- System Specific/Anvil Foundry
- Beersmith Equipment Profile for Foundry 6.5 by /u/Oginme
- My Anvil Foundry 10.5 Efficiency Journey from 30% to 75%+
- How I Regularly Achieve 81-83% Mash Efficiency on the Anvil 10.5
- Getting Mid- to Upper-70s Efficiency Depending on Mash Thickness
- Andy Farke’s Review, Process Tips, and Efficiency Tips
- Anvil Brewing Transfer Pump
- Anvil Foundry Lid on Anvil Kettle (for Steam Condenser)
- Valve DIY Upgrade to Triclamp by /u/viper803
System Specific/Anvil Foundry
Beersmith Equipment Profile for Foundry 6.5 by /u/Oginme
Brewhouse Efficiency: 67%. This is an initial estimate that needs to be adjusted based on your own experience.
Mash Tun Volume: 6 gallons.
Mash Tun weight: 5.50 lbs, based on manufacturer specification.
Mash Tun Specific Heat: 0.12, based on stainless steel construction. The double walled construction should not affect this figure, which is used to estimate the heat loss to the mash tun to calculate the doughed-in mash temperature.
Recoverable Mash Dead Space: 0.87 gal (1.17 for the Foundry 10 gallon version).
Mash Tun Dead Space Losses: 0.00 gal. This should be adjusted based on your practices and experience.
Boil Off (Evaporation): 0.55 gal. This is an initial estimate that needs to be adjusted based on your own experience and observations. The Boil Off is likely to be affected by local factors, such as elevation, relative humidity that day, wind, and amount of air movement from any moisture ventilation fan you are using.
Cooling Shrinkage: 4.00% (/u/Oginme is using 2.20%, but 4.00% is a reliable estimate based on the physics of the expansion of water by temperature).
Loss to Trub and Chiller: 0.33 gal. Initial estimate. This should be adjusted based on your practices and observation. You can choose to dump the boiler out and have zero loss.
My Anvil Foundry 10.5 Efficiency Journey from 30% to 75%+
"First of all, I would like to congratulate all those folks that post 75% and 85% type efficiencies right out of the gate with their Anvil system; I am not one of those people. I started my homebrewing adventure head first and started all grain brewing with this system; so probably a lot of my newbie revelations will seem obvious to the more experienced. I created a reddit account just to make this post to hopefully help those like me who are struggling like I was. I also welcome additional comments on how I might get even more efficiency from my setup. I do use the recirculating pump.
"I searched the Internet high and low for comments and thoughts on efficiency while on my journey. When i say efficiency I mean two different things. Specifically in brewersfriend, I am using the pre-boil mash efficiency number you can only see when your recipe is read-only and the fermenter based brewhouse efficiency which is the total process efficiency number you get at the end in your fermenter OG reading versus what brewersfriend expects in the read-write recipe.
"So first off I followed the popular Internet advisements; first I played with my mill settings. I use a malt muncher 3 roll mill. I really played around with this. I started with the factory setting which is 12 o'clock and 14 batches later I have settled on around 1:30 o'clock for 'big grains' and around 2:30 o'clock from "small grains". These clock settings are facing the handle side and obviously the opposite setting is on the other side of the mill knob. There is quite a bit of dust, but the hull integrity is good enough. On small grains like torrified wheat or black patent; either there is no hull or the grain is so fragile it would be destroyed anyway. There is still quite a bit of fine grain slop at the bottom when I transfer to fermenter and I probably lose somewhere around a half gallon due to that...sometimes a full gallon. Making these changes did help my efficiency a little, but it was not an amazing leap...maybe 10% better.
"Another Internet teachings was temperature and also mash PH as well as DP. In general unless recipe specific I now run at 152F and last ten minute I run at 170F. I also found out the exact water report for the water I use (Costco water made by Niagara water in my case). I use these values to control my PH using gypsum, baking soda, Epsom salt and calcium chloride. I basically only make British inspired ales and go for something close to Burton on Trent water profiles. One thing I found out is that depending on your re-circulation technique; temperature values in and out of the mash pot can be wildly different. I increased my mash times from 60 minutes to 70-90 minutes to accommodate my techniques. I generally stir the entire pot of grain every 10-15 minutes; allow 10 minutes of settlng and then recirculate again. Before my final changes I will go into later I would sometimes run the recirculator full blast outside the mash pot to equalize the temperature in the entire system. Inside the pot I would have to run very slowly or a guaranteed stuck situation would occur. I also, when removing the grain basket, would put it on a deep baking sheet and capture all the drippings while boil and other activities were going on..it is not an insignificant amount of liquid. All these changes got me around another 10%...so now I was running at a whopping 50%.
"During this time I really started digging on my efficiency. I would take a refractometer reading several times during the brewing process. I started using a hop spider to limit some of the final slop in the bottom of the boil kettle. One discovery from doing this was adding a 1.5L starter really doinks your efficiency numbers. I accommodate for this now (basically front load my OG number to accommodate). There are a lot of opinions on decanting, etc. out there, but personally I am a cheap person and don't like throwing out beer and active yeast so I add the whole thing understanding the impact. The lesson I learned here is get the data often; cool your wort and take a refractometer at key moments, use a thermal pen to verify your temps in several places and use PH paper tests to see where your ballpark readings are. In the short term I would add a pound of sugar to compensate if the gravity reading was way off...at the time I was really sick of making session beers every time.
"Now I added a new part in the Anvil product line, the "small batch adapter ring", to my setup. In my opinion this is the "every batch adapter ring". I did find some knowledge of homemade versions of this in my googlings but not a lot of data. Not a lot to say..boom..there was another 10% efficiency just adding that.
"This next item I added was pretty trans-formative for me. Adding the Brew Bag made to fit the Anvil system (400 micron). i just did my first batch with it so information is preliminary, but OMG. My pre-boil efficiency was 90%. I actually ended up making so much beer I had to use two Anvil 7.5 fermenters for the batch (8 gallons total). I could not nicely fit the deflector plate when using the bag and I was doing my normal trickle style re-circulation and noticed the mash never settled. I think the re-circulation was just taking the easiest exit path which was the top of the bag. I ended up running the recirculator full blast without the defector plate. That was pretty satisfying. I could see the fine grain accumulating around the top where it was exiting, confirming my theory, and eventually the liquid rate was so high other exits had to be used and the grain bed would settle. I then did my normal stir routine, but with no settling time..blast for 10-15 minutes and then stir; wash rinse repeat. This was 16 pounds of grain so mileage may vary accordingly.
"Sparging never really seemed to improve my efficiency, but it is an effective way to do some extraction and also increase volumes. This comment is very specific to the Anvil system. Using all these mechanisms did improve my sparge experience, but in general it still dilutes my pre-sparge gravity. In the last batch i did end up sparging a little over 1.5 gallons, but mainly because I wasn't interested in making a barley wine and with my efficiency so high this was going to be a 8-10%+ ABV beer.
"I welcome any other ideas to continue improving. I kind of wish I had gotten the 200 micron bag to see the final slop reduction impact, but right now I am satisfied enough with the results."
How I Regularly Achieve 81-83% Mash Efficiency on the Anvil 10.5
By /u/bahr84
"Here is what I posted on the Anvil Foundry Users facebook group. It has helped many people increase their efficiency:
"I have received many inquiries into how I regularly achieve 81-83% mash efficiency on the Anvil 10.5. So, I've decided to make a post detailing my process. So, here goes. Apologies for the essay you are about to read:
"I use the small batch adapter. I theorize this increases efficiency due to the wort/sparge water being forced through the last 5 inches of the grain bed. Without the adapter, fluid will take the path of least resistance and go out the perforations in the sides of the malt pipe, missing a good chunk of the grains and sugars in the bottom. I have had my grain milled by 2 different LHBSs and achieved the same efficiency. I add 4 oz of rice hulls to every batch I brew. It makes a huge difference. Rice hulls are cheap. I keep a bag around at all times. I am using 220V.
"Step 1: Preheat strike water. I use 1.25 quarts of water per lb. of grist. Do not follow Anvil's recommended strike water volumes. They utilize a greater volume of strike water, only leaving a gallon of sparge water, which isn't nearly enough. The more sparge water, the more sugars you can extract from the mash. I add 2 mL of lactic acid to each the strike and sparge water.
"Step 2: Mash in. Stir vigorously while recirculating wort. Make sure to break up any dough balls. Leave the perforated sparge plate off the top for the first 30 min of the mash. Continuously, but slowly, recirculate.
"Step 3: 'Rake the mash' Stir the entire grain bed at mash in, 50 min, 40 min, and 30 min. Recirculate the entire time.
"Step 4: Vorlauf. After stirring at 30 min, affix the sparge plate and recirculate for the last 30 min. Do not stir the mash during this step. This will leave you with beautifully clear wort.
"Step 5: Mash out. Yes, do it. I know there is much debate over mash out. I get it, I used to think it was crap, but since doing a thorough mash out, I have increased my efficiency by 3% on average. Raise the temp to 170 and recirculate until the temp normalizes above 168. This takes about 15 min.
"Step 6: Sparge. With the sparge plate on, sparge with 170F water until you've reached your preboil volume. I go for 7.3 gallons estimating 1 gallon of boil off.
"I usually see a few % less efficiency if my grist is either wheat/adjunct heavy or over 12 lbs.
"Easy peasy.... Time for a beer. Prost!"
Getting Mid- to Upper-70s Efficiency Depending on Mash Thickness
"On my 6.5, I do an 0.032 crush on my 3 roller mill and get efficiencies in the mid to upper 70s depending on my mash thickness. I do some manual recirculation and stirring to help keep the temps in my mash range. I also sparge rather than do a full volume mash for a couple extra points on my efficiency.
"There is a slight learning curve to them. But once you sort out where the efficiency of your process is on the foundry you can dial in your recipe and make hitting your numbers nice and easy.
"Also make sure you measure the temp in your malt pipe. The built in thermometer sits in the dead space below the pipe right next to the element so I find that tends to be 2-5 degrees warmer than the wort in the malt pipe."
Andy Farke’s Review, Process Tips, and Efficiency Tips
Anvil Brewing Transfer Pump
Size of green thrust washer: OD = 9.35 mm ID = 4.35 mm Thickness = 1.20 mm (source)
Anvil Foundry Lid on Anvil Kettle (for Steam Condenser)
https://old.reddit.com/r/Homebrewing/comments/ysjj1m/anvil_foundry_lid_on_anvil_55_gal_brew_kettle/
Valve DIY Upgrade to Triclamp by /u/viper803
https://old.reddit.com/r/Homebrewing/comments/1fauebs/anvil_foundry_valve_upgrade/