Vern's Dunkel

Yes, that^^^
I would caution that the "Mash Complete" entry which gives you "conversion efficiency" is always different from "Pre-boil Gravity" though one would think they're the same thing...I've never been able to make the conversion efficiency make sense and just use the Pre-boil and "Boil Complete" entries to track things.
Point is that once you determine the range of efficiency you're like to get with your system - somewhere between 75% and 80%, for instance - you can set your preferences to use that number and your recipes will automatically reflect that and allow you to be pretty accurate when formulating a recipe. Of course, that assumes that you'll use the same or very similar procedure and volumes in terms of mash and sparge, etc. There'll always be a brew that for whatever reason is an outlier, but by and large you can dial it in and make things predictable.
 
Morning!
Grain bill, for all purposes was 7 lbs and water I used for mashing was 1.5qt/lb or about 2.65 gallons. It was pretty close to that. all of the grains, Munich Dark (5.5lb), Munich 10L (.5lb), Carafa II (3.75 oz), Melanoid malt (.75 lb) was all ground ground and went into the mash tun. Water was 160 to start. Stirred, but added about 1/3 tsp of Amylase Enzyme into the whole. 1 hour later, iodine showed blue, so I took out about 3 qts of grain liquid and boiled it on the stove for probably 10 minutes and added it back in during a stir.
Checked again in about 15 min, still blue, but temp was 151 deg F. so just stirred and lid.
Home made mash tun from 5 gal Rubbermaid orange (GOTT) cooler modified with circle of SS screen at the bottom connected to tubing to go out of the mash tun, valve on outside on same length of hose.

Checking again, there was no color from the small dab of "mash" water in my small white bowl. (used about 1 tsp of mash water) so conversion was done.

Started draining into my Bayou Classic kettle. before adding water to the mash tun I checked the gravity which was 1.083. Kept adding heated fresh water from a large pan on the stove to the grains to drain out more of the wort. By the time I got done, and according to the line I was at the 4 gal mark in the kettle.
At that point I checked the gravity and it was at 1.051 so I started the boiling.
Start of boiling I added 12 gram Crystal hops (AA 4.8%) with 8g of Hallertau (Yakima AA=3.8%) I saved the 20 g of 100% Hallertau for the final addition. I only had 1 oz (28 g) of both Hallertau and Crystal in the refrigerator.

Set timer for 50 minutes and stirred occasionally, while internet browsing and sipping my Bell's Porter.
After timer, I added the pelleted 20 oz or Hallertau hops (AA 3.8) to the boil, and at the end of the next 10 minutes I added the SS cooling coil and got it all hooked up.
Little over an hour from start of the boil I shut off the gas and started the cold water running in the heat exchanges. Stirring occasionally to help with cooling. Got it down to 65 deg F in pretty short order (we live in the country and our well water is pretty cold)
Took out the cooler and got a sample and checked the Brix/ S.G. It was back up to 1.060 and a bit high at 6.35% ABV

Ran the wort out the bottom valve through a wide funnel with a pretty tight nylon screen in it to a 5 gallon bucket and had to stop a few times to get the green gunk (assuming hops) off the screen to continue. Got that all done except for just a bit of sediment, leave and crap at the bottom of the kettle
Started more straining from bucket to fermentor (plastic 5 gal pet) and got out some more green sediment. I added about 1/2 gallon of my water (from winery) to the bucket and added in the wort from the fermentor. rechecked gravity and now it's at 1.052 for final gravity.
So by best guess is from 7 lbs of grist I ended up after boil with a little over 3.75 gals. of wort. Color is dark, but not black, more of a very dark brown.

Still have a bit of sediment at the bottom of the fermentor and going to rack the clearer stuff off that lees (sediment) so the beer will ferment without so much left over hops. and "other".

I understand some don't even rack off the green sediment B4 starting fermentation?
Addendum: racked and have about 3.60 gals, so probably had 3.75 gallons of wort after water additions, after boil. Took a small sample of the post boil wort (before any water additions in the aeration and straining) and this was from the bottom of the kettle, settled, poured off just a bit of sediment, to work this morning (Winery) and centrifuged the sample and read the Brix on our 16-8 Brix hydrometer, which read 14.50 corrected for temp. pH on our Hach Sen-Sion pH meter was 5.47. So I recorded those numbers. Remember, post boil was diluted to 1.052 with plain water since I wanted something in the range of 5.43 % ABV.
 
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After I got finished with cooling the wart I moved it to a 5 gal PET carboy. This was around 4:00 AM. Then pitched yeast S- 23. Later that morning about noon (LOL) I noticed the sediment at the bottom and racked off that into a 3 gallon PET at appx 85% full and a 1 gallon glass at about the same 85% volume. Fermentation started very nice by early afternoon and by Sunday morning going gangbusters.

Now it has slowed down and there is a sediment (and I assume yeast) at the bottom and wondered if you all rack again into a full secondary off the gross lees (trub) and then decant the bottom sediment to recover yeast for immediate use?

Nice color. I upload pics to the recipe. https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebr.../vern-s-dunkel
__________________
Vernon

I was born with nothing and managed to keep most of it.
Associate Winemaker in Michigan but former Nebraskan
 
You shouldn't be racking at all until after full fermentation and floculation - a week or two minimum. I'd be concerned that you've lost a lot of the yeast in the first racking and may have trouble with full attenuation.
Ignore the sediment. Just let it ferment. Staying on the lees is helpful for the first week or two.Yes, you can harvest the trub for future pitches.
 
I'm not concerned at all about any lost yeast. The yeast grows, multiplies (doubles in number) about every 80 to 100 minutes, depending on temperature. At higher temps the doubling effect is sooner.

So, yes you answered my question. Leave it alone until fully stopped at 2 weeks and I can harvest the yeast (and there still is a BUNCH) at the bottom.

Yeast bud with and without oxygen around 26 times to the point that budding scars are so plentiful that some either live and continue on for a while and die or reproduce sexually. Yeast start out asexual (budding making daughter cells), clones of themselves. Daughter yeast cells also bud, and create more daughters, and so on and so on. Then after so long they can reproduce sexually and produce a new strain of yeast. Saving "used" yeast at the bottom means saving a lot of yeast that have already had bud scars on them and reached or nearly reached the end of their asexual life. Some may even be hybrids. But, as it goes, there would be a WHOLE bunch of yeast to start up a new ferment.

I guess my main concern was this: Would there be protein and grain sediments, and left over hops that I would not want to introduce to a new wort?
 
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I’ve seen it said that you should make sure fermentation hasn’t completely stopped nefore you rack to secondary. Theory being, I believe, that you’ll insure a CO2 blanket in the head space. I think we all agree on RDWHAHB.
 

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