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Hello all. I'm brewing a brown ale this weekend and had some questions regarding the water adjustments. I plugged the information into Bru n Water adding 4 grams of calcium chloride and it's telling me my mash PH will come it at 4.7 which seems low to me for not having tons of roasted grain. I...

My recipe is: 6 gallon batch 9lbs Pilsner malt .5lbs light Munich .5lbs American wheat Mash for 60 minutes at 149 with a ratio of 1.33 quarts per pound I boiled for 90 minutes, cooled and took 5 gallons to the fermenter As for my hydrometer reading, the OG reading I took in...

So I just got done bottling my Kölsch and it's way over attenuated. My OG was 1.048 (which is what I wanted) and my final gravity was 1.002, which is obviously extremely low. I'm thinking it has to be infected because I don't know how else it could finish so low, but trying it at bottling I...

I understand the concept of adding more after mash to get half the amount. Does anyone actually know the benefit to doing equal parts? If it's only for efficiency then I don't really care because I'm getting 73% as is. Is there another benefit to doing it that way?

I think it's kind of silly personally to obsess about your sparge gravity but missing your preboil volume. That screws up your efficiency, the final gravity/strength of the beer, hop efficiency, pitching rate and probably lots of other things. If you can hit your preboil volume and keep the...

Ah. That makes sense. I was under the impression you thought you had to take all 7 gallons since you sparged with it. You'd just fill to 6.5 gallons and you're good to boil. I don't drink while I brew because of that reason. Haha. My being anal about everything starts dropping off until I get to...

I've only done about 10 all grain batches so I'm definitely not an expert, but have been able to increase my efficiency and my last batch I hit my expected OG perfectly, so I'll give my thoughts. Some of this stuff you already have done, but I'll reiterate: 1. Make sure you have a calibrated...

Hey all. I had a question regarding mash/sparge water ratios. I currently use a calculator that I really like because I end up with about the right amount of water going into boil, so it's working for me. I'm doing a hefe with 11.4 pounds of grain and 6 total gallons. I input a mash ratio of...

Ok, so I'm playing around with bru 'n water and I think I have everything figured out, but I'd like to make sure. For my hefe it's 6 total gallons with 11.4 total pounds of grain. It's 5.7 pilsner and 5.7 wheat malt. I put in 11.4 pounds base malt with 2L as that's about the Lovibond of both the...

How the heck are you supposed to get your ph in a good range with RO or distilled water then? I guess you could use acid malt but that uses lactic acid as well right?

I'm glad I thought to ask. That's crazy that the lactic acid mixed with the chalk neutralizes it. Water chemistry is extremely advanced. In that case I'll just worry about using lactic acid to hit a desirable mash ph. You did mention in that interview to keep the calcium relatively low to keep...

To Martin if you read this, I happened to catch your interview on the brewing network and I found your chalk/lactic acid concoction for a hefeweizen very intriguing. I think I'd like to give it a try. I believe you said using RO water you mixed .35 grams of chalk and .6 ml of lactic acid per...

Ok so I was messing around with the water calculator on brewer's friend and I do really like the set up for it. Not to confuse anyone since I originally mentioned a hefe I am planning on brewing, but I plugged in a Kölsch I just brewed to see where my ph really was on that. It was: 9lbs...

That makes sense as I know acid can drop ph quickly. How much lactic acid are we talking in measurements to try and incrementally drop the ph? I'm wondering if there's a rule of thumb like hypothetically, "this amount of lactic acid will drop the ph a tenth of a point" Since I know conversion...

Hey all, I know the beginner water questions have to get really old but I know this is the place to ask them. My question is concerning mash ph brewing with RO water. In the past I've used RO water and have just added a teaspoon of calcium chloride in the mash or a teaspoon of gypsum for...

No the stout was brewed at a friend's house with his tap water. The tap water has about 40ppm of total alkalinity as said by the water report. I'm starting to brew in a new location and will have to start brewing with RO water since the water is softened.

Whoops! Didn't know that. Well I've only done a couple of batches doing that. Kind of wish I would have gotten colorphast strips now. They seem simpler and I wouldn't have to worry about them crapping out eventually. Was the other poster accurate in saying 5.1 mash temp is 5.4 room temp? So...

Didn't know that about adding Magnesium. I'll forget about that then and adjust accordingly. I will also look into pickling lime. I hit 5.1 at mash temp, not room temp.

Yea it's a Milwaukee 55 or something like that and it's maybe 2.5 months old. Yea 2 point calibration with 4.0 and 7.0 buffer packs that I only open right before I use it. I Also keep the meter sitting in a pack of 4.0 solution to keep it working well.

Right. I did know some alkalinity was necessary after my last stout I did. The water had 40 ppm of total alkalinity. I came in at 5.1, added a half teaspoon of chalk and nothing. This is why this time I'm using baking soda instead of chalk and why I'm adjusting my water to 62 ppm total...