Adding Acid to Mash Water?

[philm63]

Brewing a Kolsch next weekend and Bru'n Water has my estimated mash pH at 5.53. Using RO water with 9 Lbs Pilsner and 10 oz Vienna. 6.25 Gallon batch size. What might be a good way to get this down to the 5.2-5.3 pH range? Or is 5.5 ok as is?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I would let it mash at 5.5 pH, or even 5.65 pH (which is closer to my guess as to where it will terminate the mash for the case of 50 ppm Ca++). Then I would add acid to adjust it to 5.2 pH (if/as required) post boil.

 

[mongoose33]

What else are you adding to your RO water?

I just put your numbers into EZWater. If I add 5g Calcium Chloride, 5g Epsom Salts to the strike water, I'd expect a mash pH of around 5.4-5.4. Without any additions to the RO water at all, in the 5.6 range.

If you want to bring it down a bit, try a couple ml of Lactic Acid.

[BTW, the additions above are what I use in my Kolsch]

 

[philm63]

My salt additions are calculated out as follows:
MASH: 1.13g CaSO4, 2.70g CaCl2, & 0.90g MgSO4
SPARGE: 1.25g CaSO4, 3.00g CaCl2, & 1.00g MgSO4

If I added all my salts in the MLT while heating the strike water would that help to drop the pH even if only a little?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Why would you need to drop the mash pH? The peer reviewed documents I've been researching indicate 5.2-5.5 pH measured at mash temperature, which equates to roughly 5.5-5.8 pH at room temperature as being the ideal mash pH range. If 5.53 is accurate, you are already at the bottom of the most acceptable mash pH range. And if 5.65 proves accurate, you are pegging the midrange perfectly.

 

[Yooper]

My salt additions are calculated out as follows:
MASH: 1.13g CaSO4, 2.70g CaCl2, & 0.90g MgSO4
SPARGE: 1.25g CaSO4, 3.00g CaCl2, & 1.00g MgSO4

If I added all my salts in the MLT while heating the strike water would that help to drop the pH even if only a little?

Yes, add all of your salts to the mash and that will drop the pH a bit. I would take out the MgSO4 (you don't need it), and use only CaSO4 and CaCl2, since the calcium would help here with preventing beerstone and assisting yeast flocculation.

 

[FirstAidBrewing]

I would second the lactic acid, but add it only after you have a stable pH reading after dough-in. A little goes a looooong way so add a bit, mix well and take a pH reading after two minutes or so. Continue as needed.

 

[mabrungard]

I'm more comfortable with targeting a more modest mashing pH of around 5.4. A pH of 5.5 might be pushing it for mashing and for boiling. I find that pale beers are a bit harsh at that elevated pH. I do agree that post boil pH reduction can help out pale beers.

 

[philm63]

Are published pH ranges for beer styles at mash temp or room temp? I see pH 5.2-5.3 recommended for a Kolsch (Googled, of course...) but at what temperature? I always measure pH at 68 F. I also wait at least 20 minutes into a mash before pulling a sample for measuring.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Are published pH ranges for beer styles at mash temp or room temp? I see pH 5.2-5.3 recommended for a Kolsch (Googled, of course...) but at what temperature? I always measure pH at 68 F. I also wait at least 20 minutes into a mash before pulling a sample for measuring.

Much of it depends upon whom you trust to be doing the real science and research into flavor and other key parameters, I.E., the big names among the commercials or the (ahem) big names among home brewers. I've come to the opinion that the commercials (if they reference it at all, which does not appear to happen often) reference pH measurement at mash temperature, and the far more recognized (at our level) home brewing oriented types have misconstrued this somehow to be at room temperature. YMMV, but seek for peer reviewed research data from industry types and ye shall find. For example:

Malting and Brewing Science (Briggs, Hough, Stevens, and Young) definitively states the ideal mash pH range as 5.2-5.5 pH at mash temp (which is in the same source immediately ballparked to be 5.5-5.8 pH at room temp [wherein the ideal mash pH midrange target would thereby be 5.65 at room temperature]). No less than Bamforth subsequently states that the rest of the scant data one finds with specific regard to the proper mash pH measurement temperature and its associated ideal pH range (generally along the lines of 5.2-5.6 pH as measured at 68 or 75 degrees) is coming from nothing more than circular reasoning of totally unknown origin, whereas someone at some unknown juncture in the past took the actual research done at mash temperature and said out of the blue (plus put it into print, lending credence beyond measure) that it must have been done at room temperature, and from then on the parrots all jumped on board and repeated this unfortunate mantra of unknown origin until it became literally cannonized gospel (as I interpret Bamforth).

You are free to feel safe and secure among the home brewers parroting 5.2-5.6 pH as measured at 68 or 75 degrees, or you can step into the world of endless bashing and let the parrots of the mantra bash you at will. The choice is yours.

I've further, and in my opinion far more importantly, come to the opinion that the commercials are far more interested in kettle pH than mash pH (which might be why they don't talk much of mash pH). For example: Rochefort, one of the Trappist Monasteries, states that it mashes at 5.8 to 5.9 pH (due to combined grist and water alkalinity), and subsequently adjusts pH only downstream in the kettle to pH 5.2. AJ deLange once stated that he asked a bunch of commercials about mash pH, and (if I'm reading him correctly) the (paraphrased, most common, or collective) answer he received was (in essence) "That sort of thing seems to be of far more importance to you home brewer types".

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Has anyone beside me noticed that in a careful reading of the famous BYO magazine retraction in regard to the controversy it drew over mash pH temperature and ATC, there is only retraction and apology with regard to the authors initial error in understanding with regard to ATC, and there is (properly, in my opinion) ultimately no retraction at all with regard to his stance on mash pH as it correlates to temperature (which is in agreement with mine).

https://byo.com/mr-wizard/setting-record-straight-mash-ph/

 

[philm63]

I just read that piece and can see where this can get confusing. I have found plenty of information available in homebrewing literature and online over my 7 years of brewing regarding pH measurements, and in my experience most say to measure pH at room temperature. I have found little in the way of statements regarding temperature when a recommended mash pH is referenced thus it has always been my assumption that the stated mash pH is measured at room temperature. I can see that my assumption was wrong.

My eyes are wide open now, thank you.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I just read that piece and can see where this can get confusing. I have found plenty of information available in homebrewing literature and online over my 7 years of brewing regarding pH measurements, and in my experience most say to measure pH at room temperature. I have found little in the way of statements regarding temperature when a recommended mash pH is referenced thus it has always been my assumption that the stated mash pH is measured at room temperature. I can see that my assumption was wrong.

My eyes are wide open now, thank you.

I'm also recommending that you take mash pH readings at room temperature. I'm merely making you aware that the ideal room temperature range for mash pH is likely to be 5.5 to 5.8 (midrange target 5.65), as opposed to the conventional home brewers presumption of 5.2-5.6 (midrange target 5.4).

 

[ScrewyBrewer]

I cool mash samples to room temperature before taking a pH reading to prevent damaging the probe bulb. Last week I kegged ten gallons of a Kolsch style beer brewed with 21 pounds German Pilsner and 1 pound of Vienna malt. Mashed with twelve gallons of RO water treated to 4ppm magnesium, 21ppm calcium, 8ppm sodium, 32ppm chloride and 32ppm sulfate. At 30 minutes and 77F the mash pH sample measured 5.28. I had added 10ml of lactic acid to the strike water along with the brewing salts.

Here's a picture of the fermented beer used for testing final gravity.