RO water recipe

Lonnie Mac · 08-28-2009, 11:54 PM

Ah!

So I have been fed up with my water here in SO Mexas. I now own a dang nice RO system.

My friends, honestly my brain is full! I swear if I learn one more single friggin thing I will have to forget something very important.

What I have been looking for is some sort of a brewing water recipe. I have always made all of my brewing water the night before. 20 gallons filtered. I want to continue that process. I adjust PH afterward, and simply mash and sparge with that 20 gals. I make some pretty ok beers from time to time, but since IKE, it seems our water is hit and miss. This is pretty normal for city water anywho... Some cities source their water from different sources from month to month...

With RO now, I am looking for a water recipe, or two or three...

Say light, med, dark, whatever. Maybe like what to add per gal or something so I can get back to consistency!

Anyone ever come across some sort of baselines like this?

**arturo7** · 08-29-2009, 12:27 AM

Welcome to the world of water chemistry!

R/O water is like a blank piece of paper.

Just as you need words on the paper, you need minerals in the water.

R/O pulls just about everything out of it. I can't explain the science, but the minerals in the water react with the grain to produce the sugars. No minerals, no extraction. Not much anyway.

Spend a little time in the Brew Science forum and read up on the water discussions. You will want to "build" specific waters for specific styles.

In a perfect world, there would be a chart that tells us which minerals in what measures to add to R/O water for different styles.

(i'm a couple deep right now, I hope this makes sense)

EDIT: Not much help, was I?

**Budzu** · 08-29-2009, 02:59 PM

Hi Lonnie,
I actually build my water for every beer I brew, from RO water. I keep 5 salts on hand to build with, and I use Palmer's mash water calculator to get an idea of where my alkalinity will land. I suggest you get this calculator (it can be downloaded in excel format) and read the included guide.
For all beers that aren't darker than 18-20 SRM, I've been able to trust the calculator to give me the pH I want. I've found that beers darker than that need usually a lesser amount of Baking Soda to raise the alkalinity than what is recommended by the calculator. In these cases, I'll add all my salts EXCEPT baking soda, then add 1 gram at a time and check pH in between additions until I reach my target.

With all that said, I do have a few addition amounts that I will stick to when coming back to certain beers/colors. I'd be glad to share some so you can have some examples. Let me know if you need those, or if you need help running the calculator. I also have a voice server that I could use to walk you through it in the event you need help using it. I cannot walk for a few days due to an injury so it really wouldn't put me out to give you a hand with it.

Cheers and good luck!

http://howtobrew.com/section3/Palmers_Mash_RA_ver2d.xls

**Schlenkerla** · 08-29-2009, 03:06 PM

Here's a link to water reports and how to adjust your water.

Palmers....How to Brew - By John Palmer - Reading a Water Report

The spreadsheet is here; How to Brew - By John Palmer - Residual Alkalinity and Mash pH

Budzu - Ooops didn't see the link above....