Malting Equipment for Breweries That Malted In-House
Malting in-house is a decision about control, not about saving money in year one: it puts germination, kilning and the flavour of your base malt inside your own building. Hermann lists malting equipment inside its product range alongside brewing vessels, distillery equipment and auxiliary kit, so a malting line can be specified the same way as the rest of the plant. This article covers what a malting add-on needs, how it interacts with your brewhouse, and the arithmetic behind buying micro brewery equipment and a malt line in the same project.
Key takeaways
- Malting is listed as part of the published range, so it can be quoted with the vessels rather than sourced separately.
- Steeping, germination and kilning need water, gentle heat and airflow of their own; they cannot share the brewhouse services without a plan.
- A malting line roughly doubles the raw-material weight you handle, because grain loses mass as it germinates and dries.
- Every shipment leaves with five inspection steps behind it and a data plate on each tank, which matters when a second vessel joins the site later.
Why a brewery considers malting in-house
The usual reasons are control and identity rather than price. A brewery that malts its own base grain can set kilning temperature itself, which is what separates a pale base from a lightly coloured one, and can build a house character that no bought-in bag can copy. The cost is space, utilities and attention: malting is a second process with its own schedule, and it does not forgive interruptions. For most small breweries that means one malt at a time, brewed in a rhythm that matches batch size, rather than a catalogue of styles made from home-malted grain.
There is a middle route that suits small breweries well: buy the base malt and malt only the speciality grain that carries your house flavour. It keeps the process knowledge inside the brewery, keeps the grain store small and leaves the bulk of the tonnage to a supplier who malts every working day. Decide that split before the malting line is sized, because it is the biggest single input into how much plant you actually need.
What malting actually involves
The sequence is short and old: soak the grain so it begins to germinate, keep it turning while enzymes develop, then dry it with warm air until it is stable, and finally mill it for the mash. Each stage has its own vessel and its own air or water demand, which is why a malting line is a small plant rather than a single machine. The equipment is published within the range, and the site requirements can be reviewed in a 3D layout before anything is ordered, which is the easiest way to discover that your germination area and your cold room were competing for the same wall.
| Stage | What happens to the grain | Assumption used in this article |
|---|---|---|
| Steeping | Grain absorbs water and begins to germinate | Until about 45% moisture, roughly two days |
| Germination | Enzymes develop and rootlets appear | Four to six days with turning and airflow |
| Kilning | Warm air dries the grain to a stable moisture | Target near 4% moisture for a pale base malt |
| Milling | Grain is cracked for the mash tun | Roll gap set to suit the lautering design |
Sizing the malting line to your brewhouse
Start from the grist in one batch and work backwards, because the malting line is sized by how much malt you use in a week rather than by how much you store. A malting run must be long enough to be worth cleaning and short enough that the germinating grain does not sit waiting for the brewhouse. If your brewhouse brews twice a week at 1,000 litres, a once-weekly malting run is a natural rhythm; if it brews every day, either the malting line grows or you buy your base malt and malt only specialities. Being honest about that ratio at the drawing stage is what keeps a small malting room useful instead of ornamental.
Utilities, floors and grain handling
Malting is a wet process that ends in a dry one, so floors must drain and dry, and the room needs ventilation that does not fight the rest of the building. Grain arrives in sacks or bulk, moves up and down through the process, and leaves as malt for the mill, which means vertical space and a handling route are worth planning on paper. The published malting equipment sits beside distillery and auxiliary equipment in the range, so the same design conversation covers both. Ask for the layout in 3D before signing: it is the only reliable way to confirm that a silo, a steep vessel and a mill can all be reached without moving a pallet of malt twice.
Worked example: barley behind 1,000 litres of beer
All figures here are our own arithmetic, and the assumptions are listed in the sentence. Assume a grist of 18 kilograms of malt per hectolitre of wort, a 1,000 litre batch, so 10 hectolitres x 18 = 180 kilograms of malt per brew. Malting does not create weight: grain loses water and rootlets, so producing 180 kilograms of malt from barley at a 12% malting loss needs 180 / 0.88 = 204.5 kilograms of barley, and adding an 8% handling and screening allowance takes that to 204.5 x 1.08 = 221 kilograms of barley per brew. At two brews a week, 48 brewing weeks a year, that is 2 x 180 = 360 kilograms of malt a week and 360 x 48 = 17,280 kilograms, or about 17.3 tonnes, of malt a year — and 221 x 96 = 21,216 kilograms, about 21 tonnes, of barley in. The practical reading is simple: a malting line is a grain-handling project as much as a vessel project, and planning it at 20 tonnes a year rather than 17 keeps the store and the mill from becoming the bottleneck.
Frequently asked questions
Can malting equipment be added to an existing brewery?
Yes, it is published as a separate part of the equipment range, so a malt line can be specified later; the constraint is usually room, drainage and airflow rather than the vessels themselves.
How much barley does in-house malting need per brew?
Using this article's assumptions of 18 kg of malt per hectolitre and a 12% malting loss, a 1,000 litre batch needs about 180 kg of malt, which starts as about 221 kg of barley.
Specify the malt line and the brewhouse together
A malting room built as an afterthought is usually a malting room with a ventilation problem, so bring it into the first design conversation even if you intend to buy it in year two. Send the batch size, the number of brews a week, the base malt you want to make and the space you can give up; a design team that handles vessels, malting kit, bright tanks and canning or bottling machines in one catalogue can then place the rooms properly. Hermann has designed craft brewing equipment for 23 years, sells into more than seventy countries and provides the installation and technical support to bring a second process online. It is worth asking for the hot-side details as well, since mill settings and lautering design have to agree. Compare the whole list through the company's contact page before placing a phased order.
The equipment list, inspection steps and warranty wording above come from the manufacturer's own website at hembrewing.com, read on 23 Sept 2026; the malt and barley quantities are our own labelled arithmetic based on the stated assumptions. Confirm the current published equipment list before ordering[1].