I've had a couple of dreaded stuck sparges recently but I think I know what the problem might be.
I've managed to work through the sparges but the grain that's left behind has a good layer of what I can best describe as sand on top of the spent grain. It's seems to a recent enough issue, I've had more stuck sparges in the last year than I've had in the previous 4 years and I'm wondering if the shop I'm buying the grain from has changed how it's being milled.
The bags of grain I'm getting seem to have a lot of dust in them but they could have always been like that and I'm only noticing now because of these stuck sparges. I'll fork out for my own roller eventually but I can't afford one right now.
Could a homebrew shop change the way they're milling their grain? Would it be cheeky to ask them to mill the grain a bit more coarse?
If anyone has any suggestions I'd love to hear them.
Thanks
Are they mash kits? Turn the bag over a few times to evenly distribute the grain in the bag before adding to the mash water
you could try adding some rice hulls or oat hulls to fluff the grain bed up
If you're working from 25kg bags, you will likely have more 'flour' than hull as you get to the bottom of the bag.
The HBS use commercial crushers and unlikely to change the crush for just 1 punter as have to recalibrate back and it's a pig to set up to get it right to start
If you look at what you received you should have some hulls intact with the germ "popped" out and some split in 2
Have you changed your water to grain ratio or doing bigger beers recently ?
Can you post a pic or 2
What are you using to drain your MT, slits are better than punched holes, consider more slots/holes
Always have you holes slits on the underside of any pipework so that it will always draw and not be stopped.
A blast of co2 or small shot from the hose pipe usually will clear it if you are really stuck
As LE says oat husks or rice hulls are good particularly for wheat beers but need to be soaked/rinsed first.