai

Nope, I didn't post.  It was just curiosity.  I used 2 consecutive batches of rye IPA since I make it so often and it's so consistent.

[denny]

I'm about wiped out from travel, but let me be sure I am clear on what is being said. ?The sparge water in a fly sparge can be cool for post mashout sparging? ?What is cool? ?What were the procedures?

Mike, both Kai and I batch sparge.  The water I used was maybe 55-60F.  As I said, I didn't do a lot of documentation since I was just curious to see what would happen.

[Mikey]

Next time you get your hands sticky from syrup or some other sugar substance, rinse one with cold water and the other with warm. The warm one will be clear of sugar faster.

I think you can cold sparge in a pinch, but there's no real advantage to doing it all the time.

[denny]

No one said there was any advantage to it.  It's just proving there's no disadvantage and the comparison to syrup doesn't work here.

[Kaiser]

Syrup is much thicker than wort. And while there might be efficiency benefits to using hit water I don't think that they are more than 1%. That 1% means much to commercial brewers but it's easily in the noise for home brewers.

Kai

[Mikey]

OK then dip both hands in concentrated wort, let dry and rinse. Warm water will rinse it faster, IMO.

[narvin]

OK then dip both hands in concentrated wort, let dry and rinse. Warm water will rinse it faster, IMO.

Maybe if you're rinsing wort sugars that have dried on your hand... which would be just as concentrated as syrup.

I haven't done the math, but I don't think sugar solubility / saturation point in 170 vs colder water makes much difference at all with the concentration at sparge time.

[Mikey]

I can probably brew beer standing on one leg, but what's the point? I'll be heating my sparge water while I mash, so the wort going into my tun is hotter, IE shorter brew day.

In the end, I'll have my feet up in the air drinking a cold beer, while you're still cleaning up. 

[Mark G]

OK then dip both hands in concentrated wort, let dry and rinse. Warm water will rinse it faster, IMO.

True, but who lets their mash dry before sparging? Now THAT would be a long brew day. 

[Mikey]

OK then dip both hands in concentrated wort, let dry and rinse. Warm water will rinse it faster, IMO.

True, but who lets their mash dry before sparging? Now THAT would be a long brew day. 

Good point.

[denny]

I can probably brew beer standing on one leg, but what's the point? I'll be heating my sparge water while I mash, so the wort going into my tun is hotter, IE shorter brew day.

In the end, I'll have my feet up in the air drinking a cold beer, while you're still cleaning up. 

What you seem to be missing is that's it's an experiment to gain knowledge as opposed to a technique you'd use in everyday brewing.  The purpose is to find out if a mash temp increase leads to lower viscosity and better flow of wort.  The indications are that it does not, but that doesn't mean I'll be sparging with cold water.  Unlike someone who's never tried that experiment, I now have personal data to draw on.

[bluesman]

Hopefully we will better understand this technique someday. Personally, I would be really interested in some experimentation done to prove the effects of a mashout on efficiency and fermentability. If there were only thirteen months in a year I could possibly find the time to git-r-done.   

[Mikey]

I can probably brew beer standing on one leg, but what's the point? I'll be heating my sparge water while I mash, so the wort going into my tun is hotter, IE shorter brew day.

In the end, I'll have my feet up in the air drinking a cold beer, while you're still cleaning up. 

What you seem to be missing is that's it's an experiment to gain knowledge as opposed to a technique you'd use in everyday brewing.  The purpose is to find out if a mash temp increase leads to lower viscosity and better flow of wort.  The indications are that it does not, but that doesn't mean I'll be sparging with cold water.  Unlike someone who's never tried that experiment, I now have personal data to draw on.

I understand that it was just an experiment, but I don't don't see the merits of it in brewing. Someone could measure the effects of butterfly farts on the environment and they might even find that they're detrimental, but in the end, butterflies will continue to fart.

And for what it's worth, long before I ever read this thread, I sparged my mash with additional warm (approx. 110F) water to extract a little more wort for a starter. It got me what I wanted, but as to the level of efficiency, I couldn't say nor did I really care at the time. So, based on what is described here, if I ever do it again, I can rest assured that I'm actually getting good extraction after all.  Thanks.

[4swan]

In a single step infusion mash what is the value of mashing out at a higher temp before sparging?  How do you know if you need to do this?

I know this doesn't chime in on the cold sparging, but I thought I'd add something from a fly sparger.  For a while I added hot water to bring up the mash to 165F before I started sparging. I stopped doing that, and now just sparge with water at 165-170.  I did not notice any change in efficiency or fermentabilty by removing the mash out step.

[Kaiser]

I don't think that the mash -out does much with respect to locking in the fermentability of the wort. After 60 min at 150-155F, there won't be much b-amylase left anyway, And that is primarily the enzyme that the mash-out is supposed to denature.

Kai