Chasing 2 Degrees Loss in the Mash Tun
A few months ago, I thought I’d fly sparge in my Mash Tun. I had built a sprinkler to help in this. I’ve since decided to batch sparge, since fly sparging is more difficult and is cumbersome to do with my setup. So for a while I left the sprinkler in place and didn’t use it. I noticed after my last brew day that I lost 2°F during the hour-long saccharification rest. I decided to get the sprinkler out of the way and removed it, which left a big hole in the lid. So I decided to add some extra insulation to see if I can ensure that there is less than 1°F of temperature loss.
The hole. Seems like this would cause a lot of temperature loss over an hour.
Cover over the top.
Cover inside.
This is what I tried.
Looks like a popcorn ceiling for a cooler.
So after nearly a day, I checked on it. It seems to have stuck – I couldn’t easily pull it off, although I don’t know how well it’ll hold during an hour-long mash… we’ll see next weekend.
It expanded a little. Which is okay.
It throws off the balance of the lid a little, but not too bad. Heck, the cheap hinges will probably go someday soon anyway.
Cheers!