Bru'N Water - critique please?

[knash3]

New user to Bru'N Water, but Lord knows I love playing with numbers. Tweak the spreadsheet long enough and it starts to feel like reality!
Anyway, brewing a stout tomorrow with Denny's 1450 (rumored to floc slowly) so feel the need to get near the calcium target for Black Balanced profile. My tapwater chloride level is close to target, so both Gypsum and CaCl push either sulfite or chloride over target. I've chosen to do both to manage the ratio between the two. Is this wise, or would I be better off diluting and then building to keep chloride on target? (prefer just using tap water)
Here's the profile (if I know how to attach...):

 

[doug293cz]

New user to Bru'N Water, but Lord knows I love playing with numbers. Tweak the spreadsheet long enough and it starts to feel like reality!
Anyway, brewing a stout tomorrow with Denny's 1450 (rumored to floc slowly) so feel the need to get near the calcium target for Black Balanced profile. My tapwater chloride level is close to target, so both Gypsum and CaCl push either sodium or chloride over target. I've chosen to do both to manage the ratio between the two. Is this wise, or would I be better off diluting and then building to keep chloride on target? (prefer just using tap water)
Here's the profile (if I know how to attach...):

Neither gypsum (calcium sulfate) nor calcium chloride will increase your sodium concentration. What are you adding thats basically doubling your starting sodium content?

Brew on

 

[knash3]

Thank you doug293cz for responding, I've corrected the original post as the sulfite / chloride was my concern, not so much sodium. Also attached the mineral addition section of the worksheet. To answer your question, sodium increase is coming from baking soda used to increase bicarbonate. I'm still unclear on the target bicarbonate level, as the comments indicate there is no desired level beyond that required to hit target mash PH. I added some to approach the water profile target of 160, but is less bicarbonate best? Would I be better off halving (or eliminating) the baking soda addition?

 

[mabrungard]

Both the bicarbonate and calcium levels presented in those profiles are the starting ESTIMATES that you may target. However, the actual bicarbonate level used in the mash is dependent ONLY on the mash pH. In other words, ignore the target bicarbonate level and adjust the actual bicarbonate level so that your resulting pH prediction is where you want it.

 

[Yooper]

Thank you doug293cz for responding, I've corrected the original post as the sulfite / chloride was my concern, not so much sodium. Also attached the mineral addition section of the worksheet. To answer your question, sodium increase is coming from baking soda used to increase bicarbonate. I'm still unclear on the target bicarbonate level, as the comments indicate there is no desired level beyond that required to hit target mash PH. I added some to approach the water profile target of 160, but is less bicarbonate best? Would I be better off halving (or eliminating) the baking soda addition?

What's your projected target mash pH? I'd shoot for 5.5ish, and you may not need any baking soda at all to hit that.

 

[knash3]

Both the bicarbonate and calcium levels presented in those profiles are the starting ESTIMATES that you may target. However, the actual bicarbonate level used in the mash is dependent ONLY on the mash pH. In other words, ignore the target bicarbonate level and adjust the actual bicarbonate level so that your resulting pH prediction is where you want it.

Thank you Martin, appreciate the clarification. Will ignore bicarbonate target going forward. Is calcium ~50 PPM a worthy target, or should that be a byproduct of other additions? Increasing calcium is what lead to my exceeding target for Chloride and correspondingly increasing Sulfite over target.

 

[knash3]

What's your projected target mash pH? I'd shoot for 5.5ish, and you may not need any baking soda at all to hit that.

Thanks for commenting Yooper - I started with your simple water adjustment sticky advice, and am now digging a little deeper.
Without baking soda, mash PH is predicted at 5.3, with addition it's 5.4. That's with no acid malt or lactic acid. I brewed this Saturday (while sipping Yooper's Oatmeal Stout - yum!) and pH at end of mash was 5.54, so likely started as predicted. Next time I'll leave the baking soda out, now that I understand bicarbonate target is not relevant by itself.

 

[mabrungard]

50 ppm Ca is appropriate for ales, since that helps them clear up at the end of the ferment. Lagers don't require that much Ca since the lagering process clears the beer when performed correctly.

 

[ajdelange]

Next time I'll leave the baking soda out, now that I understand bicarbonate target is not relevant by itself.

The reason there is no bicarbonate target is that by the time the beer finishes at a pH around 4.5 98.7% of any bicarbonate you have added has been converted to CO2 gas. In converting it absorbs protons and that is what we use it for - to absorb protons and raise pH.

Note also that cold beer carbonated to about 2 vols is going to have approximately 40 mg/L bicarbonate content as a consequence of the gas used to carbonate it.