Help Translate Water profile

I've read this report about 10 times. I've compaired it to HTB website and I'm still in the dark. My last three batches have had low efficency. I've asked for a more fine mill from my HBS, but I think it's the water.

http://www.corpuschristimarina.com/files/g17/2005 CCR.pdf

That's the link to the PDF. I tried to cut and past but it will not let me.

Here's what I'm thinking and please add in if I'm wrong or off base or if there's a better way.

pH is 8.0 - not bad but could be lower.
Calcium - not a clue but it is listed with magnesium for hardness.
Sulfate - is pretty low at 54 ppm - gypsum may be my answer to lower mash pH.
Hardness- 111 Calcium/magnesium I'm not sure if this is hard or soft water but my guess would be soft because I do not get spots in my shower.

I'm thinking that if my mash pH is above 7 I'm going to add 1 tsp of gypsum. About 4 grams this will keep me under the 150 pp/m mark for sulfate and should lower my pH. I'm not sure what it will do to my calcium but I'm thinking it will still be below 150 pp/m mark.

Yeah, that's pretty soft water, so you have a fair amount of flexibility in adding things to it if you need to.

What kind of grainbills were the three batches that you had low efficiency with? Your pH is not that high, really. Unless you're doing all-base-malt beers, I highly doubt that your mash pH is high enough to be the cause of serious efficieny problems.

Given that you levels of everything are pretty low, just using buffer 5.2 might be a pretty good strategy--see what that does for your efficiency. Unless you're going for Pilsen-izing your water--then you might need to dilute 50/50 with distilled water.

I thought of using 5.2 buffer but after reading some post here about off flavors. I deceided to try a few other things first. My batches were a Fat Tire Clone and a Stout. So I was not over the top base malt dominate.

I don't remember reading about anyone reporting off flavors from the 5.2 buffer. Did you read that specifically, or were some people just wondering/worrying about it? I'm also curious what else you decided to try first.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=25107&highlight=buffer

http://www.brewboard.com/index.php?showtopic=54771&hl=5\.2+stabilizer

These are just 2 links I pulled up. There are more out there, but I just don't want to take a chance and get the salty/mineral taste.

This is a quote from EBeer.

"I recently did a small pH experiment where I did three back to back 5 gallon brews of the same recipe. Each mash pH was taken to ~5.2 via three methods: phosphoric acid, lactic acid, and 5.2 Stabilizer.

Long of the short is 4 tasters detected a 'saltiness' or 'mineral' flavor with the 5.2 Stabilizer. This was subtle but present. I'm not sure if it was the only beer tasted that it would have been that pronounced, however next to the other brews (blind tasting of course) it was noted. My guess is that the 'mineral' taste is the residual buffers in the 5.2, but I'm no water chemistry expert."


First: I'm going to try adding Gypsum to my mash if it's pH is above 6.5 because my water is pretty soft.
Second: If my mash's pH stays high I'm going to add some lactic acid.

Hopefully I'll only have to do one or none of these. Going to do a IPA this week. I'll let you know how it pans out for me.

www.howtobrew.com Chapter 15. This will help you understand your water report, promise. It might make you more confused at first, but read chpt. 15 2-3 times with your water report in hand. Eventually it makes sense

LarMoeCur - thanks for the links. I hadn't actually heard of anybody saying they could taste it. I recently started adjusting my water after I moved (a LOT of RA in our water here!) but I don't have any finished beer to tell yet how the adjustments helped. What I did for my brew yesterday was add some lactic acid (based on Palmer's calcs) to bring the RA down and I used 1/2 Tbs 5.2 hoping to lock in the pH. I hope it worked!

Well, I did an IPA yesterday.

14# MO pale malt
1.25# 20L Cystal
1.25# Munich


I asked for a finer mill, but I'm not sure it happened. It looked about the same as it always does from AHB.

This had to be the worst brew day I've had in 10 years.
First thing that went wrong. My welded coupler leaked on my HLT. It wasn't a big deal just a very small leak. It did take my focus away some what.

Second thing. The pH strips I got are worthless. I would test the mash and couldn't tell if it was 5.2 or 5.5 it look the same color. So, I had to guess. I hate guessing, because I never get it right. Anyway, I added 1/2 tsp gypsum based on my water research. From what it looked like on my beyond worthless pH strips it did lower my mash pH. I'm not sure to what but it looked that way.

Third thing. I added a sparge arm to my mash cooler. I use the expanding foam insulation to fill in the cooler lid and seal the hole for the arm. Well now it seems my cooler looses heat faster with more insulation. This could be my a result of my forth problem.

Forth thing. I bought a new thermometer from Wally World. The probe type. Well it seams that it is either wrong or my old thermometer is wrong by about 4 degress. I was looking to mash at 154 F one said I was at 154 the other 150. I said close enough. Check at 30 minutes down one said 150 other 146. Normally I drop from 155 to 154ish in 30 minutes not a whole 4. Now I have to find a way to check my thermometer.

Anyway, back to my water issue. I was shooting for a OG of 1.077 at 5.5 gallons (70% eff). What I got was not even close. I collected 7 gallons at 1.054 and boiled down to 4.5 gallons at 1.062 missed both my gallons and my OG. I can not remember what Beer Smith told me but I think it's right about 58%. Which blows!

I fly sparged for almost 90 minutes at 170 F. Sparge arm worked great that's about the only good thing I can say.

Now I'm not sure what to do? I guess I'm going to have to buy a mill to make sure my grains are mill the way I want them. Maybe switch to bottled water. pH strips suck. I do not think I'll use them again.

I got no clue as to why my efficiency is so low. My efficiency in San Diego was a solid 70 to 80% all the time. Now I'm lucky to break 60%. I have had to get some new equipment because of my stupid movers, but I mainly think it's the water.

Any ideas?

I think your water might be the culprit. Unfortunately, the Corpus water report is really inadequate for determining the residual alkalinity (RA) for brewing purposes because it doesn't show what the bicarbonate levels are. Without that, how can you determine what the RA is? I think Total Dissolved Solids includes that, but I don't think you can just say that bicarbonate = total solids - (calcium & magnesium).

Another thing I was curious about on your water report - what's up with the "City's Internal Annual Monitoring Avg"? Those numbers are quite different from the "Average", which is what you're assuming the water has.

You might consider sending a water sample off to be tested. Without knowing what's really in your water, any adjustments are just shots in the dark, and you could be adjusting the RA in the wrong direction.

Where can I send a sample too? Any idea on the cost to have it checked?
I'm going to call the water plant and see if they can give me some more info.

This really has me stumped.

www.wardlab.com I think you want test W-6.

Ward Labs will tell you everything you need to know. I don't remember what the test number is but just ask for the household mineral test and you'll be fine.
You can compare that to the water profiles in Palmer's How To Brew for the type of beer you want to brew and get your water dead on for the particular style.
I have had Wards do about four tests now, plain well water, tap water from a friends house and a couple of different dilution samples. I can now get my water just the way I need it using several different methods.
You need to remember the mash PH is just that, mash PH not the plain water.