Water profile -how to fix...

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conpewter

conpewter

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So I emailed the water departement in my town again and asked for the specific minerals I was interested in. Last year I asked for a water report and just got the one that has all the unsafe chemicals listed (amounts of arsnic etc.) but nothing really useful.

Well this time he filled in my answers (except for two that the tests will come back in a couple weeks) and also expressed interested in brewing and said he'd been reading a few books! That was pretty cool so I wrote back a long email about how to get started and possibly meeting for a drink and then brewing together.

Well here is what I have. I have really hard water... which I knew (since the house has a water softener) and I'm not sure what all to do with it. I may need to add some magnesium, calcium looks ok. The problem is my CaCO3 levels are way high...

I guess my question is what kind of styles am I looking at here (I'm thinking stouts/porters and IPA/Bitters) and what to do to get other styles.

Thanks!

Sodium, Na- 40 mg/l (ppm)
Potassium, K- to low to measure
Calcium, Ca- 70 mg/l (ppm)
Magnesium, Mg to low - Manganese 150 ug/l (ppb)
Total Hardness, CaCO3- 424 Mg/l
Nitrate, NO3-N - 0.18 mg/l (ppm)
Sulfate, SO4-S - 43 mg/l (ppm)
Chloride, Cl - .5-1.2 Free Mg/l (ppm) to 3-3.5 Total mg/l (ppm)
Carbonate, CO3
Bicarbonate, HCO3
Total Alkalinity, CaCO3 - 320 mg/l (ppm)
 
You have water with high residual alkalinity. It's good for only the darkest stouts. For anything else, you're going to want to do one of 3 things.

1) start w/ pure RO/distilled water and use brewing salts to build the water profile you want

2) Heavily dilute with RO/distilled to cut the alkalinity. You still may need to add some minerals back in.

3) Use acid to neutralize the alkalinity.

There's tools online that can help with all of this and I've found palmer's chapter about water to be very helpful. He's also got a nomograph and spreadsheet you download.

We have even more alkaline water here (469 ppm bicarbonates) and I've had success using all of the approaches I listed. I also add the 5.2 pH buffer from 5 star to idiot proof what I'm doing. The actual water coming out of your faucet can vary (sometimes a lot) throughout the year, so I get as close as I can and let the buffer lock in the pH where it needs to be.

Hope that helps. Cheers.
 
Last year I asked for a water report and just got the one that has all the unsafe chemicals listed (amounts of arsnic etc.) but nothing really useful.
Click to expand...

That is EXACTLY what has happened to me the last year!

I'm looking into getting 5.2 buffer as my water when mashing (don't even bother correcting the water out of the faucet) is off the charts PH style.

Welcome to Dublin Illinois BTW! LOL
 
Lil' Sparky said:
For anything else, you're going to want to do one of 3 things.

1) start w/ pure RO/distilled water and use brewing salts to build the water profile you want

2) Heavily dilute with RO/distilled to cut the alkalinity. You still may need to add some minerals back in.

3) Use acid to neutralize the alkalinity.
Click to expand...

do you do all that for the strike water AND the sparge water? Or just the mash?
 
Cool. Well I hope to keep from buying a lot of RO water, not really the cost I'm concerned with but more the convenience factor. What would be a good acid to add?

I've been on HowToBrew for most of the morning reading up on it. Also trying to figure out what my water softener does to the water. As far as I can tell after the water softener my calcium is down to nothing, but the sodium is up to 224 ppm, which is not good, also the softener does not actually affect alkalinity so not helpful.

If I'm reading right I think the calcium is OK, it is the amount if bicarbonates that is my issue (represented as the total alkalinity, I did a calculation and I think my Bicarbonates are at 390)
 
If you want you can send a sample of your tap water to Ward Labs and they'll run a test for all the things we need to know about for brewing. It's like $16 or so, but then you'll know exactly what your softened tap water looks like.

I'm still trying to figure out the water thing myself. Can't do Pales of any kind, but ambers through stouts come out pretty good. I've tried playing in Beersmith with the profiler tool but I can't get it nailed down. Adding one thing screws up the numbers of the previous item I added. It's a tricky game.
 
conpewter said:
Cool. Well I hope to keep from buying a lot of RO water, not really the cost I'm concerned with but more the convenience factor. What would be a good acid to add?

I've been on HowToBrew for most of the morning reading up on it. Also trying to figure out what my water softener does to the water. As far as I can tell after the water softener my calcium is down to nothing, but the sodium is up to 224 ppm, which is not good, also the softener does not actually affect alkalinity so not helpful.

If I'm reading right I think the calcium is OK, it is the amount if bicarbonates that is my issue (represented as the total alkalinity, I did a calculation and I think my Bicarbonates are at 390)
Click to expand...

We've got some local places that sell RO water, and I just stop by w/ 2 carboys the day before or the morning I brew and fill them up. Only costs a few bucks.

I've used lactic acid. I've also heard that sulfuric acid is good, too, but you have to be more careful when working with it.

From what I've read, you don't want to use water that's been through a water softener. You're just trading one problem for another, and you don't want that much sodium in your brewing water.

You're right - your calcium #s are fine. It's the bicarbonates that are way too high.
 
No softened water! It'll ruin your brew. The problem isn't the sodium, it's the chlorine! Your beer will be so high in chlorophenols it will taste like you are sucking on and burping up burnt band-aids. Blech.

Three guesses how I know that.. :eek: :D
 
Hope the OP doesn't mind, but I'm needing help with this too. Here's my report from Ward Labs. As I've mentioned previously, I can't do Pale Ales, IPA, ESB, etc without getting a tanniny flavor. Stouts, Ports, Reds, Browns are all good. What can I do?

pH 8.1
Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) Est 161
Electrical Conductivity, mmho/cm 0.27
Cations / Anions, me/L 2.8 / 2.6

ppm
Sodium, Na 9
Potassium, K 5
Calcium, Ca 21
Magnesium, Mg 15
Total Hardness, CaCO 115
Nitrate, NO 3.0 (SAFE)
Sulfate, SO 4
Chloride, Cl 6
Carbonate, CO 3
Bicarbonate, HCO 113
Total Alkalinity, CaCO 98
 
I have also been investigating water. Since it is the single largest component of your beer it should be studied. I sent an email to Baltimore water people and IMMEDIATELY got this response.
Alkalinity* 41
Calcium 19.5
Chloride 30
Hardness 72
Iron <0.01
Magnesium 5.10
Sodium 14.1
Sulfate 14.2
Seems this will be good for pilsners and pale malts. Tonight I will see if Brewsmith(subscribed finally:rockin:) if they can tell me what I need to add for each beer I brew. Here's a list from R. Daniels site showing brewing cities water profile. Compare yours to see how it fits in. I am going to have to add some chemicals to increase alkalinity for darker beers as I am really low.

Water chemistry of classic brewing cities
Pilsen Dortmund Munich Vienna London Burton Dublin Calcium 7 225 75 200 52 268 118 Magnesium 2 40 18 60 16 62 4 Sodium 2 60 7 8 99 54 12 Chloride 5 60 10 12 60 36 19 Sulfate 5 120 10 125 77 638 54 Alkalinity 14 180 152 120 156 200 319

edit: The chart doesn't look very good. If some can fix, please do. HEre's the link to his page
http://www.allaboutbeer.com/homebrew/water3.html
 
Code: 
		Pilsen 		Dortmund 	Munich 		Vienna 		London 		Burton 		Dublin 
Calcium		7 		225 		75 		200 		52 		268 		118 
Magnesium 	2 		40 		18 		60 		16 		62 		4 
Sodium 		2 		60 		7 		8 		99 		54 		12 
Chloride 	5 		60 		10 		12 		60 		36 		19 
Sulfate 	5 		120 		10 		125 		77 		638 		54 
Alkalinity 	14 		180 		152 		120 		156 		200 		319
 
Saccharomyces said:
Try some gypsum for hoppy beers, and a few ml of phosphoric or lactic acid in the sparge water to keep the pH below six during the sparge. I dilute my water with RO to get to your profile. :)
Click to expand...

I think this is more helpful than trying to match a cities water. I mean Pilsen really didn't like their water and have to do all the acid rest crap to get it to work out well. We really don't know what breweries do to their water after they get it.

For my particular case I want to come up with the additions/process I need to do for very general styles

Low SRM low hops
Low SRM high hops
Ambers (somewhere in between)
Porters/Stouts (I probably don't need to do too much here..)

After I get those generalities down I don't really want to think about water anymore, My head is spinning after a couple days of researching water chemistry.
 
I sent an email off to my municpal water department yesterday after this thread started...and HOPEFULLY they'll respond back to me...I finally pulled out the residential water profile they sent me and realized it, like most muni reports is more concerned with water toxicity than telling us what we need to know.
 
I am not trusting the water report I got. Apparenty water is pretty close to electrically neutral. So using a spreadsheet I found it does a lot of stuff, but one thing it does is add the Cations and Anions up as a way to check that you have all the information. Mine comes up with a pretty significant error. I'm thinking of getting a Ward-Lab report anyway, it doesn't cost all that much.
 
conpewter said:
I think this is more helpful than trying to match a cities water. I mean Pilsen really didn't like their water and have to do all the acid rest crap to get it to work out well. We really don't know what breweries do to their water after they get it.

My head is spinning after a couple days of researching water chemistry.
Click to expand...

Good point. Perhaps asking a local brewpub what they do w/ their water might be the way to go, assuming you have a local brewpub. We have a few in Baltimore and might stop by and ask the head BM. I hear ya on tthe spinning head:drunk:

PS Thanks 944play for the chart
 
I'm actually lucky that we have two brewpubs nearby, one that is really really good, I have a "Beer Club" membership there. Unfortunately they are both in "West Dundee" across the river so I think they use a different water source. I will email them though and see. Even if they run off different wells they probably have the same hard water issues due to the local geography (Unless W. Dundee pulls out of the river and treats).

Thanks for the idea.
 
My turn my turn!!!

I just got this back from the water department.

Here is the most of the information you requested, (less the types of hardness Carbonate, Bicarbonate)
I hope this helps you.

Tap pH 7.71
Sodium, 8 mg/l
Potassium, 1 mg/l
Calcium, 29.7 mg/l
Magnesium, 6.5 mg/l
Manganese Not Detected
Nitrate, Not Detected
Sulfate, 20 mg/l
Chloride, 7 mg/l
Total Alkalinity, 76 mg/l
Total Hardness, 98 as CaCO3
Non - Carbonate Hardness 22 mg/l

Daniel S. McKenzie, Superintendent
City of Port Huron, Water Filtration Plant
Click to expand...
 
conpewter said:
For my particular case I want to come up with the additions/process I need to do for very general styles

Low SRM low hops
Low SRM high hops
Ambers (somewhere in between)
Porters/Stouts (I probably don't need to do too much here..)

After I get those generalities down I don't really want to think about water anymore, My head is spinning after a couple days of researching water chemistry.
Click to expand...

I'm working on the same thing but I have a few nice tools at my disposal. I have a saltwater aquarium so I use RO/DI water and add salts back to it since it is trivially easy to construct whatever water profile you'd like with 0 ppm TDS water. Also, I have access to microgram precision scales. I've tried to measure out salts on my hop scale (1g precision) but it just isn't sensitive enough to be trusted. So, I'm brewing a nice porter this weekend and have been trying to decide on what the perfect water profile would be for a nice malty sweet oatmeal stout with very low IBUs. This is where I'm at so far:

Ca2+ = 150 ppm
Mg2+ = 0 ppm (supposed to be enough in malt to get the job done and >30 = bitter)
Na+ = 125 ppm (to enhance the sweetness of the malt)
SO4- = 0 ppm (to ensure low bitterness)
Cl- = 200 ppm (to accentuate flavor a la Palmer)
HCO3- = 225 ppm or perhaps less (don't have any trouble getting a mash pH of 5.2 but there also doesn't seem to be anything to be gained by increasing the bicarb its a pH control ion not a taste ion.)

For 5 gallons of RO/DI this is nearly perfectly accomplished with 6.0 grams of NaCl and 7.0 grams of chalk.
 
Ok another thought/question. I run my brewing water through a carbon filter (as well as our drinking water) to help improve taste. I'm about to send a sample off to Ward lab.... Should I take it before the filter or after? If I take it before I will have a more consistant base to calculate what the filter does and have an approximation of what the water is like coming out of it. On the other hand if I take it after the filter i have an idea what the filter can do, but the filter is about 6 months old now so it is near the end of its life.

Does anyone even know what an activated carbon filter does to the ions we are interested in? I am reading that it really has no affect on the calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate levels, not sure about sodium, sulfate...


Also I read that a water softener not only strips out the calcium and magnesium, but also turns Calcium Carbonate into Sodium Carbonate, calcium bicarbonate to sodium bicarbonate. So that is interesting but not related to my question...
 
conpewter said:
...Does anyone even know what an activated carbon filter does to the ions we are interested in? I am reading that it really has no affect on the calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate levels, not sure about sodium, sulfate...


Also I read that a water softener not only strips out the calcium and magnesium, but also turns Calcium Carbonate into Sodium Carbonate, calcium bicarbonate to sodium bicarbonate. So that is interesting but not related to my question...
Click to expand...

Absolutely. Reefkeepers use activated carbon blocks as one of typically five stages in purifying water. All carbon does is strip out chlorine which if left will annihilate the RO membrane. Activated carbon doesn't do anything for homebrewers that a 30 minute boil won't accomplish; i.e. drive off chlorine. Also, most decent carbon blocks are rated for 20,000 gallons so at six months it might still have a lot of life left in it depending on your rate of consumption.

Water softeners are definitely counterproductive as well. Best bet would be to add a two-stage system which consisted of a 10-micron activated carbon block and a Dow Filmtec RO membrane. That or just skip it altogether and work with your tap water as a starting point.

Best place on the internet for very cheap and very good filter systems for homebrewers (and reefkeepers) is BulkReefSupply.com.
$99 three stage RO system
2-stage-ro-l.gif
 
Wow, I just looked at the prices for some of these components on MoreBeer.com and they are ripping homebrewers off! $26 for a 10" filter housing; it's $12 at BulkReefSupply!
 
Boiling gets rid of chlorine but an extra step before the mash. I always(almost always...ok sometimes:)) leave my pots full of the water on the stove top the night before brewing. Leaving water out overnight out gases the chlorine. AND I am ready to brew at the crack of dawn. I usually have my grains ground, water measured the night before, keeps brewday time to a minimum.

Chems Ro advice seems like an inexpensive way to strip the water of everything, then just add what you need to make the brew.

After reading more on water it seems best to have water lower in alkalinity than high. Many recommend diluting high alkaline water or precipitating out the carbonates.
Here's a decent link w/ amounts of minerals(salts, ions etc) to raise your concentration.
Welcome to Homebrew Adventures
 
Hey Guys: I found a site w/ good (albeit head spinning information) about Richmond VA water comparing to brewing area around the world. It also shows examples using promash. I'm still playing w/ brewsmith to figure this out. One thing for certain: you can't always get what you want. You can often get close but never spot on.
www.jedflight.com - /jrhb/water.ppt
 
Revvy said:
Thanks Con, I got lost reading that section in HTB...I haven't yet sat down with beersmith and the numbers to see what happens...
Click to expand...

Revy: your water is very close to mine.
I just spent way toooo much at brewsmith water profile. Plug your numbers into base water(need to be in PPM, not mg/l). Palmer has a conversion chart if you need to change them over. Also on his page is a list of each mineral and its affects on beers including amounts affecting sweetness, high/low bittering, dark/amber/light beers. After you plug in your base water values; select target(essentially a desired city water) and it will show you the differences between the 2 water profiles. I am making a nut brown ale and choose London. I compared its profile with Palmers information. Seems Londons water is close to what I want for a NBA. After both profiles are entered I adjusted the mineral additions(on left side of page). As I adjusted a mineral I watch the differences change. Still playing w/ that.
Ultimately the thing to do is create your own target water, say stout, enter the needed mineral concentrations and compare to your own profile, then add minerals. I am surprised Brewsmith does not do this. Seems simple to do.
conpewter: There is also a section on brewsmith for dilution. So you enter your water profile, dilute with(for you I am thinking distilled) and enter quantity, then pick desired target profile. The higher CO3 you are the more you dilute. If you don't have brewsmith download a free version for 30 days.
Enough about all of this for now....to be continued Charlie
 
Thanks Charlie,
I'm trying to make my water work out without dilution since I don't want to always have to keep RO water on hand. I plan to either add more calcium then percipitate out the ca/Co3 or just add phosphoric acid to combine with the carbonate and form co2, water and phosphates (I think). Acid is probably where I'll start as long as it won't add to many phosphates. I sent my water off to Ward Labs today since I want a profile that is very specific and has more information than the water guy gave me.

Also unless I'm mistaken ppm is mg/l I think you are thinking of mEq/L which needs to be converted.

I do have the trial version of brewsmith which I am trying out. I've also found a few spreadsheets that are helpful and one program (BreWater) that is very helpful. I'll keep up to date on this thread when I get my water profile and what I find as good general water profiles for styles, currently I'm all set for a dry stout ;)
 
balto charlie said:
Revy: your water is very close to mine.
I just spent way toooo much at brewsmith water profile. Plug your numbers into base water(need to be in PPM, not mg/l). Palmer has a conversion chart if you need to change them over. Also on his page is a list of each mineral and its affects on beers including amounts affecting sweetness, high/low bittering, dark/amber/light beers. After you plug in your base water values; select target(essentially a desired city water) and it will show you the differences between the 2 water profiles. I am making a nut brown ale and choose London. I compared its profile with Palmers information. Seems Londons water is close to what I want for a NBA. After both profiles are entered I adjusted the mineral additions(on left side of page). As I adjusted a mineral I watch the differences change. Still playing w/ that.
Ultimately the thing to do is create your own target water, say stout, enter the needed mineral concentrations and compare to your own profile, then add minerals. I am surprised Brewsmith does not do this. Seems simple to do.
conpewter: There is also a section on brewsmith for dilution. So you enter your water profile, dilute with(for you I am thinking distilled) and enter quantity, then pick desired target profile. The higher CO3 you are the more you dilute. If you don't have brewsmith download a free version for 30 days.
Enough about all of this for now....to be continued Charlie
Click to expand...


Thanks Charlie, a lot for this info....Guess I gotta start pluggin numbers.

:D
 
Ok...I'm seriously math deficient, so firgive me...i'm trying to convert the mg/l to ppm, like Charlie said...and I'm looking at the chart here..

How to Brew - By John Palmer - Reading a Water Report


I am not seeing the conversion formula for Sodium here, or am I misreading the chart, and there is only one formula for converting all the elements in my water report to ppm???

grrr....
 
stevemgordon said:
1mg/l = 1ppm :drunk:
Click to expand...

English please....I've read that all over the web but it means nothing to me especially if you look at chart in Palmer... here's some of it...

To Get From Do This

Ca (mEq/l) Ca (ppm) Divide by 20

Mg (mEq/l) Mg (ppm) Divide by 12.1

HCO3 (mEq/l) HCO3 (ppm) Divide by 61

CaCO3 (mEq/l) CaCO3 (ppm) Divide by 50

So I am seeing various number to divide by for various chemicals but not for sodium in the chart...

Or am I misreading something...

Like I said, I am severly math deficient....so just putting "1mg/l = 1ppm"
means absolutely nothing to me.....are you saying that if my sodium is 8mg/l, then it is 8ppms?
 
Sorry,

Revvy said:
are you saying that if my sodium is 8mg/l, then it is 8ppms?
Click to expand...

Yes. That table is getting at the milliequivalents. For example the molecular weight of Ca is roughly 40. (ie. one mole of Ca weighs 40g) That table is dividing by half that amount due to the 2+ charge on a Ca ion... You need the ionic concentrations in milliequivalents to use his formula to determine hardness..

It looks like you already know the hardness of your water, so all these calculations are beyond the scope of what you need to do. :tank:

really parts-per-million is talking about mg/kg or 0.001g/1000g and using the density of water (which is about 1...) its a pretty straight forward approximation of 1ppm = 1mg/l
 
Revvy: looks like steve has all your needed info.
The numbers I feel are hardest to find is what water profile do you want to end with. Beersmith has city waters around the world. As Conpewter said "we don't know what a brewery does to it's water for brewing".
What Beersmith needs is a beer style water profile. I found, late last night, a list but it's in a book and didn't feel like typing them out. The book is called Beer Captured by Tess and Mark Szamatulski. It also has a list of different water profiles and what mineral amounts needed for different beers.
I went into an LBS yesterday and no one there had any info on water. If it taste good then it is good enough to use. The hunt to learn about water continues but those murky waters are beginning to clear:D
 
balto charlie said:
Revvy: looks like steve has all your needed info.
The numbers I feel are hardest to find is what water profile do you want to end with. Beersmith has city waters around the world. As Conpewter said "we don't know what a brewery does to it's water for brewing".
What Beersmith needs is a beer style water profile. I found, late last night, a list but it's in a book and didn't feel like typing them out. The book is called Beer Captured by Tess and Mark Szamatulski. It also has a list of different water profiles and what mineral amounts needed for different beers.
I went into an LBS yesterday and no one there had any info on water. If it taste good then it is good enough to use. The hunt to learn about water continues but those murky waters are beginning to clear:D
Click to expand...

I think there is still a lot to research on how to get the best water profile you can. I know that Dublin makes great dry stouts because of it's water profile, they *Probably* don't do much to their water, but who knows? Also maybe there is a better water profile for dry stouts that doesn't exist in a famous brewing city.

For instance Dublin has 53 ppm sulfate in their water, this accentuates hop bitterness (useful in a bitter, pale ale etc) but perhaps not as useful in a stout, maybe it would be better at 20 or even 0? I don't really know but I would like to find more info on the "Ideal" water profile per style. Then I can try to adjust my water as close to that (I won't ever get exact but I can get closer)
 

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