Announcing the release of 'Mash Made Easy' version 10.70, including the new 'Knockout pH' module

[Silver_Is_Money]

Mash Made Easy version 10.70 is now available for free download on my website in both the US and Metric editions. The software is complete as downloaded, with no teaser version leading to a pay version.

Changes made since the previous version 10.65:
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Replaces the often somewhat confusing and/or cumbersome "Kettle pH" tab/sheet with my totally new "Knockout pH" adjustment computing tab/sheet. Much easier kettle knockout pH adjustment assistance is the result, as all requisite input parameters sans for the Knockout pH Target are pulled in from the main "Mash pH" tab/sheet and the "Sparge Water Adjustment" tab/sheet. The only input required of the user within this new Knockout pH Adjustment assistant module is to select the desired Knockout (post boil and cooling) pH target.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I should mention that targeting "Knockout pH" is uniquely different from targeting "Mash pH". It is a 'one or the other' proposition, as well as being a totally new paradigm. You do not follow or apply the adjustment advice of both. After inputting all of your grist, minerals, and various water parameters (volume and minerals and alkalinity), either you directly target a desired post boil and cooling "Knockout" pH via following the advice as seen on the 'Knockout pH' sheet, and you ignore Mash pH adjustment advice altogether, or you target "Mash pH" and ignore Knockout pH altogether, and follow the adjustment advice as seen on the Mash pH sheet.

Since the boil itself inherently lowers Wort pH and makes it more acidic, it is not possible to attempt to equate matching pH targets across both sheets. The Mash pH sheet has no need (or means) whereby to attempt to factor in pH drop across the boil, and rising Wort acidity thereby. That, plus Mash pH adjustment generally targets 5.4-5.6, and Knockout pH adjustment specifically targets 5.0 to 5.2 pH.

In brief, only use the adjustment advice of one or the other. But it may prove true that targeting Knockout pH is the better choice of the two methodologies (with the truth value to be assessed with side by side use and comparison of the beer outcomes thereby).

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Barth and Zaman destroyed the myth that calcium and magnesium within the mash water drop mash pH to anywhere near the degree presumed by those who make the mistake of applying the work of Kolbach to the mash. But a primary reason as to why Kolbach doesn't apply to the mash is that Kolbach never intended it to apply to the mash. Kolbach intended it for Knockout.

Short version: I'm at least somewhat attempting to vindicate the Kolbach that Barth and Zaman destroyed, by focusing the new module upon Knockout pH adjustment, as opposed to Mash pH adjustment.

A "potential" difference in my approach is that I believe calculated (text book) malt/grain/grist buffering capacity (BC) itself [in units of mEq/(Kg_pH)] varies with changes in the target pH, as opposed to BC being a constant, as I presume "may" have been the case for Kolbach, and may as well be the case for at least 'some' (if not all) others attempting pH adjustment assistant software. A key to improvement going forward is therefore to improve upon my quasi-empirical math model within "Knockout pH" which modifies BC with respect to the targeted pH.

Disclaimer: I'm not at all worthy of tying Kolbach's shoes, and in using my software 'YMMV'. Therefore verify, verify, verify. If I'm proved wrong in my approach, at least I can say that I tried. And hopefully as a consequence someone will make a better attempt at knockout pH adjustment software.

 

[brewgar]

WARNING. OFF TOPIC.
Larry, have you noticed that the latest MS Windows auto update has rendered QBREW inoperable? Just happened this week. Grrr. I have other brew software, but always found QBREW my favorite. Rats!

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

WARNING. OFF TOPIC.
Larry, have you noticed that the latest MS Windows auto update has rendered QBREW inoperable? Just happened this week. Grrr. I have other brew software, but always found QBREW my favorite. Rats!

Sorry @brewgar , but I have no idea what QBREW is. Is the latest Windows update also rendering MME inoperable? I develop MME using LibreOffice Calc within Linux/Unix. MME does not contain any macros....

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

For those not willing or comfortable enough to go with a "one shot" pH adjustment that uses a 'one or the other' (mash acid or boil acid addition) approach, I could (in the future) restore the removed "Kettle pH" module, which is more oriented toward a two adjustment approach, with one pH adjustment made within the mash, followed by a second adjustment made within the kettle.

Edit: For clarification, it would be restored along side of "Knockout pH", to present more choice.

 

[day_trippr]

WARNING. OFF TOPIC.
Larry, have you noticed that the latest MS Windows auto update has rendered QBREW inoperable? Just happened this week. Grrr. I have other brew software, but always found QBREW my favorite. Rats!

fwiw, after reading the above I successfully launched QBrew v0.4.1 and loaded a (very old) recipe.
Not seeing any problem here (win10p 21h1 with the latest round of updates)...

Cheers!

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I find it highly ironic that no one ever seems to question why Kolbach chose knockout pH as the basis upon which to anchor pH adjustment, and the pH impact of calcium and magnesium, and RA. Why didn't he choose to anchor these to Mash pH, as nigh-on everyone in this day and age believes/wishes is proper?

Could it be that he wasn't very concerned with mash pH? I still remember AJ deLange telling us that he used to poll his commercial brewing audiences as to whether or not they adjusted for mash pH, wherein he stated that the predominant response (when summed and averaged) was something akin to "You home brewers seem to be well more concerned about that than we are!"

 

[marc1]

For those not willing or comfortable enough to go with a "one shot" pH adjustment that uses a 'one or the other' (mash acid or boil acid addition) approach, I could (in the future) restore the removed "Kettle pH" module, which is more oriented toward a two adjustment approach, with one pH adjustment made within the mash, followed by a second adjustment made within the kettle.

Edit: For clarification, it would be restored along side of "Knockout pH", to present more choice.

I like this option. I like the kettle pH adjustment feature, and I don't think I want to completely bail on mash pH yet

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I like this option. I like the kettle pH adjustment feature, and I don't think I want to completely bail on mash pH yet

I agree with you that 'Kettle pH' should not have been removed when I added 'Knockout pH', so a new MME version 10.75 which includes both 'Kettle pH' and 'Knockout pH' is now available for download on my website.

 

[marc1]

I agree with you that 'Kettle pH' should not have been removed when I added 'Knockout pH', so a new MME version 10.75 which includes both 'Kettle pH' and 'Knockout pH' is now available for download on my website.

You're fast!

Thanks for maintaining and updating the spreadsheet!

 

[TheMadKing]

Hey Larry @Silver_Is_Money I am doing some cross checking on my mash pH and wanted to have a kettle acid addition to control the pH rise in my NEIPA due to the hop quantities that I'm using.

When I input my grainbill, water profile, and water quantities, MME is telling me that my pre-acid pH is 5.66 and I need to add 8.29mL of lactic acid to my mash to drop the pH to 5.3

Bru'n water is telling me that my pre-acid pH is 5.41 and that if I add that quantity of lactic acid to my mash that my mash pH will be 4.86 which is certainly off enough to be detrimental to enzyme activity

Past measurements of mash pH (in a cooled sample at room temperature) have always agreed with the Bru'n water estimate so I am very surprised that there is such a huge difference here.

I feel like I must be missing something but for the life of me I can't find an input that I have failed to check. Have you seen differences like this in the past?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Hey Larry @Silver_Is_Money I am doing some cross checking on my mash pH and wanted to have a kettle acid addition to control the pH rise in my NEIPA due to the hop quantities that I'm using.

When I input my grainbill, water profile, and water quantities, MME is telling me that my pre-acid pH is 5.66 and I need to add 8.29mL of lactic acid to my mash to drop the pH to 5.3

Bru'n water is telling me that my pre-acid pH is 5.41 and that if I add that quantity of lactic acid to my mash that my mash pH will be 4.86 which is certainly off enough to be detrimental to enzyme activity

Past measurements of mash pH (in a cooled sample at room temperature) have always agreed with the Bru'n water estimate so I am very surprised that there is such a huge difference here.

I feel like I must be missing something but for the life of me I can't find an input that I have failed to check. Have you seen differences like this in the past?

I make no comparisons to other software, and stand by my own. But since your chosen alternative has no means whereby to properly account for the BC's and/or pHDI's (I.E., the critical defining characteristics) of both Spelt (Wheat) Malt and Melanoidin Malt, and therefore you are forced to errantly default both of these to "Base Malt" (which neither of them are), therein lies the vast bulk of your huge problem/dilemma with your software of preference.

 

[TheMadKing]

I make no comparisons to other software, and stand by my own. But since your chosen alternative has no means whereby to properly account for the BC's and/or pHDI's (I.E., the critical defining characteristics) of both Spelt (Wheat) Malt and Melanoidin Malt, and therefore you are forced to errantly default both of these to "Base Malt" (which neither of them are), therein lies the vast bulk of your huge problem/dilemma with your software of preference.

Sorry, I wasn't trying to start a turf war, just wanting a sanity check to make sure I wasn't making a mistake somewhere.

I typically don't even worry about mash pH overly much and was only trying to use MME to calculate a kettle knockout addition to adjust to pH 5.0 into the fermenter.

So I plugged in my recipe and saw the 8.29mL of lactic and it raised my eyebrows. I have never in my life added more than 5mL to my mash before so that seemed like a lot.

I then plugged it into bru'n water to sanity check myself because it has been so accurate in the past that I stopped measuring my mash pH only to confirm the calculated value. I'm not trying to say one is better than the other, I just have more experience with one than the other.

FWIW BeerSmith also says that 8.29mL of lactic is way too much and recommends only 2 mL. I don't put much stock in this number though

So you're saying if I add 8.29mL of lactic and measure my pH, you believe that MME will prove the more accurate in this case because it is accounting for the pHDI of the wheat? (Which I noted was indeed very high)

This is also really interesting because several members of my brew club and I were debating the efficacy of rice hulls and during the course of the conversation we all agreed that we see a noticable efficiency drop whenever we use significant amounts of wheat. I wonder if that is because it is raising the pH enough to affect the enzyme activity and no other software is accounting for that fact in the calculated acid additions.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Also, in your software you show 24 ppm Bicarbonate in your water (or ~19.7 ppm Alkalinity), and in MME you have zero Alkalinity. For 6.84 gallons, that sums to 10.43 mEq's of Alkalinity in your chosen software, and zero mEq's of Alkalinity in MME.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

You also failed to revise your mill gap sourced grist buffer multiplier. Here is how I see your recipe in MME:

 

[TheMadKing]

Also, in your software you show 24 ppm Bicarbonate in your water (or ~19.7 ppm Alkalinity), and in MME you have zero Alkalinity. For 6.84 gallons, that sums to 10.43 mEq's of Alkalinity in your chosen software, and zero mEq's of Alkalinity in MME.

Well now I'm questioning my water report the ion balance is off pretty significantly. I did input the same parameters into MME that are in the other software though

 

[TheMadKing]

You also failed to revise your mill gap sourced grist buffer multiplier. Here is how I see your recipe in MME:

View attachment 739610

Thank you! I knew I was probably missing something. I see you've also revised my target pH to 5.4, but still 4.73mL sounds much better than 8.29!

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Well now I'm questioning my water report the ion balance is off pretty significantly. I did input the same parameters into MME that are in the other software though

You failed to input your % Source Water.

 

[TheMadKing]

You failed to input your % Source Water.

Well that was dumb...

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

The wheat (as spelt) is rather basic with respect to your chosen target of 5.30 pH. Here is how I see it when I update to your water and your target pH:

 

[TheMadKing]

The wheat (as spelt) is rather basic with respect to your chosen target of 5.30 pH. Here is how I see it when I update to your water and your target pH:

View attachment 739615

Mine agrees with this now as well.

Thanks for taking the time to look at this and helping me Larry, very much appreciated!

 

[TBA]

Larry, just downloaded v10.85 and tried for first time. Going to be a big help for me, thank you. One question, why is the input on the IBU page in metric for the standard version?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Larry, just downloaded v10.85 and tried for first time. Going to be a big help for me, thank you. One question, why is the input on the IBU page in metric for the standard version?

Good catch! I'll have to flip that. But at least the Hops ounce weight is revealed immediately to the right of grams. Version 10.85 is now up on my website. This will need to wait until my next update, but I'm update burned out at present.

 

[TheMadKing]

Hey Larry, your spreadsheet is a marvel and I'm glad I trusted you with this. It nailed my pH right on (I switched to targeting 5.4)

I will be using MME going forward for everything. Thanks!

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Hey Larry, your spreadsheet is a marvel and I'm glad I trusted you with this. It nailed my pH right on (I switched to targeting 5.4)

I will be using MME going forward for everything. Thanks!

Thank you kindly. Well appreciated!!!

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Larry, just downloaded v10.85 and tried for first time. Going to be a big help for me, thank you. One question, why is the input on the IBU page in metric for the standard version?

Please PM me if you would like to test a version of 10.85 with your issue corrected.

 

[prankster1590]

I use the following equation for mash pH. Does it compare?

Distilled water/mash pH:

pH=1,086*log(814984,25/a)

a= specific acidity. The specfic acdity of specialty malt can be calculated as follows:

a=14+0,13*EBC(color)

Than mash pH can be calculated as follows:

pH = Sum(distilled malt pH*fraction of malt in recipe) + (5,7*Sum(fractions of specialty malts in recipe)) - ((0,14*Sum(a specialty malts*fraction specialty malts in recipe)/Mash thickness))+ ((0,013* mash thickness + 0,13)*Alkalinity) - (0,28*[Ca]) - (0,012*[Mg])

All concentrations and alkalinity are in mEq/L

1 mEq/L Mg2+ = MW/charge --> 24.3 mg/mmol*2 = 12,15 mg/mEq --> 1 mEq/L = 12.15 mg Mg2+/L = 12,15 ppm Mg2+

So 100 mg of Mg2+ = 100/12.15 = 8,23 mEq. Or when the concentration is 100 mg/L its 8,23 mEq/L

 

[Tropheus]

I use 100% RO water for brewing, what / how do I set this in MME I usually set everything to 0.00 and Bicarb to 8 with a ph of 7. my TDS reading of RO is 8ppm

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I use 100% RO water for brewing, what / how do I set this in MME I usually set everything to 0.00 and Bicarb to 8 with a ph of 7. my TDS reading of RO is 8ppm

If your TDS is 8 ppm, then on an mEq/L level this must be split equally between cations and anions. Therefore not all of it can be Alkalinity. Charge neutrality is the driver here.

That said, within MME ones source and/or dilution water analyticals are introduced via the use of the 'Water' tab/sheet.

 

[Tropheus]

thank you for taking the time to reply.

would i be very far out if i started off with a blank sheet and zero all of the boxes in Water tab?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

thank you for taking the time to reply.

would i be very far out if i started off with a blank sheet and zero all of the boxes in Water tab?

Yes! With a very low TDS of only 8 ppm, you can safely just begin from the assumption of zero mineralization.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

My initial and purely ballpark guess is that your RO water has no higher than 3.15 ppm Sodium ion and no higher than 4.79 ppm Chloride ion, and perhaps about 0.08 ppm Alkalinity. That particular combo hits ~8.0 ppm TDS, and also balances cations and anions at 0.137 mEq/L each. Albeit that other combos may do likewise. This assumption presumes that your water passes first through a water softener, and then through an RO unit. If it doesn't, then all bets are off as to such guessing, with the caveat that it doesn't matter and you can presume zero mineralization.

That plus 35/23 x 3.15 = 4.79
(whereby the MW of Na is 23 and the MW of Cl is 35)

 

[Tropheus]

Thank you for that, I don't have a water softener.