Braumeister 20l equipment profile and mash profiles

[philthebrewer]

If you are reading this then you have probably bought or are thinking of buying a Braumeister brewing kit and are wondering how to get the best out of it.  I have now been using my Braumeister 20l for 5 years and have brewed around 50 different beers.  47 have been excellent.  Of the remainder I have had 2 equipment failures (1 impeller failure and 1 thermostat breakdown) both of which were quickly fixed by replacement parts from my supplier (HumlegÃ¥rden in Sweden) with great support from Speidel.  The remaining 1 failure was my own fault due to insufficient sanitation.  The best recipes I have now put into the beersmith recipe cloud.  I would love to also put the equipment and mashing profiles in the cloud as separate items but this is not possible, so I am making this post.

There is always a demand for the equipment profile from new starters with Braumeister, so I post this here as my last posting was in 2011.

I had been hoping that someone else (maybe Speidel) would create a set of mashing profiles for different types of beers as the great strength of the Braumeister equipment is its ability to perform multi-step mashing with ease.  However, since nobody else has come along I will publish my own.  After much experimentation and reading I have come up with the attached 4 mash profiles for full body, lager, light body and wheat beer.  They do produce a different outcome and I would love to get some feedback from others.

Ideally I would love to see postings here from anyone who has improved on these equipment settings or mashing profiles or has other specialty mashing profiles to add.

happy brewing
Philip

2020 Update on grain absorption and water profiles:
I have just started using my Braumeister again after a 3 year holiday (moved to Italy) and have updated to Beersmith 3.

I have always had problems with both water volumes (too much sparging recommended) and estimated Final Gravity (too low).  So I decided to do some internet searching and see if anybody has solved these problems.  Good news:

1. Speidel have released a much better set of instructions here: https://www.speidelbraumeister.com/  They also recommend starting the mash in at 60 degrees C (140F) in order to reduce the cleaning of the heating coils (have not tried that)

2. You can adjust Beersmith to solve the excessive sparging recommendation. 
This is done by either editing your mash profile by ticking the box "Brew in a Bag" or by going to Tools/Options/Advanced Options and adjusting the Grain Absorption down from 0.96 to something lower.  I just copied the BIAB 0.586 number as it produces the correct sparging volumes for my typical brew.  See attached screenshot.  I prefer this method as Beersmith then reminds me to do some sparging.  I only sparge around 2 litres even if Beersmith says to do more, but I just add the extra as top up water.


3. You can adjust the FG estimate in the same Advanced Options screen by unticking the box "Adjust for Mash Temperature" (see same screenshot).  When I do this I get FG estimates exactly matching my FG outcomes.

Hope this helps
Philip

[MR2Matte]

Thanks a lot for this Phil. I'm also a Swedish homebrewer from Skåne. Going to get my 20L braumeister today. Been going at it with manual induction heaters/pots/pots with heating element built in etc to learn the brewing process properly the past 2 years, but now am sick of using so many different pots etc and not entirely happy with the BIAB method so finally gave in and decided that it was time for a Braumeister 20L system.

Will try out your beersmith profiles! thanks a lot.

where are you based by the way?

[philthebrewer]

Hi Matte.  Welcome to the weird world of Braumeister.  Probably you have made a brew or 2 on the weekend already.  The most difficult part I find is to get the water levels correct.  The Braumeister instruction manual shows a 23 litre mashing volume and then does no sparging and some top up.  This does not give a good yield.  So the trick is probably to determine the perfect sparging volume (say 5 to 7 litres) and then work backwards to how much mashing water you need.   The good thing is that water is free (well almost) and here in Stockholm it is pretty good quality.

Happy brewing and feel free to ask any questions about the Braumeister.  I may just have solved them or if not it will make me feel better to know that others have the same problem.

Cheers
Philip

[Cervantes]

Hi guys,

Not sure if you're aware, there is now a dedicated International Braumeister forum https://forum.braumeisters.net/

It's early days yet, but it's shaping up to be a great resource for Braumeister owners.

Cheers
Andy

[ud03266]

Hi guys,

I'm just buying the Braumeister, but I'm also in Sweden (although an American).  Can we stay in touch on our brewing experiences?

/Jay

[Roadrocket]

I've got the 50l but I mostly brew 25l batches using the short malt pipe. I have the stainless hood which I find reduces boil off down to about 3l per hour. I mash in with 30 litres then sparge with enough water to account for the grain absorbsion. I then get 25 liters in the fermenter after losses to boil off and trub etc.

I use pellet hops which I find easier to use and much easier to clean up. I don't bother with a hop filter. I whirlpool after the boil and wait 20 minutes for the trub to settle before running the hot wort through a plate chiller into the fermenter. I get a very small amount of hop debris in the fermenter but it soon settles to the bottom and doesn't end up in the finished beer. I back flush the plate chiller and I've not had any problems with blockage.

I don't brew any better beer on the Braumeister than I made with my old 3 pot system but it really works well, it's much easier to clean and has a much smaller footprint. It's also beautifully engineered. I love it.

[Tee Jay]

Hi there,
you mentioned using a stainless steel  hood. My 20 l struggles to hold a good rolling  boil & limited to 99 degrees C
Will the hood assist in  the boil temperature?

[The Beck]

Phill how do I add the mash profiles you posted to BS?  I can open them just fine when I drag the downloaded file into or onto beersmith but I cant find a way to make it a part of the mash profiles in beer smith.

[brewfun]

Phill how do I add the mash profiles you posted to BS?

Open the Braumeister file in BeerSmith.
Open Profiles > Equipment
Copy the Braumeister file
Paste the file into the equipment list. It will autosave upon closing the profile window.

Do the same for the mash profiles.

BeerSmith will reprompt you to save the imported file. You can select "no" or you can save the file in a folder for future reference.

[The Beck]

Thanks brewfun.  Spent the last day trying to figure why my desktop folder was locked,  After i got that sorted out your instructions worked,

[hambrook]

Just did my first brew in my BM 20L - I plan to brew English Ale / Bitter and am trying to understand the best mash schedule for these dark brown , malty beer styles - I NEARLY used the Full Body version posted above but was unsure about the high temperatures as the recipe I am using specifies a 90 minute 66 degree mash.

Has anyone got a success full Mash profile for English Ale in a BM?

Here's the log of my first brew day: https://forum.braumeisters.net/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=977

[MonsieurBadgerCheese]

Good Evening,

brewfun,

Thanks for the info. I am the new proud owner of a 20L Braumeister. I tried to follow your instructions, and successfully added the 'equipment profile'. As you said, when I exited, the program asked me to save. I accepted. My issue is, to where? Where is the profile saved to? I can't find it again! Thanks in advance.

MBC

[brewfun]

As you said, when I exited, the program asked me to save. I accepted. My issue is, to where? Where is the profile saved to? I can't find it again! Thanks in advance.

The files as pasted above is probably still in the download folder you have assigned. They have different functions, though. One is for equipment and the other is for mashing. You must add them to BeerSmith appropriately.

When BeerSmith opened, did you copy it to the respective Equipment or Mash profile they belong within?

The equipment profile is "Braumeister 20l" and the mash profiles all begin with "Braumeister."

[MonsieurBadgerCheese]

It was the equipment profile that I was trying to add. I had Beersmith2 open on the 'Profiles/Equipment' window and the 'Braumeister 20l equipment setting by philthebrewer.bsmx' file on the desktop. When I dragged the file onto the window, the profile successfully opened in Beersmith2. When I closed the window, Beersmith2 asked me if I wanted to save the profile. I selected 'yes', but was then unable to find the Braumeister profile again. Presumably it should be saved in 'Profiles/Equipment'?

MBC

[brewfun]

When I dragged the file onto the window, the profile successfully opened in Beersmith2. When I closed the window, Beersmith2 asked me if I wanted to save the profile.

And it opened as it's own tab, correct?  The file still needed to be dragged into the equipment profiles tab.