Trouble Shooting My Mashes

WhiteLightning · Post by **WhiteLightning** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 6:44 pm

Ok, so i've not been having very good luck with my mashes. For a 12gal batch of mash I had 18lbs of course ground barley, 7lbs of liquid malt, teaspoon of amylase.
I boiled 5 gallons of water along with the malt for 10 min after boiling started. i added this water and malt to my 12 gal tub along with the 18lbs of dry barley, I let that combo set till it cooled off, which took 12hrs till temp was low enough to add yeast. I also added the liquid amylase before i let the mash sit for 12 hrs till yeats pitching.
I did get fermentation, but I dont think i'm getting enough conversion of the starches.
What am i doing wrong.

Post by **Grayson_Stewart** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 3:54 am

You're boiling your malt and killing off all the enzymes that convert starch to sugar. You shouldn't let the malt ever go above 150 F.

Post by **Tater** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 4:36 am

Some of the liquid malts have been boiled down before being canned and will not convert any other grains.

Big J · Post by **Big J** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 5:10 am

Is your barley malted? What was the temp of the mash after you add the water/extract mixture to the grain? It should be about 65C (definitely not above 70C or below 60C) if you are using malted barley and relying on that for conversion.

I've never used amylase enzyme additions but from what I have read it is usually only alpha-amylase, and you need alpha and beta-amylase for successful conversion of starches to fermentable sugars. Check if your amylase is a combination or just one.

Cheers,
J

Post by **Grayson_Stewart** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 5:45 am

My bad, I didn't see that you used liquid malt....liquid malt (as far as I know) will never convert anything because it is the barley starch converted to sugar.

WhiteLightning · Post by **WhiteLightning** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 7:30 am

dangit, cause the liquid is the cheaper of the two. I really couldn't tell you the temp, cause I dont rely on temp readings.
What would be a basic way to mash, that will produce me results?
Thanks

Big J · Post by **Big J** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 9:35 am

You should read through http://www.howtobrew.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow esp the section on all grain brewing. And the parent site under recipes>grain has some pretty straight forward instructions in many of the recipes.

Cheers,
J