EZwater vs BruN water (HELP!)

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kingschiff

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I've been using EZwater, after missing some PHs, I did some research and found BruN water. Long story short, same specs added into both sheets. 100% distilled water, no lactic acid. EZ is giving me 5.4 mash PH, BruN water is giving me 4.18.

I have double checked #s and additions in both programs numerous times.

What gives?
 
@mabrungard It'd be a honor to get your help! I like your program so much more, but not sure if I'm missing something. I watched a 20 min setup video, so feel I have a pretty good feel for it.
 
Just did the same specs in brewers friend online calculator, got 5.30. so something has to be off in the BruN water sheet.
 
You need to provide complete recipe, in order to get an answer. What's your Mash, Sparge and Total Batch volume?
 
So your water has a pH of 7? Is this something you have measured with a pH meter?

I can see you have quite a few roasted malts, but you also upped the Chloride and sulfate a fair bit. I wouldn't go more than 50 ppm each, as well as 40-50 ppm Ca. Recipes with lots of roasted malts, will need some bakng soda or anything to bring the pH in range.

Regarding the 2 spreadsheets: I've used both and most reliable is Bru'nWater, but I do have a pH meter which I use for mash, start and end of boil.

When I used EZWater, my beers were not good. The spreadsheet is easy to use and most times it will appear as if the pH for most recipes will not dive under 5.2-5.3, which is weird, as I brewed some where it went under 5.2 and EZwater predicted somewhere around 5.4.

In the end, if you measure mash pH, once you do, you will know what you need to do. I usually take a ph measurements in the first 10-15 minutes of the mash and I adjust from there.
 
Well just mashed in, after 10 min, 4.2-4.3 ph.
blows my mind that 2 programs were wrong...

sorry for doubting bruN water!
 
If you were mashing a grist comprised of nothing but 100% Black Patent malt, and your mineralization level was high, and your mash water was relatively neutral in pH and free of alkalinity, you could legitimately mash at pH 4.2. But any other (as in more normal) grist conditions, and it simply can't happen.

The lowest dark roasted malt DIpH in the data Briess provided to me shows a single particularly dark (particularly low Lovibond) lot of Black malt (Black Patent to most) mashing all by itself at pH 4.24 in DI water. And it appears to be an outlier with strangely high acidity when compared to most other dark roasted malts.

Stable mash pH is only achieved at 30 (to better in my opinion 60) minutes into the mash. Was it still reading 4.2 pH at the 30 and 60 minute marks of the mash?
 
My PH meter was calibrated at 4 and 7 right before this. confirmed mash PH at 4.2-4.3.
I added 1G of baking soda and it brough it to 4.5 at the 30min mark. Yes the distilled water I have jumps betwen 6.8-7
 
Final beer ph into fermenter is 4.5, so we’ll see. From what i read some stouts are around there.
 
If the 2-Row is along the lines of Brewers malt I get a calculated mash pH of 5.27 prior to any addition of baking soda for your recipe.

If I mash 14.5 lbs. of nothing but your Black malt I get 4.49 pH. This sets the pH floor below which you can't go without adding acid or additional calcium or magnesium. But you don't have 14.5 lbs. of this malt, as you are only adding 1 lb.

There simply isn't enough acidity within your recipes combined malts to drop your pH as low as you have measured (4.2 to 4.3 pH). The 1 lb. of Flaked Oats you added are rated at a whopping 6.2 pH and would alone counter and balance your 1 lb. of black malt to within a decent mash pH range. Then you also have 10 lbs. of base malt that is going to be noticeably basic with respect to any typical mash pH target, and if this malt was alone it would require acidification. And against this base malt you only have 2 additional lbs. of acidic roasted malts, and also 1/2 lb. of dark crystal to counter the base malts deficiency of acidity with their own acidity.

I don't know what happened here, but Brewers Friend at 5.30 and Mash Made Easy at 5.27 and EZ Water at 5.4 seem to be confirming each other fairly well. And 4.2 pH is simply not possible.

You also have likely tens of thousands of people who have made recipes along the lines of yours and not hit 4.2 pH in the mash. If all of your grist components were well on the low side of their nominal midrange of DI mash pH values, you might hit 5.0 pH. But chaos theory would place the likelihood of all of your components being oddly low in DI_pH at rather thin odds.
 
Final beer ph into fermenter is 4.5, so we’ll see. From what i read some stouts are around there.

Boiling drops wort pH by typically about 0.2 points, so if you mashed at 4.2 pH your kettle knock-out pH should be on the order of 4.0. Nothing adds up here.

Were your calibration buffers fresh, or reused?
 
If the 2-Row is along the lines of Brewers malt I get a calculated mash pH of 5.27 prior to any addition of baking soda for your recipe.

If I mash 14.5 lbs. of nothing but your Black malt I get 4.49 pH. This sets the pH floor below which you can't go without adding acid or additional calcium or magnesium. But you don't have 14.5 lbs. of this malt, as you are only adding 1 lb.

There simply isn't enough acidity within your recipes combined malts to drop your pH as low as you have measured (4.2 to 4.3 pH). The 1 lb. of Flaked Oats you added are rated at a whopping 6.2 pH and would alone counter and balance your 1 lb. of black malt to within a decent mash pH range. Then you also have 10 lbs. of base malt that is going to be noticeably basic with respect to any typical mash pH target, and if this malt was alone it would require acidification. And against this base malt you only have 2 additional lbs. of acidic roasted malts, and also 1/2 lb. of dark crystal to counter the base malts deficiency of acidity with their own acidity.

I don't know what happened here, but Brewers Friend at 5.30 and Mash Made Easy at 5.27 and EZ Water at 5.4 seem to be confirming each other fairly well. And 4.2 pH is simply not possible.

You also have likely tens of thousands of people who have made recipes along the lines of yours and not hit 4.2 pH in the mash. If all of your grist components were well on the low side of their nominal midrange of DI mash pH values, you might hit 5.0 pH. But chaos theory would place the likelihood of all of your components being oddly low in DI_pH at rather thin odds.

I don’t understand how i got that ph reading then... I calibrated my meter at 4.0 and 7.0... I get what you’re saying but I did get that PH. So idk the answer.
 
Boiling drops wort pH by typically about 0.2 points, so if you mashed at 4.2 pH your kettle knock-out pH should be on the order of 4.0. Nothing adds up here.

Were your calibration buffers fresh, or reused?

Batch sparged with treated water. Also this recipe has some DME in the boil to bump OG.
 
Did you take pH readings at mash temperature or room temperature? If at mash temperature they would be about 0.3 points low vs. room temperature.
 
Did you take pH readings at mash temperature or room temperature? If at mash temperature they would be about 0.3 points low vs. room temperature.

I bought a ph meter that had temperature correction and assumed that would take care of it. With that aside, main question here is the massive difference in the programs readings.
 
I bought a ph meter that had temperature correction and assumed that would take care of it. With that aside, main question here is the massive difference in the programs readings.

Temperature control will not compensate for this. Add 0.3 to all of your readings. Still way low.
 
So any ph reading not at about 68, add .3 to?

No, roughly 0.3 points for compensation only works for measurements taken at mash temperatures, and for which one is assuming room temperature equivalence.

Technically it is 0.35 points, but some meters may be off by only 0.25 points. Perhaps the latter is due to temperature compensation, but of this I'm not certain.
 
No, roughly 0.3 points for compensation only works for measurements taken at mash temperatures, and for which one is assuming room temperature equivalence.

Technically it is 0.35 points, but some meters may be off by only 0.25 points. Perhaps the latter is due to temperature compensation, but of this I'm not certain.

That’s weird, can’t believe I’ve never heard that before
 
I'm surprised by this thread. As mentioned, its unlikely that a typical stout or porter grist is going to drop as low as mentioned.

Yes, ATC pH meters DO NOT correct for the chemical and thermal effect of measuring wort pH at mashing temperatures. ATC only corrects the meter and probe's response to differing measurement temperature. The pH offset mentioned above is only approximate and it is not fixed. The offset is not always 0.3.

Only measure wort pH after cooling the sample to around room temperature.
 
I'm surprised by this thread. As mentioned, its unlikely that a typical stout or porter grist is going to drop as low as mentioned.

Yes, ATC pH meters DO NOT correct for the chemical and thermal effect of measuring wort pH at mashing temperatures. ATC only corrects the meter and probe's response to differing measurement temperature. The pH offset mentioned above is only approximate and it is not fixed. The offset is not always 0.3.

Only measure wort pH after cooling the sample to around room temperature.

I really can't fathom how the PH would get that low, or why BruN water said it was. But it was right...
 
I really can't fathom how the PH would get that low, or why BruN water said it was. But it was right...

Or was it a case of two errors confirming each other, with a smattering of confirmation bias mixed in? Where is A.J. deLange when we need him? If you move this to the 'Brew Science' forum he will quite likely see it and respond. It would be great if D.M. Riffe would also lend comment, as well as RPIScotty.

A.J. deLange is presently developing the worlds first "Gen 2" mash pH software.
D.M. Riffe is the creator of the highly trusted MpH Water Calculator.
RPIScotty has his own advanced spreadsheet versions of both of the aboves work.
 
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As an aside, I can't see where EZ Water has been actively managed or updated/upgraded in a good number of years.

Ditto for the Kaiser Water Calculator, which is the first of such calculators that I became aware of and actively used. It would be great if Kai Troester (Braukaiser, or simply Kaiser on this forum would return to active participation on this forum).
 
The lowest "measured" mash pH's I had ever seen posted on this forum prior to this thread came in at 4.9.

4.2 pH is a tad greater than 5X more acidic than 4.9 pH

Proof:
10^−4.2÷10^−4.9 = 5.0119
 
The lowest "measured" mash pH's I had ever seen posted on this forum prior to this thread came in at 4.9.

4.2 pH is a tad greater than 5X more acidic than 4.9 pH

Proof:
10^−4.2÷10^−4.9 = 5.0119

I just don't understand how I got there then lol. I showed you guys everything I used.
 
Final beer ph into fermenter is 4.5, so we’ll see. From what i read some stouts are around there.

If you allow that the boil reduced your mash pH by 0.2 points, then your mash pH at room temperature (right or wrong) was 4.7. Unless your 4.5 pH as seen above was measured hot, and as for right at the end of the boil, in which case the cooled wort pH was perhaps ~4.8 at that juncture, and the cooled mash pH was ~5.0.
 
If you allow that the boil reduced your mash pH by 0.2 points, then your mash pH at room temperature (right or wrong) was 4.7. Unless your 4.5 pH as seen above was measured hot, and as for right at the end of the boil, in which case the cooled wort pH was perhaps ~4.8 at that juncture, and the cooled mash pH was ~5.0.

The weirdest thing is when I take all the grain and salts out of BruN it gives me 5.62 (shouldn't it be 7?) ph, and then if your point is correct. why is bruN water showing me a 4.2 estimated PH?
 
The weirdest thing is when I take all the grain and salts out of BruN it gives me 5.62 (shouldn't it be 7?) ph, and then if your point is correct. why is bruN water showing me a 4.2 estimated PH?

Software (my own included here) can be wrong, and often is. Simple as that. And particularly more so for Gen 1 software, which is quite highly empirical overall. In my opinion, Gen 2 (A.J. deLange) must be used to solve this issue. Gen 2 gets down to literally counting protons. It should get to the heart of the matter.

PS: There are no readilly and fully available Gen 2 software packages presently available. It is currently a work in process. But A.J. can run your recipe through his current model and give you his opinion of the most likely mash pH.

A heads-up early warning though. For all of the Gen 2 solutions A.J. has posted to date, his mash pH's (or the ones I've followed at least) are virtually always higher than most any Gen 1 software prediction. So don't be surprised if he comes in at above MME's 5.27 mash pH prediction, or Brewer's Friends 5.30 mash pH prediction.

As to why your actually measured pH correlates well to the 4.21 mash pH prediction of BW, and fails to correlate even remotely with EZ, MME, BF, MpH, and perhaps also Kaiser, I can't explain that.
 
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I guess this all wraps into, how do I make sure I hit that 5.4-5.6ph gravity? Especially if you really can't add salts after you mash in, and I need the salts anyway due to distilled water.
 
I guess this all wraps into, how do I make sure I hit that 5.4-5.6ph gravity? Especially if you really can't add salts after you mash in, and I need the salts anyway due to distilled water.

Sorry, but I'm not sure of precisely what you are asking here.
 
I'm just in a weird spot now I guess. Not sure what to use, thought I figured out a big piece of the puzzle. But clearly not lol
 
So lets say, I brewed this again. What steps could I even take to get the PH up to reasonable #s? Even if I take out all salts except baking soda, and add 1 G per gallon. it's only in the high 4s, and 72ppm sodium. I would appreciate any feedback anyone has.

I've also seen that @mabrungard is not a fan of adding dark malts late into the mash, as it is still going to drop the PH at the end.
 
So lets say, I brewed this again. What steps could I even take to get the PH up to reasonable #s? Even if I take out all salts except baking soda, and add 1 G per gallon. it's only in the high 4s, and 72ppm sodium. I would appreciate any feedback anyone has.

I've also seen that @mabrungard is not a fan of adding dark malts late into the mash, as it is still going to drop the PH at the end.

1) First we need to establish that your pH meter truly and reliably measured a valid mash pH of 4.2.

2) Second we need to establish that your chosen software is legitimately indicating pH 4.2 for this particular set of grist, water analyticals, and water to grist ratio circumstances.

I contend that both cases are highly suspect. My reasons follow:

1) Because I've never heard of a mash hitting a legitimate measured 4.2 pH this side of intentionally souring a beer. And albeit perhaps being excessive on its dark roasted malts, your grist is not alone in this area. And on top of that, you have very little crystal malt, and crystal rivals or surpasses deep roasted malts in its level of acidity. So your grist is not all that unique in its level of inherent acidity.

2) Because one outlier software package flies deeply in the face of a gaggle of others which are seemingly all in general agreement.

3) Because no one reading this thread (so far at least) has come forth and stated that they see 4.2 pH on their meter during their Stout or Porter mashes.

4) Because in a thread where I asked what was the most baking soda anyone ever added to their mash to counter low pH when brewing specifically robust Stouts and Porters, most all respondents stated "none" and only one admitted (almost embarrassingly) to once or more adding 4 to 5 grams. 4 to 5 grams of baking soda is not going to move a mash with your grist weight from pH 4.2 to pH 5.4. And in the same thread the lowest observed metered pH during a mash was indicated at 4.9. You are in unique territory here. And unique may mean that your premises are incorrect. And your premises appear to be that your 4.2 pH mash pH measurement is valid, and that with respect to a plethora of mash pH software only Bru'n Water is valid.
 
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Were your pH meter calibrants (4.01 and 7 buffers) at mash temperature when used to calibrate your meter (seeing as that you took your mash pH readings at mash temperature)?

Are your chosen calibrants 100% assuredly the correct ones for your meter?

Does your meter pass the stability test as seen in a sticky on the Brew Science forum?
 
No, the calibration solutions were room temp. I'm assuming they're correct for my meter? I didn't think there was certain solutions for certain meters.

I'm in no way, saying what I think/know is correct. By far you all know much more, I'm just perplexed.

Alone judging by me taking the mash PH while it was hot, I'm guessing the "actual" mash ph was 4.5 or so.

Also, I've added the BruN water sheet (https://drive.google.com/open?id=1frCvpRp46ZUJhjo3ZlyysE6lDz958Tuz)

here so people can check it out...
 
13.5 grams of baking soda to hit a mash pH of 5.4 is what I get for the Bru'n Water spreadsheet as seen at your provided link. This for a 5 gallon batch. That's a lot of baking soda for a 5 gallon batch, but in reality it may take even more than that to move a 14.5 lb. grist mashing at 4.2 pH up to 5.4 pH.

Let's look at this another way. Adding 13.5 grams of baking soda to 4.5 gallons of mash water is roughly the equivalent of starting out instead with 472 ppm alkalinity water, and mashing in that. Much of past historical advice has generally been to mash robust Stouts in 100 ppm to 200 ppm alkalinity water.
 
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For additional perspective, 4 grams of baking soda in 4.5 gallons of mash water is nominally the equivalent of mashing into water with 140 ppm of alkalinity (as CaCO3). And 5 grams of baking soda in 4.5 gallons of mash water is nominally the equivalent of mashing into water with 175 ppm of alkalinity.
 
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