Karpool
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PH should be between 5.2 and 5.6 for home-brew. If its 7 then you are not converting enough sugars.
All "my" homebrew tastes the same!
- Thread starter jd350b
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BrewnWKopperKat
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Unless you're going to quite bit of trouble to remove dissolved CO2, both your RO and distilled water will have a pH well below 7. My RO is regularly in the 5s. (I know this because I use RO to clean my pH meter after I measure wort.)
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
Back in reply #22, there was a solid troubleshooting technique assuming tap water with unknown mineral content:
Back in reply #24, I offered a reduced cost alternative with RO water
back in reply #27, was the agreement to the idea
back in #28, it was noted
If someone is willing to post a recipe / process for a one off brew session with distilled / RO water, that would benefit a lot of homebrewers. There may be bonus points for documenting the recipe with places for sampling / tasting / measuring along the way.
back in #22 said:
Back in reply #24, I offered a reduced cost alternative with RO water
back in reply #27, was the agreement to the idea
back in #28, it was noted
If someone is willing to post a recipe / process for a one off brew session with distilled / RO water, that would benefit a lot of homebrewers. There may be bonus points for documenting the recipe with places for sampling / tasting / measuring along the way.
First you have to know whats in your water. A ph meter by itself doesn’t tell you that. You have to send away a sample to a place like Ward Labs and get your results back. It costs about $40 if I remember. Worth every cent. I’ve had mine done once and I’m going to get it done again during a different season to compare results.
Then you use one of the water chem programs people listed earlier. You enter your water numbers from your report and your grain bill for the beer you are brewing. Then you have to enter gypsum and/or calcium chloride to get the minerals where you want them. After all that is entered then you see what the software says the ph will be and then you adjust with acid or acid malt last. Because the minerals affect ph too. The software is usually spot on. I don’t own a ph meter or buy ph test strips and haven’t run into a problem yet.
I'm not sure what this post is supposed to be getting at.
You've gotten pretty fired up through the course of this thread and I'm not seeing the justification. People are trying to be helpful for the most part.
The simple answer is that the calculations for where a mash pH will end up for a given water profile (ionic content) and a given grain bill is very complicated. Software such as Brew n'water, Mash made easy, Brewfather, and others use formulas created by chemists.
RO and distilled water are essentially the same, almost completely devoid of salts. "We" know this because that's what RO filters are designed to do. I personally know this because I have an inline TDS meter on the output of my RO system and it reads a pretty consistent 6-7ppm (compared to the 400ppm going in). I have also sent my well water and the RO output water to a lab to test the ionic content. I don't think this part of it is anecdotal.
This is starting from a known water profile so the formulas I mentioned will work pretty well. It starts to get a little blurry when it comes to grain bills and their affect on the mash pH. There are thousands of different grains and the actual mash pH is going to be hard to nail down perfectly because even the acidity from one lot to another varies. Nevertheless, some assumptions are made for the sake of the software calculations and they do an adequate job of estimating what the pH will be if you load the starting water profile in correctly. For RO or Distilled water, the ionic content is zero or near zero. For those who do not want to source RO or distilled water, it's best to get a water test done so you know what you're starting with.
The reason why it SEEMS like people are dancing around your starting water pH question (and this has already been repeated several times) is that the ionic makeup of the water is the only thing you need to know. The starting pH is irrelevant and not the figure that gets manipulated. I mean it does indirectly, but the question of "how do you adjust your water pH?" is a bit of a trick question.
If you DON'T know what your water is, the only thing you should be adding to your mash is acid or base in response to a pH reading you don't like. Indiscriminately adding other salts is pissing in the wind.
TLDR: If you know your water's ionic content (which a Wardlab.com test or starting with RO water will both acheive), and you use software like Brewfather, it will very adequately estimate your mash pH for a given recipe. I know it's adequate because I also have a pH meter and it has been close enough for dozens of batches. After enough people agree with this as a true statement, even anecdotally, you eventually have to believe it enough to try it for yourself at the very least. Or not.
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bracconiere
Jolly Alcoholic - In Remembrance 2023
hey! i can still tell the difference between a really stouty stout, and a all base malt light beer! lol
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
What about comparing a stouty stout to a portly porter?
bracconiere
Jolly Alcoholic - In Remembrance 2023
What about comparing a stouty stout to a portly porter?
the way it was explained to me you bring the tap to the char for a 'stout', and you walk to the tap for a porter?
So the guy is gone, nobody ever got an answer to what the “homebrew” flavor means. Could be anything - from a band aid type infection to oxygenation to underattenuation to a number of other things. But I like how everybody went off on all their own seperate tangents and discussions without ever getting enough info from the op.
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
Or use RO/distilled water in a proven recipe in a 'test' batch.
With an RO/distilled water and a proven recipe, there is no need to recalculate salt / acid additions - and the water adjustment ingredients can be included in the recipe.
With an RO/distilled water and a proven recipe, there is no need to recalculate salt / acid additions - and the water adjustment ingredients can be included in the recipe.
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
Chapter 1 proposes a list of top priorities for making great beer.
- Sanitation
- Fermentation temperature control
- Proper yeast management
- Proper boil
- Solid recipe
- water adjustments for quality water, proper mash, and flavoring
- oxygen ingress prevention and mitigation
Observing / tasting beer through the brewing process helps identify which step (or steps) in the process is introducing the problem. For example, with a dirty (or leaking) auto-siphon, the beer will likely taste good at packaging, but not in the glass.
The OP failed to actively participate in the thread and sometimes discussions diverge. This isnt project management software.
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
Historically, calling out an OP that didn't return often causes OP to return the next day.
Let's see what develops!
If all the OP's beers are tasting the same, my initial reply to him would be to add more hops, a lot more hops.
OP has been a forum member since 2013. It would be strange for them to abandon the account now. Maybe they'll come back in another decade. 
I'm sure people will still be willing to help them.
I'm sure people will still be willing to help them.
My very first question in post #2 was in regards to the source water. What I wanted to know, was if it was tap water treated with chlorine/chloramines. My answer, then, would have been to treat with campden tablets. I am very sensitive to that flavor, having lived on a rural private well my entire life and not drinking water that’s chlorinated. Every beer I’ve ever had from other brewers who don’t treat their city tap water has the same underlying flavor to me regardless of style. OP stated they used bottled water from the store. Later on other questions and beliefs about bottled water and RO/DI water were posted that weren’t being understood/ accepted. There were actually quite a few posts deleted or modified by a moderator, which makes it hard to understand the context of some of the conversation. These sometimes do go sideways when the OP stops participating, which was in post #8. Maybe they are still lurking or have been scared off. If they’re still following, narrowing down the “flavor” will certainly yield more useful banter. Here’s a list of common “off flavors” they can look at.
https://learn.kegerator.com/off-flavors-in-beer/
https://learn.kegerator.com/off-flavors-in-beer/
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
Back in #13 @AlexKay did a quick search that turned up some additional information on OPs bottled water:
Agree. My first beers all were made using tap water, which I later determined was chloramine treated. Takes a while to sort out all these issues for a new brewer. Things improved greatly after I switched out the water source.
Back then you were chasing down all sorts of issues affecting the beer, fermentation temperatures, sanitation, wrong yeasts, insufficient starters, etc. So many issues all at once.
The chloramine produces chlorophenols which are easily detected. I can’t tolerate phenols in beer. I’ve long believed that a lot of phenolic tasting “Belgian” beers at local breweries are from their phenolic reject tank! Then they get rid of it to unsuspecting clients one flight at a time!
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But why do you go straight to water chem when his question is so vague and nobody ever figured out what the “taste” is? Like I said it could be anything from a band aid infection to underattenuation to oxidation to yes, water. The point is, nobody knows because it was never answered.
Seemed like a relevant question to me with such a vague post. We had to start somewhere. He answered that question quickly in post #7 and gave a few more vague details in post #8, then never returned. Aren’t these topics a process of elimination? I can’t help it that OP never returned for more help. The other conversation admittedly derailed when another poster asked questions about other water issues. Several of us then, tried to explain that his beliefs weren’t entirely correct, but we were never able to tell them what they already knew what they wanted to hear.
BrewnWKopperKat
(Ο_Ο)
"Animal" (Muppet Movie closing credits) did it better!
Since this thread went in a direction of interest to me and seems to still be running (for better or worse), I'd like to confirm something I read above in relation to my own brews.
I have just started all grain stove top BIAB. Before that I did extract/steeping and some partial mash. I have only done a couple AG brews and the last one was a Dubbel which is just finishing fermentation (been at OG for the last 5 days, but I let it sit for a full 21 just to be sure its cleaned up). After I took the last reading I did a taste and I think (mind you I may be paranoid) that I taste a very slight flavor that I could only describe as medicinal. It is very slight and I am hoping a month or two it clears or recedes even further to the background. I used OYL-028 Belgian Ale W which I believe is the same strain as Wyeast 3787 and I have heard that 3787 can have phenolic issues if it stresses, which I don't think mine did. I pitched at 64 and fermentation free rose to 72 where I held it until it was finished. I pitched a full package (just at 3 months old) and allowed a 5 hour vitality starter before pitching (this is a 2.5 gallon batch).
I use tapwater, but run it through a carbon filter that should remove chlorine, but maybe not chloramine as thoroughly (I have read conflicting reports).
@Beermeister32 above mentioned choramine producing chlorophenols. I am thinking my issue is water related as my sanitation practices are thorough and my setup simple and I have never noticed this before on any beers. My question is, do you think carbon filtering is enough or should I add Campden tablets as well and would that clear chlorine or chloramine well enough to start? (I'm not sure what my city water uses)
I know I will need to get into water tests and PH at some point, but I would like to get my other processes down first... I can only afford so many steps at one time.
Thanks for any input, and forgive if I should have started a new thread....
I have just started all grain stove top BIAB. Before that I did extract/steeping and some partial mash. I have only done a couple AG brews and the last one was a Dubbel which is just finishing fermentation (been at OG for the last 5 days, but I let it sit for a full 21 just to be sure its cleaned up). After I took the last reading I did a taste and I think (mind you I may be paranoid) that I taste a very slight flavor that I could only describe as medicinal. It is very slight and I am hoping a month or two it clears or recedes even further to the background. I used OYL-028 Belgian Ale W which I believe is the same strain as Wyeast 3787 and I have heard that 3787 can have phenolic issues if it stresses, which I don't think mine did. I pitched at 64 and fermentation free rose to 72 where I held it until it was finished. I pitched a full package (just at 3 months old) and allowed a 5 hour vitality starter before pitching (this is a 2.5 gallon batch).
I use tapwater, but run it through a carbon filter that should remove chlorine, but maybe not chloramine as thoroughly (I have read conflicting reports).
@Beermeister32 above mentioned choramine producing chlorophenols. I am thinking my issue is water related as my sanitation practices are thorough and my setup simple and I have never noticed this before on any beers. My question is, do you think carbon filtering is enough or should I add Campden tablets as well and would that clear chlorine or chloramine well enough to start? (I'm not sure what my city water uses)
I know I will need to get into water tests and PH at some point, but I would like to get my other processes down first... I can only afford so many steps at one time.
Thanks for any input, and forgive if I should have started a new thread....
I’ve heard carbon filtering isn’t enough and Campden tablets would take days to fully clear chloramine. Chlorine easily; chloramine days and days. So what’s a home brewer to do…
So now I buy jug water and build up the right mineral profile. A lot of brewers use RO water too.
Our SoCal water supply smells organic half the time anyway, reservoir water…. good riddance!
So now I buy jug water and build up the right mineral profile. A lot of brewers use RO water too.
Our SoCal water supply smells organic half the time anyway, reservoir water…. good riddance!
jd350b
Member
SS brewing stainless 5 gallon conical - I use starsan
I really don't think the beer is infected, it just has the familiar home brew taste
VikeMan
It ain't all burritos and strippers, my friend.
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For the love of God, what does it taste like?
