Chronic attenuation issues

[VikeMan]

Gotta ask, you are using a hydrometer correct? Not a refractometer?

Calibrated my hydrometer and all kettle thermometers.

 

[Gruel]

I found that using more than one thermometer is a good idea. Several of my digital ones started to give bad readings, but not necessarily in an obvious way. For both brewing and coffee roasting I now switched back to an old analog meat/baking thermometer, and I occasionally cross check with a digital one.
(A baking thermocouple thermometer started to read intermittently high, due to an intermittent short where the wire left the metal probe housing. Several encapsulated NTC thermometers turned out to be not all that encapsulated after all; they went bonkers, also reading a few degrees high, after maybe ten hours of liquid immersion.)

 

[OldSkrecz1]

Did you measure the mash pH at mash temperature? If so, add about 0.3 to get the pH at room temperature. It's actually better to cool the sample down and measure at room temp, if for no other reason than it's less wear on your pH meter's probe.

Even if its an ATC probe? Its a Milwaukee MW 102. Do you think it would be off by .3?

 

[OldSkrecz1]

Gotta ask, you are using a hydrometer correct? Not a refractometer?

Everything stopping at about 1.020. I been there.

Hydrometer. Yes

 

[OldSkrecz1]

Quick question.. If I wanted to raise my mash PH. How much Baking soda do I add (roughly)? Ive been reading that its hard to dissolve Baking soda into the mash. Would you add it into the mash water before adding the grains? Maybe circulating the water? Any thoughts?

thanks

 

[VikeMan]

Even if its an ATC probe? Its a Milwaukee MW 102. Do you think it would be off by .3?

Yes. The ATC feature corrects for the fact that the meter itself behaves differently depending on temperature. But it doesn't correct for the fact that the wort has a different pH at different temperatures.

The 0.3 is a rule of thumb. I've seen anywhere between 0.25 and 0.35 cited. The reason it's a rule of thumb is that the actual value will be different depending on the makeup of the solution, and also because mash temps and room temps also vary.

In the case of your mash pH on this batch, celebrate success! We'll never know exactly what your mash temp was, but clearly you were in the ballpark.

If I wanted to raise my mash PH. How much Baking soda do I add (roughly)? Ive been reading that its hard to dissolve Baking soda into the mash. Would you add it into the mash water before adding the grains?

Just add NaHCO3 in the calculator to determine how much. Any of the mash salts should (ideally) be dissolved in the strike water before mashing in.

 

[doug293cz]

Quick question.. If I wanted to raise my mash PH. How much Baking soda do I add (roughly)? Ive been reading that its hard to dissolve Baking soda into the mash. Would you add it into the mash water before adding the grains? Maybe circulating the water? Any thoughts?

thanks

Baking soda dissolves pretty quickly. What doesn't dissolve well is chalk (calcium carbonate.) If you don't want the sodium that comes with baking soda, you can add pickling lime (calcium hydroxide), which dissolves much easier than calcium carbonate.

Brew on

 

[hottpeper13]

I use RO water because my well has 400 ppm of CaCO3 and that is even too high for stouts. So when i need to add back some alkalinity I just mix RO and house water to get what I want. The math for water is easy since it's linear, so half house water gets me to 200 ppm which is close enough for dark beers, 25% for amber, and guess what ........it dissolves just fine. LOL

 

[doug293cz]

I use RO water because my well has 400 ppm of CaCO3 and that is even too high for stouts. So when i need to add back some alkalinity I just mix RO and house water to get what I want. The math for water is easy since it's linear, so half house water gets me to 200 ppm which is close enough for dark beers, 25% for amber, and guess what ........it dissolves just fine. LOL

That's because you aren't dissolving anything - the CaCO3 is already in solution. Diluting a solution doesn't require dissolving anything new. Dissolving solid CaCO3 in water takes some effort.

Brew on

 

[VikeMan]

I use RO water because my well has 400 ppm of CaCO3 and that is even too high for stouts. So when i need to add back some alkalinity I just mix RO and house water to get what I want.

When you see a Total Alkalinity of 400 ppm "as CaCO3," that means total alkalinity (whatever the source) would be 400 ppm if you expressed it as if the ions making it up were instead CaCO3. Most alkalinity is HCO3.

 

[hottpeper13]

The point is if you're using RO water because your tap is high in alkalinity just dilute it!

 

[VikeMan]

The point is if you're using RO water because your tap is high in alkalinity just dilute it!

As long as the remaining (diluted) profile fits the style (or brewer preference), that's a great idea.

Sadly, from a flavor/mouthfeel perspective, ions can't be diluted individually at different rates, which makes building up from distilled water the way to go for almost all of my batches.

But from a pH perspective, any water (with high alkalinity) can be diluted to hit any alkalinity/mash pH desired.