What water additions should I use?

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h22lude

h22lude

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I'm going to be brewing both of these recipes soon (my buddy and I wanted to try both and see which one we like more). What water additions should I add...if any? Both will be AG.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f76/thunderstruck-pumpkin-ale-ag-extract-versions-26699/

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f76/punkin-ale-145060/

pH 8.9
Na 12
K <1
Ca 19
Mg <1
CaCO3 52...hardness
SO4-S 11
Cl 19
CO3 6
HCO3 15
CaCO3 22...alkalinity

Mash pH would be 5.65 and chloride/sulfate ratio would be .58


I've played around with the EZ water calculator spreadsheet to get my water to the "normal" levels". If I add 4 grams of both calcium chloride and epsom salt in the mash water it will bring everything up to...

Ca 67
Mg 16
Na 12
Cl 104
So4 102
Chloride/sulfate ratio 1.02
Mash pH 5.59
 
I'm no expert but the only other thing that I would do if it were my beer is add a bit of lactic acid to bring the pH down to 5.50. I realize you're within the "desired range" at 5.59, but it wouldn't take much to get it in the center of the range, which would give you a bit of a cushion in case your water or grains are off a bit from your estimates. I used to target 5.6, but have noticed a slight improvement in my beers since I started targeting a bit lower. Good luck!
 
Or you could add a few percent acid malt to lower the pH. Water additions are really a personal taste thing, IMO. Besides getting everything in the proper range, of course. For one of those recipies I'd probably lean more towards cacl to accentuate the malty side. Maybe cut back the gypsum 25%.
 
If I add 2oz acid malt it lowers my pH to 5.45.

If I lower the epsom salt addition to 3 grams it raises the pH to 5.5 and it will lower sulfate to 85 bringing the chloride/sulfate ratio to 1.23 which is still in the range of a balanced beer.

Now if I scratched the epsom salt and went with gypsum, my water profile would be...

Ca 97
Mg 0
Na 12
Cl 104
SO4 107
Chloride/sulfate .97

Wouldn't I want some Mg in it?
 
I'd drop the epsom completely b/c malt has enough Mg for a healthy fermentation in it already and doesn't need any added. Also you actually have 33ppm of sulfate and don't need any more with that beer. SO4-S gets multiplied by 3.

Just add enough CaCl2 to the mash to reach 50ppm of Ca+ and you should be golden. I came up with about 4g of CaCl2 to the mash to get pH 5.5. The C60 and Victory will drop pH and you shouldn't need acid. Check a cooled sample of mash pH with a calibrated meter and only add acid if it's above 5.6.

Don't get caught up in trying to match chloride/sulfate ratios. It doesn't really work like a 1:1 ratio. It took me a couple of overdosed-on-salts batches (tasted like alka-seltzer) to figure out that sometimes less is just the right amount.
 
RCCOLA said:
I'd drop the epsom completely b/c malt has enough Mg for a healthy fermentation in it already and doesn't need any added. Also you actually have 33ppm of sulfate and don't need any more with that beer. SO4-S gets multiplied by 3.

Just add enough CaCl+ to the mash to reach 50ppm of Ca+ and you should be golden. I came up with about 4g of CaCl+ to the mash to get pH 5.5. The C60 and Victory will drop pH and you shouldn't need acid. Check a cooled sample of mash pH with a calibrated meter and only add acid if it's above 5.6.

Don't get caught up in trying to match chloride/sulfate ratios. It doesn't really work like a 1:1 ratio. It took me a couple of overdosed-on-salts batches (tasted like alka-seltzer) to figure out that sometimes less is just the right amount.
Click to expand...

I agree. No MgSo4 at all, and just a bit of CaCl2. No gypsum. You want to keep chloride under 100 ppm anyway, and you don't need an increased sulfate at all.
 
RCCOLA said:
I'd drop the epsom completely b/c malt has enough Mg for a healthy fermentation in it already and doesn't need any added. Also you actually have 33ppm of sulfate and don't need any more with that beer. SO4-S gets multiplied by 3.

Just add enough CaCl+ to the mash to reach 50ppm of Ca+ and you should be golden. I came up with about 4g of CaCl+ to the mash to get pH 5.5. The C60 and Victory will drop pH and you shouldn't need acid. Check a cooled sample of mash pH with a calibrated meter and only add acid if it's above 5.6.

Don't get caught up in trying to match chloride/sulfate ratios. It doesn't really work like a 1:1 ratio. It took me a couple of overdosed-on-salts batches (tasted like alka-seltzer) to figure out that sometimes less is just the right amount.
Click to expand...

Yeah I did know about having 33 SO4. That is what I entered into the EZ water calculator spreadsheet.

I'll have to check again but if I remember correctly adding just CaCl+ didn't lower my mash pH enough. When I go home after work I'll plug in just 4 grams of CaCl+ to see what happens.

All this water stuff confuses me lol. There are just too many variables and too many different opinions. I guess it is one of those things where you need to experiment and take notes.

I think right now I'm more interested in making sure my pH is correct. I do also add some yeast nutrients near the end of the boil which I think has some of these minerals as well...like Mg.
 
Yooper said:
I agree. No MgSo4 at all, and just a bit of CaCl2. No gypsum. You want to keep chloride under 100 ppm anyway, and you don't need an increased sulfate at all.
Click to expand...

Will this be true for most styles I brew or will it change drastically?

At this point I have gotten good at the brewing process. Now I need to tweak the little things to make my beers come out better...like mash pH and water profile.
 
h22lude said:
Yeah I did know about having 33 SO4. That is what I entered into the EZ water calculator spreadsheet.

I'll have to check again but if I remember correctly adding just CaCl+ didn't lower my mash pH enough. When I go home after work I'll plug in just 4 grams of CaCl+ to see what happens.

All this water stuff confuses me lol. There are just too many variables and too many different opinions. I guess it is one of those things where you need to experiment and take notes.

I think right now I'm more interested in making sure my pH is correct. I do also add some yeast nutrients near the end of the boil which I think has some of these minerals as well...like Mg.
Click to expand...

The salts are not really supposed to help you hit your pH, as they don't really move the pH that much. They are for flavor and yeast health (and calcium helps with flocculation). They do help a little, so sometimes a recipe with crystal malt and some added CaCl2 WILL be in the proper pH, though. Malt has plenty of magnesium, and "less is more" is good. It can enhance hops bitterness, but a bit too much and it gets sharp and tart. It's not that much that is "too much" so I almost never use it.

If you need to adjust pH after the salt additions, use phosphoric or lactic acid or acid malt in the mash.
 
Yooper said:
The salts are not really supposed to help you hit your pH, as they don't really move the pH that much. They are for flavor and yeast health (and calcium helps with flocculation). They do help a little, so sometimes a recipe with crystal malt and some added CaCl2 WILL be in the proper pH, though. Malt has plenty of magnesium, and "less is more" is good. It can enhance hops bitterness, but a bit too much and it gets sharp and tart. It's not that much that is "too much" so I almost never use it.

If you need to adjust pH after the salt additions, use phosphoric or lactic acid or acid malt in the mash.
Click to expand...

When I go home I'll check to see what CaCl does to my profile and mash pH and see if I need any lactic acid or acid malt to lower my pH.

So I guess having less than 1ppm of Mg in my water is actually a good thing.
 
I plugged in the recipe with 1lb c60 and victory with your water profile. Most of my recipes with similar grists hit pH 5.4 consistently with RO water and small CaCl2 additions to raise Ca+ to 50ppm.

Every now and then I have to add phosphoric acid to the mash to lower pH--usually on beers with no crystal or specialty malts. Those are the beers I've started adding 2-3% acid malt to the mash on.
 
So I plugged in the grains and my water profile. I then put in 4 grams of CaCl2. Now it looks like

Mash pH 6.0
Effective Alkalinity 22
RA -26

Ca 67
Mg 0
Na 12
Cl 104
So4 33

If I add 2 oz of acid malt I get...

Mash pH 5.51
Effective Alkalinity -47
RA -95
 
If it were me, I'd take RCCOLA's advice and add as little CaCl2 as it takes to get to 50ppm of Ca, and the minimal amount of acid to keep your mash ph between 5 - 5.5
As Yooper has said (probably a million times by now) less truly is more when it comes to mineral additions. There are some fringe exceptions, but they are rare.
 
h22lude said:
So I plugged in the grains and my water profile. I then put in 4 grams of CaCl2. Now it looks like

Mash pH 6.0
Effective Alkalinity 22
RA -26

Ca 67
Mg 0
Na 12
Cl 104
So4 33

If I add 2 oz of acid malt I get...

Mash pH 5.51
Effective Alkalinity -47
RA -95
Click to expand...
That sounds pretty reasonable. I'd run with it. Do you have a pH meter?
 
h22lude said:
No I don't. I have heard that they are a waste of money so I just never bought one. People recommend getting strips instead like these

http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?cPath=178_67_362&products_id=1012


If I do 3 grams of CaCl and 3 oz of acid malt it brings my Ca to 55 and mash pH to 5.47
Click to expand...

Those strips are useless. I had some and checked them against my calibrated pH meter.

Here's a thread where I show how bad those strips are. If I had adjusted my mash based on their readings I would have had a pH of 6.6.

Who told you meters were a waste of$$?
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/ph-ro-water-adj-brewday-pics-244963/
 
When I was thinking about getting one I did some online research and found some reviews on here where people said they like using the strips over their meter. They didn't say meters are bad, just not worth the money over the low cost of the strips.

Did you try another strip to see what you get? Not saying you are wrong but that strip could have been bad or something. if it happened again then I would definitely say strips are useless. It would be cool to see a side by side test of a meter and a few strips to see the difference.
 
h22lude said:
When I was thinking about getting one I did some online research and found some reviews on here where people said they like using the strips over their meter. They didn't say meters are bad, just not worth the money over the low cost of the strips.

Did you try another strip to see what you get? Not saying you are wrong but that strip could have been bad or something. if it happened again then I would definitely say strips are useless. It would be cool to see a side by side test of a meter and a few strips to see the difference.
Click to expand...

Oh yeah. I used multiple strips, different pH from acidic to alkaline. pH 3 to 7 and all read wrong. There are strips that are decent. ColorpHast brand but even they read .3 off.

The strips you have though--very bad. There's a thread about strip comparison on northern brewer. Ill post if I can find it. Here's one about the strips you have. http://forum.northernbrewer.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=109815
 
RCCOLA said:
Oh yeah. I used multiple strips, different pH from acidic to alkaline. pH 3 to 7 and all read wrong. There are strips that are decent. ColorpHast brand but even they read .3 off.

The strips you have though--very bad. There's a thread about strip comparison on northern brewer. Ill post if I can find it. Here's one about the strips you have. http://forum.northernbrewer.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=109815
Click to expand...

Oh sorry those are the strips I was originally talking about. I linked the wrong ones. I don't have them...I was thinking about buying them.

So for a pH meter, what would you recommend?
 
I have the Hanna pHep 5 and it works great. I bought it mainly for winemaking though. I don't think I'd spend that much (~$90) just for brewing. The estimates on the EZ spreadsheet work well enough for me that I usually don't even pull out my meter to confirm.
 
I use this $37 pHep -> http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002NX0VY2/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

The pHep 5 is better and reads to .01 while mine only reads to .1 but mine works fine and reads close to what EZ water predicts. My beer hasn't had any astringent or tangy flavors related to pH since I started using it.

Know in advance though that you need storage solution and buffers to maintain a meter properly. Some aren't willing to do that. I recommend these.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0045I6EC6/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0045I6EGM/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004G8PV8I/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
 
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