Water adjustments for my IPA

So I have put together an original AG IPA and it will be the first time brewing it with my tap water profile(With additions) which is:

IBU: 65
SRM: 9
Pre-boil Vol 6.5gal

target volume 5gal

90 min boil

Tap Water:

Alkalinity: 55
Sodium: 28
Chloride: 56
Sulfate:9
Calcium:21.8
Magnesium:7

water PH 7.1

Adjusted Tap water

Alkalinity: 98
RA: 34 (IPA SRM 9)
Sodium: 89
Chloride: 118
Sulfate:181
Calcium:74
Magnesium:19

To achieve this I added:
1.8g of baking soda
5.5g of gypsum
3g of epsom salt
2.5g canning salt

I used the water chemistry calculator at brewersfriend.com

Am I approaching this right? and are any of these additions excessive? I want to be able to mash without using 5.2 Stabalizer. TIME TO GET RID OF THE TRAINING WHEELS. Should I add the gypsum to the boil or all of the water in the HLT??

klamz

I am a novice at water adjustment so take everything I say with a grain of salt No pun intended.

For an IPA you want to have a good amount of sulfate. Sulfate will accentuate your hop bitterness where chloride will accentuate your malts. I would leave out the canning salt (I'm assuming you meant CaCl, table salt) since that adds Calcium and Chloride. IPA's don't need a lot of chloride because they are all about the hops. However, calcium is necessary for yeast health and flocculation. If you want to boost the calcium add more gypsum. That will also boost the sulfate as well and that is a good thing. Burton on Trent has a chloride/sulfate ratio of 1:29. You don't have to go that extreme but as you have it listed yours is 1:1.5. BoT also has very high levels of calcium and HCO3.

As far as adding salts it is my understanding that adding them to the HLT will not work because they will not be fully soluble. You want to add some to your mash at dough-in and then the rest in the boil kettle. So to reach 6.5 gallons of runnings you mash with say 5 gallons and sparge with 4 gallons. Take your total gram additions and add 5 gallons worth to the mash. Then sparge with untreated water since you are just rinsing the grains. Make sure to note the amount of second/third runnings added to the boil kettle (say its 3 gallons). Add salts to treat 3 gallons more water.

Canning salt is I believe NaCl sodium chloride. which is uniodized kosher salt. I just lowered it to 1.5g and i have a Cl:SO ratio of 1:2 now. I didnt have a problem disolving Epsom salt and canning salt in my HLT, but i do remember that Chalk wouldnt disolve which im not using in this batch. Thanks for the advice!!

any more is much appreciated!

I would back off on the Na. I personally feel less Na is better. To raise your RA, I would suggest some chalk, or CaCO3. While chalk will not dissolve quickly in water, it will dissolve in the mash...

mgo737 said:

I would back off on the Na. I personally feel less Na is better. To raise your RA, I would suggest some chalk, or CaCO3. While chalk will not dissolve quickly in water, it will dissolve in the mash...

Click to expand...

Yeah, "salty" beer tastes bad. I like a low Na, if you need more chloride, I'd use CaCl, not NaCl. I can't think of any water profiles that would be better with more table salt.

And I've read that elevated Na + Cl is a double whammy as far as salty taste is concerned. I'd go with a Cl level near 50ppm while you can go nuts with SO4, like 200ppm.

I ended up putting 1gram of NaCl before I read the responses. This shouldnt be too bad with Na at 75ppm right??? i'll taste a sample after it ferments.


My other question is how much of these additions should be put into the mash to hit the target Ph?? Remember I dont want to use 5.2 buffer. I'm trying to get my Ph corrected without it. I know baking soda has an affect on Ph and so does gypsum and chalk. for example, everyone says chalk doesnt disolve well in the HLT. that's fine, but how much do I add to the mash? certainly not the whole addition right? just enough so the mash Ph is balanced correclty i'm assuming. Is it a matter of adding a little then checking Ph with Ph strip?? I also heard people treat all their HLT water first then just use that, but how does this affect sparge Ph?

Thanks


Klamz

I like "EZ water calculator". This is what I'd do for your water for an IPA. The additions are for each gallon of mash and each gallon of sparge. The mash additions are added to the mash, the sparge additions are added to the boil kettle after you collect runnings:

Starting Water (ppm):
Ca: 22
Mg: 7
Na: 28
Cl: 56
SO4: 9
CaCO3: 55

Mash / Sparge Vol (gal): 1 / 1
Dilution Rate: 0%

Adjustments (grams) Mash / Boil Kettle:

CaSO4: 1 / 1

MgSO4: 0.5 / 0.5



Mash Water / Total water (ppm):
Ca: 82 / 82
Mg: 19 / 19
Na: 28 / 28
Cl: 56 / 56
SO4: 208 / 208
CaCO3: 55 / 55

RA (mash only): -15 (4 to 9 SRM)
Cl to SO4 (total water): 0.27 (Very Bitter)

I don't see any reason to use canning salt or baking soda.

Awesome calculator!! A lot better then the calc I was using at brewers friend. See the reason why I added the baking soda was to bring up the bicarbonate level. I thought that it was recommended to have an RA of around 80 for a beer with 10 SRM. i must be confused!!!!!

i'm looking at the chart in john palmer's book on Mash ph. I connected the dots La La La to get a target RA for SRM of 10 on the chart, which is the SRM of my beer and says somthing like 90 RA why is -15 RA ok????? this is what is confusing me.

The way I understand it is that RA and its relationship to the beer's SRM is approximate at best and it depends a lot on where the color comes from. Your post said 9 SRM and I noticed the -15 RA put the range at 4-9 SRM. Worst case scenario, your mash pH is 5.2 instead of 5.3. If you want to increase your RA but not affect the overall SO4 profile, you can also hold back like a gram of gypsum in the mash and add it to the boil instead. It won't pull the mash RA down as much but you'll maintain the overall flavor profile. I know it's not in the spreadsheet as a capability, but it's an idea anyway.

Thanks again bobby!!