Newest Threads

**motobrewer** · 10-19-2010, 02:48 PM

partial mash? lol

my tap water has a sodium level of 211 ppm (softened water...) and it doesn't taste salty

maida7 · 10-19-2010, 02:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ajdelange

PM?

Post modern?

Phase modulated?

Beers brewed in the afternoon?

TH: Haven't forgotten about you. Just haven't gotten around to it.

I assume PM = Partial Mash

**cheezydemon3** · 10-19-2010, 03:03 PM

No, I was actually referring to post marital brews.

The alternatives to AG being extract and partial mash, take your best guess.

**winvarin** · 10-19-2010, 09:59 PM

probably partial mash

**winvarin** · 10-19-2010, 10:00 PM

doh. perhaps I should read to the end of the thread before responding

**cheezydemon3** · 10-20-2010, 12:28 AM

WOW. That is my strangest ever thread jack.

Yeah Partial Mash..........

So anyways, baking soda in dark PARTIAL MASH brews.

Beerrific · 10-31-2010, 12:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Beerrific

So a RA of 25 is sufficient for brewing a 31 SRM beer. I know others have said they have done similar things, but I guess it is nice to confirm this myself. I hesitate to draw any other conclusions from this being that it was just 1 sample. But, I am going to really try to take the mash pH for every beer from now on.

An update to this. I brewed another dark beer this weekend. Darker: 41 SRM.

I mashed in with an RA of -14 and hit a mash pH of 5.3. I had the pickling lime ready to go, but did not need any. So with limited (n=2) results I am starting to conclude that it is not SRM that drives pH (obviously) but rather which specialty/roasted grains you have in there or the ratio of specialty/roasted to base malt.

***Yooper*** · 10-31-2010, 01:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Beerrific

An update to this. I brewed another dark beer this weekend. Darker: 41 SRM.

I mashed in with an RA of -14 and hit a mash pH of 5.3. I had the pickling lime ready to go, but did not need any. So with limited (n=2) results I am starting to conclude that it is not SRM that drives pH (obviously) but rather which specialty/roasted grains you have in there or the ratio of specialty/roasted to base malt.

To take this further, what about your sparge water? Have you used the meter and taken the pH during the sparge?

I guess what I'm thinking is that I haven't really acidified my sparge water, but I need to in order to really follow through with my water chemistry. Initially, I treated all my water. But I noticed that some of the salts were still in the bottom of the HLT. So I started focusing on the mash, and noticed that many techniques involved adding salts to the BK. I've been sort of ignoring that final frontier.

My question is twofold, I guess- if the sparge water needs acidified, would it be better to use lactic acid (liquid) or to work harder to dissolve the salts in the HLT, and of course, when the mash was 5.24, what was the sparge?

**ajdelange** · 10-31-2010, 03:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yooper_Brew

My question is twofold, I guess- if the sparge water needs acidified, would it be better to use lactic acid (liquid) or to work harder to dissolve the salts in the HLT, and of course, when the mash was 5.24, what was the sparge?

Lactic (or another) acid is really the only choice here. The salts we use are those of potassium (rarely), magnesium, calcium and sodium. The hydroxides of all these are strong bases so any salt from a strong acid (sulfuric or hydrochloric) e.g. calcium sulfate, calcium chloride, magnesium sulfate, magnesium chloride, potassium sulfate, potassium chloride will be neutral (no effect on pH) whereas salts of a weak acid (carbonic) such as sodium carbonate, sodium bicarbonate, and calcium carbonate will be basic and raise pH. The pH lowering calcium - phosphate reaction does not take place in the sparge as it takes place in the mash and there should not be much phosphate left to react. Perhaps in a mash with very little calcium some phosphate might make it through to the sparge but as malt is about 0.15% magnesium by weight I'd think magnesium phosphate (about a quarter as soluble as chalk) might clean out any phosphate not grabbed by calcium.

But you really shouldn't have to treat sparge water unless the untreated water is quite alkaline. Measure pH and gravity as you run off. If pH goes above about 6 while gravity is still bigger than, say, 5° P then yes, you should acidify. OW, don't worry about it.

***Yooper*** · 10-31-2010, 03:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ajdelange

Lactic (or another) acid is really the only choice here. The salts we use are those of potassium (rarely), magnesium, calcium and sodium. The hydroxides of all these are strong bases so any salt from a strong acid (sulfuric or hydrochloric) e.g. calcium sulfate, calcium chloride, magnesium sulfate, magnesium chloride, potassium sulfate, potassium chloride will be neutral (no effect on pH) whereas salts of a weak acid (carbonic) such as sodium carbonate, sodium bicarbonate, and calcium carbonate will be basic and raise pH. The pH lowering calcium - phosphate reaction does not take place in the sparge as it takes place in the mash and there should not be much phosphate left to react. Perhaps in a mash with very little calcium some phosphate might make it through to the sparge but as malt is about 0.15% magnesium by weight I'd think magnesium phosphate (about a quarter as soluble as chalk) might clean out any phosphate not grabbed by calcium.

But you really shouldn't have to treat sparge water unless the untreated water is quite alkaline. Measure pH and gravity as you run off. If pH goes above about 6 while gravity is still bigger than, say, 5° P then yes, you should acidify. OW, don't worry about it.

Thanks! My untreated water is quite alkaline. One of the fixes I've found for the mash has been dilution with RO water, usually in the neighborhood of 35% and adding some salts in small amounts- usually 3 grams CaCl2 and often a couple of grams of CaSO4. I've been focusing on the mash, but I think the next frontier, so to speak, will be checking the pH and gravity of the sparge.

To cover my bases, I've been batch sparging lately, using the same % of my tap water and RO water. Kind of taking the easy way out, at the moment!