Water calculations and ph

I am getting ready to do a rye ipa using 100 percent distilled water. This my first time using the brewers friend water calculator. I picked the light colored and hoppy water profile and it looks like it wants 7 grams of gypsum, 4.3 of Epsom salt, and 4 of calcium chloride. It says my mash ph will be 5.4 without doing anything else. Does this sound correct? I also input a lager recipe and in that one it didn't want me to do any acid additions either and it came out at a mash of 5.4. I was assuming I would have to do some type of acid additions but it appears that I don't need to. I guess that is making me question whether I did something wrong.

That sounds about right. You don't always need acid. Sometimes you will even find that the mineral additions will drive your PH too low and you will need to reserve them for the boil.

Yep, I don't 100% understand exactly how it works, but sometimes you don't need acid as the minerals drive the pH to the proper range. I'd still double check the Lovibond numbers you inputted for the grain.

Are your numbers for mash and sparge water together? If it's just for the mash, then that sure sounds like a lot of Epsom salts, but if it's for everything, you're fine.

Run the numbers through Bru'n water and see what it gives you. Good to get more than one software tool going till you find one that you trust.

The pH estimates are just that though. Without checking the mash pH with a good meter you are working blind. I find Bru'n water gives predicted values within 0.1 of measured values in my setup using tap water and additions.

In the case of a hoppy beer using a lot of sulfate-containing salts, those salts do help depress the mash pH by way of the residual alkalinity effect in which the malt phytins react with the Ca and Mg ions. It is possible that no external acid will be needed to produce a desired mash pH. In the case of the Pale Ale profile in Bru'n Water, it turns out that the very high sulfate content requires a lot gypsum and epsom and the mashing water actually needs a little bit of added alkalinity to keep the mash pH from falling below the 5.4 range.

You are OK.

mabrungard said:

In the case of a hoppy beer using a lot of sulfate-containing salts, those salts do help depress the mash pH by way of the residual alkalinity effect in which the malt phytins react with the Ca and Mg ions. It is possible that no external acid will be needed to produce a desired mash pH. In the case of the Pale Ale profile in Bru'n Water, it turns out that the very high sulfate content requires a lot gypsum and epsom and the mashing water actually needs a little bit of added alkalinity to keep the mash pH from falling below the 5.4 range.

You are OK.

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Thank you. The information you share and the time you spend helping homebrewers is awesome.

nyer said:

I am getting ready to do a rye ipa using 100 percent distilled water. This my first time using the brewers friend water calculator. I picked the light colored and hoppy water profile and it looks like it wants 7 grams of gypsum, 4.3 of Epsom salt, and 4 of calcium chloride. It says my mash ph will be 5.4 without doing anything else. Does this sound correct?

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No. Not really. Lets assume you are mashing 10 lbs Maris Otter ale malt with 3.5 gal RO water and want pH 5.4. You would need 64 mEq of protons to move that much malt from its DIpH of 5.69 to 5.4. It takes 3.5 mEq of calcium to produce, at best, 1 mEq of H+ so the total calcium requirement here would be 3.5*64 = 224 mEq of calcium. That comes from 112 mmol = .112 mol of CaSO4 and each mol of CaSO4.2H2O weighs 172 grams so you would need 19 grams of gypsum to approach pH 5.4 with this volume of this particular malt.

nyer said:

I also input a lager recipe and in that one it didn't want me to do any acid additions either and it came out at a mash of 5.4. I was assuming I would have to do some type of acid additions but it appears that I don't need to. I guess that is making me question whether I did something wrong.

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The key thing to keep in mind here is that it takes 3.5 mEq of calcium to get 1 mEq of acid. With typical malt buffering capacities of around 35 mEq/kg it should be pretty clear that calcium is not a very effective means of adjusting pH. Even though your program may have calculated the required amount of calcium incorrectly it is clear that it still calls for a lot of calcium. Your instinctive feeling that some acid is required was sound. Use acid for pH control and trim with a bit of calcium if you want to.

ajdelange said:

Even though your program may have calculated the required amount of calcium incorrectly it is clear that it still calls for a lot of calcium. Your instinctive feeling that some acid is required was sound. Use acid for pH control and trim with a bit of calcium if you want to.

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My guess is that his malt bill is also driving PH down and the calculator he used takes that into consideration. I take readings during the mash and often hit ~5.4 without the use of any acid. If OP doesn't plan on measuring PH, I would think that the calculator is probably his best bet.

The recipe is edworts bee cave brewery rye ipa.

The point remains that calcium is not an effective means of mash pH adjustment. Those who attempt to use it for large adjustments, such as the one I gave as an example, will wind up with very minerally beer. For small tweaks, have at it!

4 grams of calcium is a lot? I thought it wasn't much at all. I have acid malt but when I added a small amount in the program it dropped the ph too low. I can't figure out how to post the grain Bill from my phone and I'm not near a computer.

I just removed all mineral adjustments and the pH still shows 5.4 it didn't change it at all. The only thing that changes it is if I add a minimum of 6 ounces of acid malt. I am obviosly doing something wrong but I can't figure it out.

I feel like I'm being a huge pain in the butt so I apologize. I just unchecked the box under acid additions that says specify acid by target mash pH. Now I needed to add 4 ounces of acid malt to get my mash ph to 5.43. That was with the original mineral additions i already had in there. Am I getting close to making this work?

This is how I approach it with Bru'n water

Mineral profile

I know my water profile so I put those values in. You are using RO water so the mineral values are close to zero. Just select RO water in the spreadsheet or enter 0 for the values.

Select a target mineral profile and work out the best additions to achieve these numbers in the mash and/or sparge.

This gives you the mineral profile you want.

Now tackle pH

Enter the grain bill and the software will give you the predicted pH. Adjust grain bill with acid malt or by adding lactic acid to the water addition section to reach the desired pH.

I like to use acid malt.


During the mash (not sure exactly when is best to measure) take a sample and measure the actual mash pH. I take my sample 20 minutes into the mash when most if not all conversion has occurred. I mill my grains fine for BIAB so one could argue to wait longer for measuring a mash with coarser milling. Again not sure if this is good advice.

Compare with the predicted pH and make a note of the difference. This data point can be factored into future mash pH adjustments.

I hope there is nothing too wrong with this process. I would defer to the more knowledgeable folks in the thread. I have had good results in targeting my mash pH this way over the last number of brews. The predicted and measured pH is getting ever closer.

Again I use Bru'n Water and find it to be a very good tool.

Hope this helps, or at least doesn't steer you wrong.

Gavin,
Theres nothing wrong with a process if it works for you! There are plenty of ways to make good/great beer. Thanks for sharing your way with us!

Jeffinn said:

Theres nothing wrong with a process if it works for you!

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I don't really agree with this approach. I read lots of incorrect and demonstrably bad methods that people use all the time; their rationale being "it works for me and my beer is great".

I try to follow proven methods. Water chemistry is one area where I have made some glaring errors in the past. I may, unbeknownst to me, be continuing to make some more.

Nonetheless, thanks for the words.

Gavin C said:

I don't really agree with this approach. I read lots of incorrect and demonstrably bad methods that people use all the time; their rationale being "it works for me and my beer is great".

I try to follow proven methods. Water chemistry is one area where I have made some glaring errors in the past. I may, unbeknownst to me, be continuing to make some more.

Nonetheless, thanks for the words.

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So I pay you a small compliment on your post and you decide that the correct response is to tell me you don't agree with the approach?
The rationale of " it works for me and I make great beer" is valid. You may disagree with their approach, but for them the results justified the approach. For them, thats all that matters.
If you're unsure of your process then maybe you should refrain from offering it to others. We wouldnt want them to make "great beer" based on your mistakes.
Sorry I offended you by paying you a compliment.

Just wanted to say thank you again for the help. I just poured a tall sample of the rye ipa and it's delicious. One of the best beers I've ever made. From now on I will be using distilled water with adjustments, it's definitely worth the extra effort.