Crap. Too much Calcium chloride.

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adamjackson

adamjackson

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I overdid it. Grabbed the wrong measurer. Instead of adding .25 grams of Calcium Chloride, I added 8.4 grams.

I added this to the sparge water and cycled it through the grain a few times before brining to a boil.

So, brewing calculator shows, instead of 57 PPM of Chloride which was my goal, I have 1422PPM and instead of 90 PPM of Calcium, I have 812.71.

There's no way to fix this is there? I'm already half way into the boil.
 
What was your water profile to begin with? How much water? The numbers seem really really high. I don't know if you could dissolve that much in water. I think its a drunken math error :)
 
Original Water Profile from a water test I had done last month.(with Antwerp being what I was shooting for)

Screen%20Shot%202012-11-19%20at%201.33.43%20AM.png


Water stats AFTER adding the two teaspoons (8.4 grams) of Calcium Chloride

Screen%20Shot%202012-11-19%20at%201.33.50%20AM.png


5 gallon batch. full boil for 60 minutes.
 
gbx said:
What was your water profile to begin with? How much water? The numbers seem really really high. I don't know if you could dissolve that much in water. I think its a drunken math error :)
Click to expand...


and I'm not even drinking tonight but having a "brew day" at 2in the morning is probably a bad idea.
 
Hi Adam

Sorry I can't help with your question but wondering what software that is you are using?
 
yee, beer alchemy!!! did you add 8.4 grams per gallon or 8.4 into the entire batch? How much water?
 
gbx said:
yee, beer alchemy!!! did you add 8.4 grams per gallon or 8.4 into the entire batch? How much water?
Click to expand...

5 gallons (full boil) That same volume is entered into Beer Alchemy with an expected evaporation to 4.5 gallons then adding .5 gallons before pitching the yeast so expected final beer being 5.


Dan said:
Hi Adam

Sorry I can't help with your question but wondering what software that is you are using?
Click to expand...


Yep! Beer Alchemy
 
Beer alchemy's units are annoying. If you you added 8.4grams into 5gals, put 8.4 divided by 5 into the CaCl grams/gal (1.68g/gal)
 
I use beer alchemy and like it well enough but I don't like the water treatment section. I wrote my own spreadsheet to do it because I didn't really like any of the ones out there.
 
gbx said:
Beer alchemy's units are annoying. If you you added 8.4grams into 5gals, put 8.4 divided by 5 into the CaCl grams/gal (1.68g/gal)
Click to expand...

ah thanks!

Under 300 is certainly better than what was showing up before. Glad to know I only partialy screwed up my beer.

so what am I going to get out of these? I read more mouth feel but possibly some astringency. with this PPM for a beer that is expected to be around 5% ABV, did I ruin things to badly?
 
adamjackson said:
ah thanks!

Under 300 is certainly better than what was showing up before. Glad to know I only partialy screwed up my beer.

so what am I going to get out of these? I read more mouth feel but possibly some astringency. with this PPM for a beer that is expected to be around 5% ABV, did I ruin things to badly?
Click to expand...

I don't think you necessarily ruined things. Don't give up on it yet. High Ca and Cl aren't deal breakers. Maybe one of the water chem ninja's will see this tomorrow morning and comment. Carry on and see how it turns out.

...and I think the whole "classic brewing cities" concept is stupid. I've written threads arguing with smarter people why it is bull**** but almost any expert will tell you it won't help you brew better. I came close to ruining a few batches trying to replicate water profiles before I found this https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewing-water-chemistry-primer-198460/
 
You'll just have to wait and see. Remember that most 'calcium chloride' is only 75 - 85% CaCl2 so that even a large quantity like 8.4 grams isn't going to raise the levels too too high. At 75% (pure dihydrate) the calcium level would be 121 mg/L and the chloride at 214 plus whatever was in the original water. Calcium at that level would probably lend a mineral quality bordering on salty to the beer. Chloride at above 200 is reported to cause a 'pasty' taste but I confess I do not know what that means. I haven't tasted paste since kindergarten and that was a long time ago.

Definitely go ahead with this beer and see how it turns out. Before dumping it if it tastes too salty, crunchy or 'pasty' consider blending it with something that was brewed with low mineral content water.
 
Thanks AJ. Happy to have your input on this thread.

I took a sample after racking it. IT definitely has a chalky taste to it but it's not as bad as I thought.
 
ajdelange said:
I probably should have mentioned that at above 300 mg/L chloride is toxic to yeast but you aren't near that level and I gather the fermentation was OK.
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AJ makes a good point. I've been involved with effluent limits for chloride and sulfate and their effect on aquatic life in streams. For many organisms, the combination and total concentration of those ions is what has the greatest effect on aquatic life. I feel its the osmotic stress that is killing those critters.

In many ways, our yeast ranching activities are similar to the issue of aquatic life in streams. If you have too high a level of mineralization in the water, those yeast don't like it. Yeast are fresh water organisms too and don't take too kindly to living in 'salty' water. Keeping the ionic concentration low in your brewing water is always a good idea.
 
I can't comment on aquatic organisms but with yeast I'm doubtful that it is osmotic pressure that is to blame. Enough calcium chloride to produce 300 mg/L chloride would result in a 12.7 milliosmole solution. A 12 °P wort made up of sucrose or maltose is at 367 mOsm/L from the sugar. Honey is stable at 87 °P and up because of osmotic stress and that corresponds to 512 - 1024 mOsm/L depending on how much of the sucrose is inverted. I'm thinking 12.7 wouldn't be appreciable.

OTOH if you know about baking you'll know that salt added to the sponge at more than about 2.5% slows down the yeast and that's believed to be in part to be caused by osmotic stress. But that's 2% of the flour and I don't know what that turns out to be in terms of the water, soluble vs unsoluble starch etc.

I'll also point out that a yeast cell is a little permeable bag of chemicals. If floated in distilled water there is osmotic pressure inward as the water wants to get in and dilute those chemicals. I have no idea what isotonic is for yeast cells but for human blood cells it's 273 mOsm/L.
 
ajdelange said:
I can't comment on aquatic organisms but with yeast I'm doubtful that it is osmotic pressure that is to blame. Enough calcium chloride to produce 300 mg/L chloride would result in a 12.7 milliosmole solution. A 12 °P wort made up of sucrose or maltose is at 367 mOsm/L from the sugar. Honey is stable at 87 °P and up because of osmotic stress and that corresponds to 512 - 1024 mOsm/L depending on how much of the sucrose is inverted. I'm thinking 12.7 wouldn't be appreciable.

OTOH if you know about baking you'll know that salt added to the sponge at more than about 2.5% slows down the yeast and that's believed to be in part to be caused by osmotic stress. But that's 2% of the flour and I don't know what that turns out to be in terms of the water, soluble vs unsoluble starch etc.

I'll also point out that a yeast cell is a little permeable bag of chemicals. If floated in distilled water there is osmotic pressure inward as the water wants to get in and dilute those chemicals. I have no idea what isotonic is for yeast cells but for human blood cells it's 273 mOsm/L.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I doubt the raw osmotic stress is enough to kill the yeast. It will shock them a bit when you first pitch them in (although not really any differently than pitching them into a high gravity wort), but yeast can regulate their water homeostasis over a pretty large range of osmotic pressures if they're given enough time to adapt.

More likely is that the extracellular Cl- concentration becomes too large for the yeast to maintain ionic homeostasis. There's usually a pretty substantial gradient between the intracellular and extracellular Cl- concentration which is important to maintain for various reasons (one of which is to regulate osmotic forces). Again the yeast are pretty robust to changes in extracellular Cl- concentration, but once you pass a certain point the molecular mechanisms the yeast uses to maintain its ionic concentration gradients will break down.
 
Don't get too hung up on the aquatic organism parallels with yeast. It was only intended to be a metaphor, not a definition. The point was that there can be negative effects with high ionic content. I don't recommend very high ionic levels in Bru'n Water, but there are some water profiles that are fairly mineralized. I would not be surprised if there was some minor reduction in yeast vitality as the ionic concentrations increase. For the most part, we brewers stay away from levels that are either chronically or acutely toxic.
 
adamjackson said:
I overdid it. Grabbed the wrong measurer. Instead of adding .25 grams of Calcium Chloride, I added 8.4 grams.

I added this to the sparge water and cycled it through the grain a few times before brining to a boil.

So, brewing calculator shows, instead of 57 PPM of Chloride which was my goal, I have 1422PPM and instead of 90 PPM of Calcium, I have 812.71.

There's no way to fix this is there? I'm already half way into the boil.
Click to expand...

First, why are you adding minerals to your sparge water? Hopefully you adjusted your mash water as well? Just curious - I never adjust my sparge since I use RO water and I want to keep it as unbuffered as possible to keep the pH low while sparging.

Second, I recommend using the water spreadsheet for estimating your mineral additions and their effects on pH (which is why you are adding minerals). It's a lot easier to understand than that calculator you are using.

Finally, for my darker beers with RO water I adjust my 8 gallons of mash liquor w/ around 15 grams of CaCl2 on average, so your 8.4 grams per 5 gallons is less than this per gallon & not a problem unless you have strange water.

dan
 

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