Mash Tun - BIAB strainer bag?

[Nztayls]

Well, finally managed to do a half-decent job of converting a Coleman beverage into a mash tun. It now has a ball-valve installed, and now I just need to work out what to do on the inside. I was thinking of a false bottom from www.allgrain.co.nz, or making a manifold out of steel mesh tubing. But then I thought, what about just using a BIAB bag? I already have one of these,...and as I am trying to convince my wife that my new hobby is cheap,...the costs are starting to mount up, and she is noticing.

Would there be anything wrong in lining the cooler with a mesh bag to act as a filter for the grain?. Seems a simple solution,...which leads me to think that there is probably some issue with it that I haven't considered. Oh, and I plan on batch sparging.

[Stu H]

Dude, I reckon it's a great idea. I used to BIAB and moved to a three vessel system with a braided hose in the mashtun. I found I was getting pretty average results sparging, and have started lining my mashtun with the bag. Now I'm getting much more reliable sparging, and higher efficiency.

[Ralph]

I could see it working well. You basically want an even bed of grain and even flow through the bed of grain. I would think you would want some sort of tray to hold the bag up off the bottom of the mash tun by a few mm as if the bag is pressed hard against the bottom the liquor cannot flow down through it to then be collected.

Something a bit like a cake rack sitting in the bottom to hold the bag up a little?

[Karl Hayes]

Hi. You could consider something like this which shouldn't break the bank. The BIAB option won't work very well without the modification Ralph mentions or possibly suspending the BIAB bag when sparging.

[Nztayls]

Thanks Karl. Is this flexible? My cooler is a round one, so I doubt that it would be 12" across the bottom, meaning I would need to bend it. If that makes sense.

[Karl Hayes]

Yup - perfect sense. They're not flexible but you can crop them with something like a tin snips and re-crimp the end.

[Scarrfie]

Here is my set up, which is on these forums somewhere. That has done me 35 batches although I have hopefully a better option I am working on now.