Brewing water for a Bohemian Pilsner

[joshesmusica]

Attached is what I've typed in according to instructions from a thread about my water report from a long time ago. I was told it's basically RO water. First question, does it look right?

Second question: I'm planning on brewing a Bohemian Pilsner this weekend. I normally add acid malt when needed in order to drop the estimated pH into the range that I'm hoping for (anywhere between 5.2 and 5.5 depending on the style). I had planned on adding acidulated malt to this one too (dropping pH to 5.5), but I'm wondering if I should add any other minerals, or if I should just go with what I had originally planned since this is my first time attempting the style?

Any help is much appreciated as I know pretty much nothing about the subject of brewing water!

 

[mabrungard]

The levels of bicarbonate and carbonate seem a bit higher than I would expect, but they seem close enough. I would add more chloride to that water for a Boh Pils. That does improve their taste. A bit of calcium chloride and a bit more of sodium chloride. Bringing the chloride level to 30 to 40 ppm seems to work well for me. Don't boost the calcium too high since lager yeast doesn't tolerate that ion very well. The small amount of sodium added won't create a salty flavor, so don't worry about that.

 

[ajdelange]

You are blessed with pretty good water with the 'pretty' being in there only because the alkalinity is right on the border at 1 mEq/l (50 ppm). You would need about 90% of that in acid, i.e. about 0.9 mEq/L of water treated to get rid of it. This could be handles with 0.9 cc of 10% phosphoric acid per L treated or assuming you are mashing with about 4 gal water an extra Oz of sauermalz. But as you re going to want to supplement the chloride a bit (makes for a fuller if less authentic Boh Pils) I'd think about cutting the mains water 1:1 with RO as a means of dropping the alkalinity to 0.5 mEq. This, of course, will also drop the other ion concentrations by the same factor so you will want to supplement with 50 - 70 mg CaCl2 per liter of water treated.

 

[ajdelange]

The levels of bicarbonate and carbonate seem a bit higher than I would expect,

That's because, as we have noted before, most labs still don't know how to calculate them correctly. For 50 ppm alkalinity and pH 8 bicarbonate is 58.8 mg/L and carbonate 0.45 mg/L.

 

[joshesmusica]

The levels of bicarbonate and carbonate seem a bit higher than I would expect, but they seem close enough. I would add more chloride to that water for a Boh Pils. That does improve their taste. A bit of calcium chloride and a bit more of sodium chloride. Bringing the chloride level to 30 to 40 ppm seems to work well for me. Don't boost the calcium too high since lager yeast doesn't tolerate that ion very well. The small amount of sodium added won't create a salty flavor, so don't worry about that.

Thanks! Could you tell me how much of each of those you would add? The bad part is that I don't have a pH meter to really be able to tell if what I've added has done it's job. But I can say, going off of this input and just using acid malt when needed, I haven't produced a bad beer. Should I be aiming for 5.5 pH for a Boh Pils?

 

[joshesmusica]

You are blessed with pretty good water with the 'pretty' being in there only because the alkalinity is right on the border at 1 mEq/l (50 ppm). You would need about 90% of that in acid, i.e. about 0.9 mEq/L of water treated to get rid of it. This could be handles with 0.9 cc of 10% phosphoric acid per L treated or assuming you are mashing with about 4 gal water an extra Oz of sauermalz. But as you re going to want to supplement the chloride a bit (makes for a fuller if less authentic Boh Pils) I'd think about cutting the mains water 1:1 with RO as a means of dropping the alkalinity to 0.5 mEq. This, of course, will also drop the other ion concentrations by the same factor so you will want to supplement with 50 - 70 mg CaCl2 per liter of water treated.

I don't really have a way to cut it with RO water. The plan was to mash with 20 liters, and batch sparge with 16L. I got advice to start with the idea of mashing with grist/water ratio of 1.65, and then adjust in order to get the mash and the sparge within 4L. So that brought it all the way down to 1.39.

There is no problem using acid malt though, and had already calculated in to use 200g/.44lb of that. Then it said that the mash pH should be 5.5. I suppose if I added any calcium chloride or sodium chloride that I would also need to up the amount of acid malt?

 

[joshesmusica]

This is the thread with my water report:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=541084

 

[ajdelange]

I'm chuckling this morning because I almost put in a comment last night about how well the water report balanced only to realize that it is because the alkalinity value of 50 was the value provided by me to make it balance. The report shows a pH of 8.1 (OP says 8) so the relevant bicarbonate and carbonate concentrations are, respectively, 59.1 and 0.35 mg/L but what counts is the alkalinity, not the carbonate or bicarbonate. Not sure, though, how Brun water processes the alkalinity, carb and bicarb so better get those right, esp. the 10 mg/L carbonate number.

I don't really have a way to cut it with RO water. The plan was to mash with 20 liters, and batch sparge with 16L. I got advice to start with the idea of mashing with grist/water ratio of 1.65, and then adjust in order to get the mash and the sparge within 4L. So that brought it all the way down to 1.39.

Assuming you stuck with the 20L that implies about 7 kg malt. Assuming that 10% of that is 20L caramel you will need 42 mEq of acid to neutralize the base malt to pH 5.5. To pH 5.4 you would need about 74 mEq acid.

There is no problem using acid malt though, and had already calculated in to use 200g/.44lb of that. Then it said that the mash pH should be 5.5.

The 42 mEq acid an be supplied by about 125 grams (1.8% sauermalz). The 74 mEq would take 220 grams (3.1%). The interesting thing here is that you'd like to increase chloride but not necessarily calcium because you do not want the beer to taste at all minerally. If you were to reduce the sauermalz to 65 grams you would be 20 mEq shy of the acid you need to reach pH 5.5. If you were to supply those with 20 mEq HCl (20 mL 1N acid) you'd get to pH 5.5 and have added 35 mg/L chloride. I mention this only because of your location. Food grade HCl is no available to home brewers in the US (that I know of). Even 5.2 mL AMS/CRS (don't know if that is available in Norway) would give you 18 mg/L chloride but also 24 mg/L sulfate which is just about at the limit you can tolerate in a Boh Pils.

I suppose if I added any calcium chloride or sodium chloride that I would also need to up the amount of acid malt?

Other way, actually. You would need slightly less as the calcium reacts with malt phosphate to produce acid. For any reasonable amount of added CaCl2 the reduction would be insignificant.

This is getting way too complicated for a beginner. Just add 50 mg/L CaCl2 (anhydride equivalent) and be sure the grist is about 2.5% sauermalz and you should be fine.

 

[joshesmusica]

Thanks for the help. I'm at work now and don't have the grain bill in front of me anymore, but I believe it was:
5.8kg Pilsen malt (bestmalz) - 84.1%
.5kg Vienna malt - 7.2%
.4kg carapils - 5.8%
.2kg acidulated malt - 2.9%

Here are the two types of calcium chloride I can buy at the LHBS, which would you recommend?:

https://m.stavanger.bryggselv.no/rå...g/Kalsiumklorid-CaCl2-1-kg-700013-p0000000742

https://m.stavanger.bryggselv.no/rå...id-CaCl2-33pcnt-E509-100ml-700014-p0000000743

 

[ajdelange]

That grain bill should work fine without any water treatment but a bit of extra chloride might be nice. Either of the two types would work but for twice the price of the liquid which apparently contains 33 g (33% of 100 mL) you get 1000/33 = 30 times the CaCl2. The question then is as to what percentage of the material is actually CaCl2. This is easy to determine by measuring the specific gravity of a solution (see the sticky). A kilo should last you a long time but it will pick up water unless well protected and you will have to check the strength periodically. OTOH with the liquid you just measure and add but you pay for that convenience.

 

[joshesmusica]

Ok thanks so much now I'm pretty excited about this. My brew partner is German and has been wanting to do this style for a while, but I wanted to make sure I have control over everything first. So this will be the first using a lager yeast (I've only done hybrids before).

I think I'll do the liquid because I don't think I would really be able to store the dry one air tight afterward so easily. So with the liquid one, how much would you recommend adding with the grain bill above?

 

[ajdelange]

I recommended 50 mg/l which for 20L would be a total of 50*20 = 1000 mg or 1 gram. This stuff is labeled 33% and I assume that means 330 mg CaCl2 per mL of solution so you would want 1000/330 = 3 mL.

 

[joshesmusica]

Thanks a ton for taking the time to answer all my dumb questions. I'll be sure to report back in a few weeks!

 

[joshesmusica]

Ok I had one more question that I thought about after typing the stuff into the brun water spreadsheet. Should I be adding the chloride to the mash water and the sparge, or is it mainly only the mash water that's important?

 

[ajdelange]

That depends on how much flavor from chloride you want in the beer, IOW do to allow the chloride in the mash water to be diluted by the sparge water. Since these are modest levels I'd say just treat the whole volume the same way.

 

[mabrungard]

Having chloride in either the mashing or sparging water is unnecessary. It can be added via a salt addition to any one of these points: mashing water, sparging water, or kettle wort. You could also add it to all of those points. It makes no difference with respect to the chloride.

However, since both magnesium chloride and calcium chloride affect mashing pH via their Mg or Ca content, Then it can make a difference with those salts are added. If you need to depress mashing pH, then it may be worthwhile to add all the salts for the batch to the mashing water where they help acidify. If you don't need to depress the mashing pH, then it may be worthwhile to add those salts directly to the kettle wort.

 

[joshesmusica]

Ok good to know! Thanks. I had planned on it affecting the pH because I assumed I needed to. Already got the specific amount of acid malt crushed with the rest of the grains, so I'll just add it to the mash.

 

[rwing7486]

I would use 100% RO water for this style of beer with just enough calcium chloride addition to achieve desired chloride levels. This worked great with in my BoPils.

 

[ajdelange]

However, since both magnesium chloride and calcium chloride affect mashing pH via their Mg or Ca content, Then it can make a difference with those salts are added.

At the suggested levels the probably pH shift from calcium is at most 0.005 pH so it can be added whenever convenient. He could even add it to the finished beer if he wanted too.