New to water chemistry and need help!!!!

Where do I start with this water profile?

Starting Water (ppm):
Ca: 145
Mg: 38.5
Na: 135
Cl: 300
SO4: 165
CaCO3: 520

I was using the EZ water calculator spreadsheet but don't know where to start.

Can anyone point me in the right direction?

I don't wish to be discouraging but the best answer is to throw it away and find another source of water. There are things you could do to get the alkalinity down but they are not for beginners. When I lived in LA we didn't drink that water and I wouldn't brew with it either. Obtain RO or otherwise deionized water and brew with that. The Primer will give you an idea as to how to get started and you can move on to one of the spreadsheets from there.

Yeah, that water is horrible. Spend a few bucks on RO water and you'll be glad you did.

Do I just buy distilled water or get an RO filter? Any good reading on how to treat RO water?

Thanks both of you for your quick responses!

Get RO water from the machine at the grocery store and read AJ's primer (which he told you about already ) at the top of the brew science forum.

You can either buy RO water or install and RO unit but if you do you should also install a water softener as if you don't the membrane will probably crud up pretty quickly with chalk. Of course you can buy quite a few replacement cartridges for the cost of a water softener but I would think you'd want a water softener for the sake of the dish washer, clothes washer, showers etc.

Thanks for the help. I listened to brew strong's 4 water podcasts the other day and want to learn how to adjust for different types of beer.

So I read the primer and wanted to make sure I understand it correctly. If I am making a pumpkin ale, I would buy RO water. Then add 1 tsp of calcium chloride dihydrate and 2% grist. If I consider this a british beer then add an additional 1 tsp of Calcium chloride and 1 tsp of gypsum. Is this all into the mash? Then sparge with RO water. Do I need to adjust for the final volume of water in the brew kettle? Does this all sound right?

Thanks for helping me out.

One tsp CaCl2 (whatever the LHBS sells which is probably a mixture of the dihyrate, monohydrate and anhydride) per 5 gallons of water. 2% of the grist should be sauermalz (acidulated malt). This is a recommended starting point i.e. you should brew the beer this way the first time. The second time, if you are interested in a more British quality, add some gypsum but do gradually e.g. a half tsp/5 gal in the second brew etc.. You can be roughly guided as to how much to use by trying some gypsum added directly to the first beer to taste.

The salts go into the water. The sauermalz goes into the grist.

One more question. The salts go into the water and the grain goes into the grist but Palmer was saying you need to account for the difference between your mash water and your final preboil volume. Do I need to adjust anything in my boil kettle after I for sparge for the extra untreated water?

I spar with AJ on occasion regarding the utility of tap water. He tends to default to using RO earlier than me. But in this case, don't even think about using this water for brewing. It will be difficult to brew great beer with that water. Do yourself a favor and incorporate RO water as a large component of your brewing water practice.

Sorry to confirm the bad news.

From my understanding you have 2 salt additions, one in the mash and the other in the kettle. For the mash you need to calculate how much water is used and add salts for that volume. Assume that each pound of grain absorbs 0.5 quarts of water and subtract that from your dough in volume. This is your 1st runnings.

After sparging with untreated water take your final preboil volume and subtract your 1st runnings to get your actual Sparge volume that needs to be treated during the boil.
I hope this helps, and if I'm off someone else chime in.

So do I divide 1 tsp by two or add 1 tsp twice?

Dear lord that is some bad water

Using EZ-Water 3.0.2 --

I would use a 50% RO / Tap water blend to get your minerals and ions at an acceptable level (and within Palmer's recommendations). With that blend, you'll have a great water for accenting malts.

Adding 2g Epsom Salt will get that blend more balanced. If you want to accent hops, add 2g Gypsum along with the 2g Epsom Salt.

That takes care of your mineral content but you'll want to monitor your mash pH and make any adjustments needed.

gjabball said:

One more question. The salts go into the water and the grain goes into the grist but Palmer was saying you need to account for the difference between your mash water and your final preboil volume. Do I need to adjust anything in my boil kettle after I for sparge for the extra untreated water?

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There are differing approaches here. One is to treat the whole volume of brewing water the same way. In this way you don't need to adjust for the differences between sparge and mash water. The easiest way to treat it all the same is to treat it all at once but some people don't have a large enough HLT to allow that. In such cases you can still treat both waters the same.

A lot of people are terrified of extracting tannins during the sparge and want to sparge with very soft water. If you are tuning for a particular chemistry in the kettle this usually means adjusting chloride and sulfate in the kettle though sometimes it is necessary to adjust pH in the kettle.

Certainly the simplest is to treat all the water the same. If you are working from RO you will not be adding alkalinity to it (any that might be required will be added to the mash) and you can sparge with it without fear. Kettle adjustment for flavor will not be required then.

A little off topic, but how much is a teaspoon in grams? I don’t have a sensitive enough scale to measure small amounts.

Calcium chloride loves to soak up water, maybe a teaspoon would be better. Gypsum, no big deal. The spreadsheets use grams. How to convert?

Wynne-R said:

how much is a teaspoon in grams? I don’t have a sensitive enough scale to measure small amounts.

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It depends on what you have in the teaspoon. Teaspoon is a volume measurement, gram is a weight measurement.

Palmers book has a chart.
http://www.howtobrew.com/section3/chapter15-4.html

So if I was going to treat the whole water, is 1 tsp for 5 gallons of water? I am trying to figure out the conversion. Also, if I was to do 50/50, it is better to use Epson salt rather that calcium chloride?

I

I am just trying to understand what I am doing and why. Thanks guys!

It depends on what is in the teaspoon

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Smart Aleck. I guess I deserved that. Apparently you figured out that what I was meaning to ask is “How much does a teaspoon of brewing salt weigh?” I guess it’s better to get it right than to further confuse already confused people. Thanks for the link.

The consensus is that calcium chloride is necessary for soft water, calcium sulfate is optional, season to taste. Magnesium sulfate (Epsom Salt) and sodium bicarbonate don’t taste good and aren’t necessary.

With your water 50/50 ain’t going to make it. Not even close.

RO it is then. I am still confused on what treating the whole batch of water at once means. Treat the mash water with enough for the preboil 6 gallons?

A teaspoonful of calcium chloride or gypsum is 3.5 -5 grams depending on how 'level' and how fluffy the powder is. It's an approximate measurement.

Wynne-R said:

Smart Aleck. I guess I deserved that. I guess it’s better to get it right than to further confuse already confused people. Thanks for the link.

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I didnt mean it as a smart a$$ comment. Just keeping it clear for everyone.

Thanks AJ, that’s what I needed. Palmer said it was 3.4g for the CaCl2 and 4.0 for the gypsum with a level teaspoon. I have adjustable measuring spoons that use a slider to reduce their volume. I can measure small volumes quite accurately, but can only weigh within a gram or so.

Wobbegong you’re fine. I was sloppy, I should have been more precise. Feel free to jump my butt as needed.

Gjabball, the whole batch is mash water + sparge water. If you’re using RO you can put it all in the mash or do the mash and the sparge together. Either way is fine, just don’t sparge with highly alkaline water.

So if I put it all in the mash lets say 4 gallons of water (with grain) and get a PH of 5.3 won't my PH in my brew pot be off if I sparge with RO water and my final preboil volume is 6 gallons?

gjabball said:

So if I put it all in the mash lets say 4 gallons of water (with grain) and get a PH of 5.3 won't my PH in my brew pot be off if I sparge with RO water and my final preboil volume is 6 gallons?

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No. Your mash pH will be where you want it, if you follow the water primer instructions.

It's often easier to just put all your water in one place (if you have an HLT) and just add the calcium chloride and/or gypsum right to all the water.

Oh I understand. I am using coolers ( until I upgrade in a couple months) and my brew pot is only 8 gallons so I can't fit all the water in the pot. Can I divide it up?

gjabball said:

Oh I understand. I am using coolers ( until I upgrade in a couple months) and my brew pot is only 8 gallons so I can't fit all the water in the pot. Can I divide it up?

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Sure. Just add the salts to your mash and sparge with RO water then, to make it easier.

So add all the salts to my mash and sparge with RO water. After that my preboil should be fine without adding anything else?

gjabball said:

So add all the salts to my mash and sparge with RO water. After that my preboil should be fine without adding anything else?

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Yes, assuming your additions follow the basic "primer" guidelines and don't go overboard of course!

I won't. Thank you everyone for your help!

Yooper said:

Sure. Just add the salts to your mash and sparge with RO water then, to make it easier.

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Be careful! If you add all the salts to the mash that were intended to produce a certain ionic content in the final wort, then its possible to depress the mash pH too far due to the excess Ca or Mg in the mash water.

Add the correct amount of calcium and/or magnesium containing minerals to the mash to produce a desirable mash pH. If the goal is to maintain the ionic content of the final wort when you sparge with straight RO water, then I recommend that the additional salts be added to either the kettle or the sparge water.

Don’t worry about it, gjabball. Martin apparently makes witch’s brews that stand up a spoon. And eat the plating off it.

I’ve never had a beer that was too acidic. 5.2 mash is way better than 5.8.

Haha. Ok

Wynne-R said:

Don’t worry about it, gjabball. Martin apparently makes witch’s brews that stand up a spoon. And eat the plating off it.

I’ve never had a beer that was too acidic. 5.2 mash is way better than 5.8.

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Oh, I know that's not true.............Martin knows more about brewing water chemistry than I will ever know and I'd always take his advice over mine!

But I still stand by my advice, with the disclaimer "follow the primer", which is 5 grams of caCl2 in 5 gallons. That's safe, and you don't have to worry about knocking down your pH too much.

If you're using a ton of salts, more than would give you an optimum pH, than you're probably using too many for a first attempt. That's why I said what I did. The chances are that you'll have a slightly too-high pH, or at least on the verge of too-high and not too low at all. Using RO water is a great start, and for the first few times (or even later on), "less is more" really applies.

I’m not trying to be disparaging of Martin. I was trying to say is that for most recipes it’s not a problem. He is apparently brewing some very dark ales.

I’m sticking with the eat the plating off thing though. I’m into pales, mostly. I can’t imagine what sort of recipe doesn’t use base malt.

My apologies to Wynne for not explaining this concept better since he apparently didn't understand what I was speaking about and others may not have either.

The issue with adding all your minerals (calculated for the total batch volume) to the mash has little to do with the color of the beer or acidity of the grist. It has much more to do with the Residual Alkalinity condition you are developing with the calcium and magnesium additions. Its interesting that Wynne mentions pales, since that is probably the style that would be most affected by this issue since many brewers use a substantial gypsum addition in the brewing water to provide the beer with a high sulfate content. Since extra calcium will be added to the mash via that gypsum addition, that will have the effect of depressing the RA of the mash water. That reduced RA has the effect of depressing the mash pH. Since we are talking about using RO water as the starting point for the brewing water in this thread, the alkalinity of that water is near zero already. Adding a large dose of calcium to that low alkalinity water can really push the mash pH down. If the grist also includes a quantity of more acidic grains beyond the base malt, then it is entirely possible to push the mash pH below 5.2 (@ room temp).

I fully agree with Wynne that it is better to err on the low side of the pH range when brewing than to be on the high side. The beer will be more palatable in most cases. But every brewer should be aware that low pH also has negative effects in beer. Unfortunately, I've experienced this result first hand. Reduced hop expression, increased wort fermentability, and a notably tart flavor are examples of those negative effects. So, a brewer should pay attention and get their mash and wort pH in the right range instead of just assuming that everything will just work out. It is still best to mash in the 'right' pH range.

So i am brewing a pumpkin ale:
9 lbs of Belgium Pale
1/2 lb Aromatic
1/2 lb Crystal 40
1/2 lb Crystal 120
1/4 lb Special Roast

I added everything into the EZ spreadsheet and am going to use RO water. I was going to add 5 grams of Calcium Chloride and 2% acid malt. After I put it into the spreadsheet I see that I have no sulfate, sodium, magnesium. So should I add gypsum?

I know everyone on this thread said less is more. Most of my reading states that I need some sulfate in my water. What do you guys think?

Lastly, if I am going to be using Distilled or RO water for all my brewing, would you buy an RO filter or just buy distilled at a grocery store?

I have learned so much from this thread. Thanks for all your guy's help.

mabrungard said:

Reduced hop expression, increased wort fermentability, and a notably tart flavor are examples of those negative effects.

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I can't imagine reduced hop expression as ever being anything but a negative consequence but I do think that tartness and increased fermentability could be positives in some cases i.e. where one wants a dry beer, quenching beer. So does this not really say that for some beers a lower than what we think of as normal limit to the mash pH range applies? I've always paused when I type 5.4 - 5.6. Isn't it really like any other parameter? IOW isn't there an 'ideal' pH for each style?

It should be obvious from this statement that I have never experienced the effects of low mash pH that I am aware of. IOW I haven't undershot intended pH....yet.

Martin thanks for that additional explanation. It hadn’t occurred to me that someone would add a ton of gypsum. Personally I don’t care for it. I did a batch with two tsp of calcium chloride and found that to be a little too much.

To the OP’s question, I would start without the calcium sulfate. You can add it back later. Try a speck or two in a beer and see if you like it. I think I got that idea from AJ.

Good luck and have fun!