Help needed with the water chemistry

[dmcmillen]

Hope this is still being monitored. I've been out of touch for a while. I am ready to do my 2nd test mash with both grains (MO & Brown) and salts for this Porter. I know now that I'm not trying to match any profile like the ones in Bru'n Water but I do need to determine what levels I would like. Right now, for this recipe, I am trying to start from AJ's recommendations in his Primer Sticky. To recap from the beginning of this post, my water is Alk 98, SO4 9, Cl 4, Na 28, Ca 9, Mg 4. You can tell from my questions that I am still trying to get a better grasp on what I am actually trying to accomplish.

• AJ recommends in his Primer sticky to add a teaspoon of CaCl and skip the sauermalz for a Porter. Obviously wouldn't want any more acidity here because of the acidity of the Brown malt. Since the CaCl is most likely anhydrous, then that would be 3.6 g CaCl (vs 5g for the dihydrate). Now is that total for the mash water and the sparge water? I.e., do I need to divide that proportionately between the mash and sparge water? I'm trying to use Bru'n Water to calculate the equivalent of the added tsp of CaCl and to be able to scale down for the test mash.
• AJ's Primer Sticky indicates that you can use RO or DI water and only add CaCl. Then there would be no Mg or Sulphate. Is that ok? Are there really no minimum levels for some of the salts?
• I actually brew 6 gals of which 5.5 go to the fermenter. Should I scale the 5 gal recommendations up (the tsp CaCl, not Bru'n Water recommendations) or is that not important?
• My first test mash yielded a dipH of 5.15 for the Brown Malt. My 2nd test I wanted to do with both grains and salts. I fully expect to have to add some bicarbonate to get the pH up. Should I do the 2nd test with just the Brown malt to establish its buffering or can I do the next test with both grains and salts and go from there?
• AJ recommends starting with water that is either DI, RO or where Alk is < 35. For this brew I would think the high alkalinity would be ok, but for "normal" brews where I'm not dealing with a Brown malt, what would be better, doing a 2:1 DI dilution to bring the Alk down to the recommended < 35 level, or use DI water? This question is related to my lack of understanding of what mineral levels I'm trying to achieve.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

You don't need magnesium for any beer, or sulfate ions for a porter. I generally adjust to 50 ppm of calcium in the mash water, and then do likewise in the sparge water, but you can optionally leave it out of the sparge water, or also optionally front load all of it into the strike water such that your total of strike and sparge water (if blended together) will come out to 50 ppm of Ca++ ions.

At this juncture it may be best to perform the test mash at the exact ratios of ingredients, water, and minerals as for your full scale recipe. That will tell you if the 98 ppm Alkalinity and the 50 ppm calcium will be sufficient to get you to 5.4 to 5.5 pH for the mash. I generally make an initial first guess at a need for about 70-80 ppm alkalinity in the strike water for a porter.

Based upon my tests of several batches of fresh and unopened CaCL2 prills, i'm guessing yours will be about 94% CaCL and 6% water when the package is first opened. You most likely will want to adjust both your strike water (mandatory) and sparge water (optional) to 50 ppm. You will be adjusting on the order of 9 gallons of water overall to 50 ppm Ca++, and not the 6 gallons you intend to end up with.

You will want to acidify your sparge water to a pH of 5.4 to 5.6.

 

[dmcmillen]

Thanks Silver!

I generally adjust to 50 ppm of calcium in the mash water, and then do likewise in the sparge water, but you can optionally leave it out of the sparge water, or also optionally front load all of it into the strike water such that your total of strike and sparge water (if blended together) will come out to 50 ppm of Ca++ ions.

Knowing that I would want to shoot for 50ppm Ca is relatively easy to achieve with one of the spreadsheets like Bru'n Water. I really didn't know what I was shooting for so I was using AJ's recommendation of 1 teaspoon of CaCl dihydrate as a starter. Since almost all of the CaCl purchased from the LHBS's is anhydrous which AJ established in his Primer Sticky, I was using 3.6g per teaspoon (5g of dihydrate), those amounts coming from the Sticky conversation. That raised the question is it a teaspoon per mash water or per mash and sparge water? Again, not knowing the Ca level I was trying to achieve, I was trying to back into whatever that might be by inputting the 3.6g of CaCl into Bru'n Water. That's a little trickier because of the way Bru'n Water works.

You will be adjusting on the order of 9 gallons of water overall to 50 ppm Ca++, and not the 6 gallons you intend to end up with.

Yes, the total water is about 9 gals to be treated with final of 6. My question was that if the recommendation is 1 teaspoon CaCl for a 5 gal batch and my batch is 6 gal should I adjust the amount of CaCl up accordingly or am I nit picking this too much. I suspect that the Sticky recommendations are general recommendations for someone who may not be using a meter or even a spreadsheet and wants some general guidelines.

Mostly I'm working on getting a "feel" for what I want to shoot for and how to achieve that.

 

[mabrungard]

Since almost all of the CaCl purchased from the LHBS's is anhydrous which AJ established in his Primer Sticky,

It might start out as anhydrous at the point of manufacture, but its probably picked up a little bit of water in the meantime. But AJ's observation is still valid. I prefer to consider my calcium chloride to be in the anhydrous form and perform my calculations with that assumption so that I don't overdose the water with that salt. Assuming that the salt is in its dihydrate form is more likely to overdose your water.