Creating a simple water profile from distilled water - did I do this right?

[Mahonroy]

Hey guys,
I am wanting to get 8 gallons of distilled water and create a simple brewing water out of it for use in the HLT (mash, sparge, adding volume, etc.)

I am using this calculator here:
http://www.brewersfriend.com/water-chemistry/

I selected 8 gallons, and "Balanced Profile".

I then played around with the "Brewing Salt Additions" numbers until I got the "8. Difference" to be as small as possible. So am I correct in that I can just get 8 gallons of distilled water, add these brewing salt additions, and be good to go?

Here are the numbers I came up with:
Chalk: 4 grams (1.05 tsp)
Baking Soda: 1 gram (0.23 tsp)
Gypsum: 4 grams (1.0 tsp)
Calcium Chloride: 3 grams (0.88 tsp)
Canning Salt: 1 gram (0.17 tsp)

 

[mabrungard]

Definitely not correct. You have added to minerals that contribute alkalinity to the water: baking soda and chalk. Fortunately, the chalk won't really do anything since it doesn't dissolve well in water. While adding alkalinity to mashing water might be OK for highly acidic grists with high percentages of roast or dark crystal malts, most grists do not need alkalinity in the mashing water. An acid is typically required in mashing water for pale grists.

I'm not sure what they are advising on the Brewer's Friend website, but you should take some time and read the Water Knowledge page on the Bru'n Water website to gain a better understanding of water and its effect on mashing.

 

[ajdelange]

The guys that push these profiles understand that the various brewing waters of the world that influenced a style or style had certain amounts of calcium, magnesium, sulfate and chloride in them but, when they finally got to the point that they realized that a profile must balance electrically, didn't know what to do other than to add in bicarbonate ion as they knew that most water does contain it. There are a couple of problems with this to which you have fallen victim. First, the amount of bicarbonate required to balance depends on the pH of the mix and as there is no pH data available from most of the traditional sources, they just pick one. Second is that the first thing the brewer of yore did when confronted with a water that contained bicarbonate is get rid of it to the extent they could. The spreadsheet guys tend to fail to mention this and you don't find out that it is a problem until you try to calculate a mash pH which requires you to add lots of acid to get rid of the bicarbonate which wouldn't be in the brewers water anyway because he took most or all of it out. The best thing to do is forget the published profiles and research the general character of the water available to the traditional brewer. Then add calcium chloride and calcium sulfate to get water that generally matches the traditional one in sulfate, chloride, calcium and magnesium. It is not necessary to be spot on. An error of 50% in an ion concentration is where things get to be significant. Errors of 10 or 20% aren't likely to make much difference.

Or forget about it alltogether and just add 2.5 grams of calcium chloride to each 5 gallons of DI water you treat, brew the beer, taste it, add a bit of gypsum and taste it again. If it tastes better with the gypsum, add some of that next time you brew. Experiment. It really is that simple.

 

[Mahonroy]

Definitely not correct. You have added to minerals that contribute alkalinity to the water: baking soda and chalk. Fortunately, the chalk won't really do anything since it doesn't dissolve well in water. While adding alkalinity to mashing water might be OK for highly acidic grists with high percentages of roast or dark crystal malts, most grists do not need alkalinity in the mashing water. An acid is typically required in mashing water for pale grists.

I'm not sure what they are advising on the Brewer's Friend website, but you should take some time and read the Water Knowledge page on the Bru'n Water website to gain a better understanding of water and its effect on mashing.

On the calculator what part did I do incorrectly? It seems that I followed the directions like I was supposed to, what am I missing?

My tap water tastes and smells like crap. All I want to do is get distilled water, add chemicals to it, and use this instead of my tap water.

 

[ajdelange]

What you missed is explained in No. 3 which also tells you how to do a good beer with deionized water.

 

[Mahonroy]

What you missed is explained in No. 3 which also tells you how to do a good beer with deionized water.

Here is what no. 3 says:

"3. Find and enter your source water's mineral levels on line 4, tune target levels as desired (line 5)."

I'm using distilled water like I mentioned above, so everything is zero and I didn't miss anything?

 

[ajdelange]

No. No. 3 says "The guys that push these profiles understand that the various brewing.....".

 

[Mahonroy]

No. No. 3 says "The guys that push these profiles understand that the various brewing.....".

You are obviously not referencing the document that I posted, because this is not in there.

Anyone else on here that make their own brewing water and can chime in please? Telling me that I'm not doing it correctly, but not offering any reason why is not helpful... and I'm starting to think that I am actually doing it correctly all along?

 

[cshamilton]

He means read the last paragraph on the 3rd post on this thread. Both the 2nd and 3rd post offer good advice.

If you simplified your proposed additions to just the CaCl2 and Gypsum it would be a reasonable starting point.

 

[mcl]

Just to add aj and Martin are both very knowledgeable in this area. I urge you to follow their instructions. If you want it very easy just add a bit of cacl and gypsum (sticky in brewscience). If you want to understand more you need to read more in bru'n water's site to learn more. Also the brewscience sub forum has a wealth of info on this issue.