Water report

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Salamander

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CACO3-242, alkalinity total-243,calcium-43.2, chloride-6.98, carbonate-216, iron-.007, magnesium-26.2, ph-7.61,potassium-.74, sodium-2.34, sulfate-6.1, TDS-216, zinc-.002. All units are in mg/l. Your expertise and input would much be appreciated. Thank you in advance.
 
Not sure what 'CACO3' nor 'carbonate' means as clearly the water contains neither calcium carbonate nor much carbonate. Trusting the alkalinity number and the pH the carbonate ion content would be about 0.65 mg/L. The report is imbalanced by 0.8 mEq/L which is quite a bit so none of the numbers can be considered very accurate. They are probably averages.

Nevertheless it is doubtless true that as the numbers suggest you have a hard, alkaline water with little permanent hardness. This makes it a candidate for decarbonation by lime treatment or simple heating/aeration preceded by calcium supplementation which is not only necessary to restore the calcium level to a healthy one but aids the decarbonation process. The problem with doing this is that it is messy, requires heat, lengthens the brew day (or you do it the day before - still means more work) and you really need to take before and after alkalinity measurements to see how you did at least until you have done it enough to know how well you are doing. It would doubtless be easier and certainly more sure to replace your water with RO water or dilute your water with RO water to the point where the alkalinity is down to less than 30 which will take so much RO water you might as well use straight RO. See the Primer for starting guidelines.
 
That Magnesium is a bit high too, might make it a tad bitter, no?

Personally, I'd just use store bought distilled water.
Add some gypsum or calcium chloride as needed.
 
I was going to brew a three gallon test batch that consist of 7.25 lbs of two row, .75 of medium crystal, .6 chocolate, and .4 black malts. 1oz of fruggles hop. I may need to reevaluate after reading your responses. Your thoughts.
 
You will have to defeat that alkalinity one way or another. Either you must remove it by boiling or lime treatment or you must neutralize it with acid, be that from a bottle or dark malt, or you must dilute it away. If you try to do it all with dark malt you will have, at this level of alkalinity, a very one dimensional beer and possibly one that is not very drinkable. The easiest way out is dilution with RO water. Try the Primer for some hints as to how to proceed.
 
The water quality report was recorded in ranges and the highest was posted. I'm researching the primer. Thank you for your insight.
 
The water quality report was recorded in ranges and the highest was posted.

That explains the large imbalance. And also clearly most of the time your situation is not as dire as the maximum numbers might lead us to believe unless the variances (deviations from the average values) are small. This doesn't change the basic advice, however.
 
But how do you know that 200 ppm of something will make better beer then 230 ppm. It's so complex and unless you know exact composition of your water or using ro water and add 99.99% pure salts it's diffucult to judge what's better. It could be a number of other factors too.
 
For starters it is rare that a good beer is made with water containing 200 ppm of anything with the possible exception of sulfate and that's an acquired taste. But the answer to your question is that you know 230 is better than 200 because you have brewed it with 230 and with 200 and it tastes better to you at 230. Note: as living things tend to respond logarithmically its also quite unlikely that a beer made with 230 would be perceptibly different from one made with 200.

As you suggest the way to win this battle is indeed to use RO or DI or otherwise low mineral water and build up to desired mineral levels with salt additions. You don't need 18 MΩ water or ACS grade salts - again, because of logarithmic response a few percent variability is tolerable. The other approach, again as you suggest, is to do a careful analysis of the water before each brew and adjust salt content to what you desire. This is, IMO, much more complicated than the RO approach but there are those who disagree and if it is difficult for a brewer to obtain RO water then they are right but it generally isn't difficult to obtain it these days.
 
Isn't ro water is more expensive ? I guess if you are lucky and your water is pretty soft then all you do is just add salts. Also don't forget pH changes associated with salt addition
 
Isn't ro water is more expensive ?
Yes, I suppose so. There are certainly capital costs and you must pay for the electricity to run the pressure pump and replace the filters and membranes from time to time. If you buy it then there is that cost plus the cost of the petrol you burn in getting to the store where you buy it. There is a trade here. If you want the best beer you have to spring for the best materials, use the best methods, have good equipment....


I guess if you are lucky and your water is pretty soft then all you do is just add salts.

Those who have 'RO' water coming out of their taps as supplied by the municipality are fortunate indeed.

Also don't forget pH changes associated with salt addition

These are thoroughly understood.
 
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