A Brewing Water Chemistry Primer

[Jay-Brew]

Just starting to look into water chemistry, which in other words means I know next to nothing about it at this point.

I will be trying my luck on my next batch. Plan is to use 100% RO and as per the primer may just add the baseline amount of calcium chloride and acidulated malt. Thinking will get 10 gallons of RO and treat all of it with 2 tsp of calcium chloride and ensure grist is 2% acidulated malt. Will use the water for both strike and sparge water.

Basically looking for some reassurance that I am thinking of all of this correctly. I guess I am wondering is it really this easy?

 

[Hermit]

I guess I am wondering is it really this easy?

Only to start. The first 'fix' is always free.

Next step is to use one of the water calculation programs. If you have a water report you can skip straight to that step. If you use RO water you can also skip to that step and just use 0 for values. That should get you close enough.

 

[ajdelange]

Basically looking for some reassurance that I am thinking of all of this correctly. I guess I am wondering is it really this easy?

When I wrote this at Yooper's request a couple of years back I experienced a major revelation at its completion: this is the way I brew. After two decades of studying this, of writing complicated spreadsheets, cataloging and synthesizing profiles (with FORTRAN computer programs), lectures, papers... I realized that when I brew I put a little CaCl2 in RO water and go. So yes, indeed, it can be this simple.

But mind you that I came to this conclusion after 2 decades of study. That's a bit more perspective than I expect most people to have. From this perspective I know why this works and why it is all you have to do (in some cases). If you ever hope to understand any of that there is a bit more to it than just 1 tsp/5 gal. RO.

We also need to note that this works great for the particular beers that I like to brew (and drink): continental lagers. For other styles you may very well find that you need to do more though adding some sulfate in the form of gypsum should about cover it.

There are also more nuanced means of dealing with malt alkalinity than just tossing in a couple of percent sauermalz.

 

[davehenry]

Hi guys. Where would a Belgian dubbel fit into the additions? I'm thinking under the minerally beer category?


Brewing up a storm in Langley, British Columbia

 

[Jay-Brew]

Only to start. The first 'fix' is always free.

Next step is to use one of the water calculation programs. If you have a water report you can skip straight to that step. If you use RO water you can also skip to that step and just use 0 for values. That should get you close enough.

That is definitely the next step. Have messed around with Bru'N Water a bit. Lots to learn that's for sure!

 

[Jay-Brew]

When I wrote this at Yooper's request a couple of years back I experienced a major revelation at its completion: this is the way I brew. After two decades of studying this, of writing complicated spreadsheets, cataloging and synthesizing profiles (with FORTRAN computer programs), lectures, papers... I realized that when I brew I put a little CaCl2 in RO water and go. So yes, indeed, it can be this simple.

But mind you that I came to this conclusion after 2 decades of study. That's a bit more perspective than I expect most people to have. From this perspective I know why this works and why it is all you have to do (in some cases). If you ever hope to understand any of that there is a bit more to it than just 1 tsp/5 gal. RO.

We also need to note that this works great for the particular beers that I like to brew (and drink): continental lagers. For other styles you may very well find that you need to do more though adding some sulfate in the form of gypsum should about cover it.

There are also more nuanced means of dealing with malt alkalinity than just tossing in a couple of percent sauermalz.

Thanks so much! I don't mean to understate what is involved and all of the knowledge behind it, but it's nice to be able to implement a straight forward process (i.e., water adjustments at least with RO) at this point in advance of working to figure out the why behind all of it. The why will come slowly over time for me I'm sure but happy that I can make some changes to my process in the hopes of a better beer. Thanks again for all of your insight!

 

[Erythro73]

I'm quite confused right now, and this might be due to a misunderstanding.

I'll be going a 2.5 gallons of amber ale soon. It will be a partial mash using a full volume BIAB mash (no sparge). I plan to have 4 gallons of distilled water to a grain bill of 4.5 lbs (2-row, munich, crystal 40, crystal 120 and victory malt).

However, when I punch my numbers in the EZwater calculator, with 1.2 oz (1.7%) of my grain bill being acid malt and adding 1.2 g of CaCl2, my predicted room temperature mash ph is 5.27, which is way under the recommended values. Furthermore, my ions/cations concentration are way under Palmer's recommended values. Of course, if I add some gypsum, I can get my pH to 5.3, but it still doesn't bring me inside the recommended range.

Is there something I'm missing? Is this because I mash with too much water for my grain bill?

 

[ajdelange]

The whole idea behind the Primer is that you don't need calculators. The Primer also recognizes that in many cases the best beers are made with minimal mineral additions and that, as the spreadsheets are often well off in pH predictions you might as well ignore them and just go with a simple, one size fits all water treatment plan. I am sure you are familiar with the benefits and the shortcomings of the one size fits all approach to anything.

If you are using the Primer, forget the spreadsheet(s). If you are using a spreadsheet, forget the Primer.

 

[Erythro73]

The whole idea behind the Primer is that you don't need calculators. The Primer also recognizes that in many cases the best beers are made with minimal mineral additions and that, as the spreadsheets are often well off in pH predictions you might as well ignore them and just go with a simple, one size fits all water treatment plan. I am sure you are familiar with the benefits and the shortcomings of the one size fits all approach to anything.

If you are using the Primer, forget the spreadsheet(s). If you are using a spreadsheet, forget the Primer.

So, I will we able to make good tasting beers with 100% distilled water (mash water and everything), (1 tsp of CaCl2)/(5 gallon of mash water) and 2% acid malt as a baseline?

And maybe some additions to make it an amber pale ale such as a bit of gypsum?

EDIT: I just noticed, my amber pale ale I plan on doing requires 6% victory malt, which is a lightly roasted malt. Should I use the Beer with roast malt baseline and skip some / all acid malt?

 

[ajdelange]

Yes, you will. That is not to say that it is not possible to make a better beer by tweaking those addition. The Primer represents a reasonable starting point.

If you are using roast malt it is indeed wise to reduce the sauermalz. If you use enough roast malt you would use no sauermalz and if you use even more then you will actually want some alkalinity. This is getting you into stuff more advanced than the Primer is intended to help you with. That is when you bring in the spreadsheets and calculators.

 

[Erythro73]

Yes, you will. That is not to say that it is not possible to make a better beer by tweaking those addition. The Primer represents a reasonable starting point.

If you are using roast malt it is indeed wise to reduce the sauermalz. If you use enough roast malt you would use no sauermalz and if you use even more then you will actually want some alkalinity. This is getting you into stuff more advanced than the Primer is intended to help you with. That is when you bring in the spreadsheets and calculators.

Thank you, ajdelange, this is really appreciated.

 

[Eucrid]

Does de-husked Carafa III need sauermalz with it?

 

[BHowe]

AJ, my hoppy beers and Saisons have been great using this! I'm about to dive into brewing a few stouts and want to utilize 100% store bought RO just like I've been doing for my pale beers.

Should I fret about possibly needing to have chalk and a ph meter on hand?

As with all of my brewing, I have employed the KISS approach, and this water piece has fit right in. Just want to be sure my roasty beers are well in line also.

 

[ajdelange]

Does de-husked Carafa III need sauermalz with it?

That's going to depend on how much of it you use. The roast malts are acidic for sure but not as acidic as some of the darker caramels/crystals. If you use a wee bit for color then you may well still need some sauermalz. If you use a bit more for color and some roast flavor then you probably will not. If you use a whole lot for a lot of roast flavor (figuring the harsh bitterness went with the husks) then you may actually need some alkali but that gets us out of the Primer domain for sure.

 

[ajdelange]

I'm about to dive into brewing a few stouts and want to utilize 100% store bought RO just like I've been doing for my pale beers.

Should I fret about possibly needing to have chalk and a ph meter on hand?

If you keep the amounts of roast malt reasonable (say less than 10% roast barley in a stout) and go easy on the calcium (chloride and/or sulfate) then you should be OK with no sauermalz or alkali. OTOH if you use a bunch of the black stuff you may indeed wind up needing some alkali (but don't use chalk). It is unfortunate that stouts, often advocated as the best place for beginning grain brewers to start because they are so forgiving (strong flavors mask errors) are the trickiest when it comes to pH management because of variability in the acidities of the malts and variability in the amounts brewers want to use. A pH meter is the only way to know for sure where your mash pH is falling.

As with all of my brewing, I have employed the KISS approach, and this water piece has fit right in. Just want to be sure my roasty beers are well in line also.

You can keep things KISS up to a point with very dark beers but a pH meter is an invaluable tool in doing so. Make a test mash and check its pH. If it is too low then add some alkali or reduce the amount of black malt until it is right.

 

[BHowe]

What would you recommend over the use of chalk?

I suppose I could use my tap water.... It was so damn heavy on sodium that it prompted my whole journey down this water road anyway.

 

[ajdelange]

If you hadn't mentioned the sodium I'd recommend baking soda. Given the sodium is already high you will pretty much be stuck with pickling lime. Of course this is the Primer thread which suggests that your tap water, no matter how mineral laden, will have been diluted with RO to the point that the sodium is low in which case you could use sodium bicarbonate.

 

[BHowe]

Baking Soda it is then if I'm using 100% RO.

Thanks.

 

[gwapogorilla]

Hefeweizen: Baseline

Baseline: Add 1 tsp of calcium chloride dihydrate (what your LHBS sells) to each 5 gallons of water treated. Add 2% sauermalz to the grist.

Deviate from the baseline as follows:


Hefeweizen: For soft water beers (i.e Pils, Helles). Use half the baseline amount of calcium chloride and increase the sauermalz to 3% (you can make great Hefe with soft water too).

Porter: For beers that use roast malt (Stout, porter): Skip the sauermalz.

Light Ale: For British beers: Add 1 tsp gypsum as well as 1 tsp calcium chloride

IPA: For very minerally beers (Export, Burton ale): Double the calcium chloride and the gypsum.

I am assuming that these amounts are for a 5 gallon batch?

Also, one last clarification please. In the example for the IPA listed above, you state "Double the calcium chloride and the gypsum." Is that, "double the calcium and gypsum from the baseline"? Cuz gypsum isn't listed in the baseline.
Maybe a list specifying the amounts for each style, rather than listing additions and subtractions. I drink my own stuff, so my "reading comprehension" really sucks.

 

[ajdelange]

It is poorly worded (and I can't edit it because Yooper posted it) but the intention was that you would double the calcium in a lager by doubling the lager baseline salts and double in an ale by doubling the ale baseline IOW 2 tsp of each of CaCl and CaSO4 per 5 gal. That is a huge amount of salts in my opinion and I would only advise that you go to those levels on the basis of gradual experimentation with levels increased above 1 tsp each. Even that, IMO, is a lot but it seems to be what people like.

 

[gwapogorilla]

Oh...okay. Thank you very much for this thread. I am just starting to dabble in the whole water thing. This is a great place to start.:rockin:

 

[BHowe]

That level of sales sure makes for some very murky tasty water, that is
for sure.

 

[Black Island Brewer]

So I've been using the Primer for a bit over a year, and have been very happy with my results. I have very soft water from my tap (4.5 calcium, 1.35 sulfate, 0.85 magnesium, 2.0 chloride, 3.3 sodium, 14.9 bicarbonate). Most of the time I can apply the basic primer without question, but sometimes I am not sure about what constitutes "roast malt". How dark, and how much? Is 2% roast malt enough to take the place of the acid malt, or does it need to be more? And is roast malt just black malt and roasted barley, or does chocolate malt constitute a roast malt? And what about crystal/caramel malts?

Again, I'm happy with most of my results, but until I get a pH meter (which is on the list) I'm using the Primer and would like to feel a little more sure about the "roast malt" deviation from baseline.

 

[ajdelange]

The high kilned grains are what makes pH prediction tricky because the heavily kilned ones are much more acidic than the less colored ones. Because of this one gets pretty quickly away from the KISS of the Primer. No, the dark malts, even the blackest, aren't as powerful as sauemalz. What 3-4% sauermalz can do would take probably 20% black malt (not that you would want to use that much - at least I wouldn't. It is with the dark beers that a pH meter really earns its cost for you. Nonetheless I would throw out 20% as an upper limit for the black and highly colored crystals and carmels below which, with sauermalz eliminated and calcium kept low, you should stay within pH bounds in most cases.

 

[JBOGAN]

I have been using bru n water for over a year and a half and decided to plug a recipe in using the kiss method. Calcium comes in at 145.7, sulfate 177 and chloride at 127.5. Using 100% distilled water the mash ph comes in at 5.1. Seems a little over the top but then again I have been tinkering around lately and watery chemistry is perplexing. Some of my beers are middle of the road and I thought an easy approach may help but I am truly lost referencing bru n water.. Should I just ignore the spreadsheet and relax?

 

[ajdelange]

Clearly you have used 5 grams (1 tsp) each of gypsum and CaCl2. Yes, that is a lot. I would actually recommend starting with half that amount of each or better yet half a tsp of CaCl2 alone and adding sulfate incrementally for taste in the glass in order to determine whether to use sulfate in other brews. Were I able to edit the original post I would make those changes. You can, of course, experiment with lesser levels to see if you get better results.

Though that is an awful lot of calcium it only pulls the pH down by perhaps 0.18 unit. With 83% base malt and 17% 60L caramel you should see a mash pH of around 5.27. With more high kilned malt pH would, of course, be lower and with less, or with a base malt with higher DI pH (the one I based my calculation on has DI pH of 5.6) pH would be higher. Don't ignore the spreadsheet but rather use it in conjuction with a good pH meter to see what is really going on. Experiment with lesser salt additions. Remember that the Primer represents at best a starting point.

 

[JBOGAN]

Thank you for the info aj. Looks like I have some more tinkering to do an maybe a little experimentation with numerous water samples. SWMBO is going to love hearing about water chemistry for another month.

 

[mabrungard]

I have been using bru n water for over a year and a half and decided to plug a recipe in using the kiss method. Calcium comes in at 145.7, sulfate 177 and chloride at 127.5. Using 100% distilled water the mash ph comes in at 5.1. Seems a little over the top but then again I have been tinkering around lately and watery chemistry is perplexing. Some of my beers are middle of the road and I thought an easy approach may help but I am truly lost referencing bru n water.. Should I just ignore the spreadsheet and relax?

Yes, that is a lot of ionic content and it may not be appropriate for most styles. In addition, the mash pH value is a bit lower than I find ideal. Reducing the various salt additions to provide a lower ionic content and bring the pH up a bit seems to be prudent. For ales, all you really need for calcium content is around 50 ppm. For lagers, it can be lower.

 

[Jay-Brew]

I used the primer for a pale ale (Two Hearted clone) and my grain bill was 2% acidulated malt, and I used RO water treating each 5 gallons with 1 tsp. of calcium chloride and 1 tsp. of gypsum.

Perhaps I will try 1/2 tsp. of each next time as per the suggestions from AJ in subsequent posts I have read and see how it varies.

My question at this point though, is what does overdoing it with the calcium chloride and gypsum result in with respect to how the beer tastes.... I can obviously reduce the amounts and see how they compare, but I am just wondering what I can expect with more or less additions. I'm not quite sure what I am looking for based on the amounts of additions. Any insight is always appreciated.

 

[ajdelange]

Sulfate dries, sharpens and renders hops bitterness rougher/harsher. Chloride enhances body, rounds and, to some extent, sweetens beer. Reduction in the levels of those two ions will reduce those qualities. In order to explore those statements relative to your own brewing I suggest obtaining some neutral, but reasonably hopped, beer and tasting it while adding increments of calcium chloride and gypsum. I also recommend brewing as much as you can while varying the amounts of these salts. Beers brewed with very soft water have a soft, mellow quality to them. Beers brewed with harder water have more of a punch - both mineral and hops. These are very much subjective observations and, in particular, they are mine. I hope others will comment.