Help with water profile Pale ale

[Jsheaffer25]

I plan on brewing up an all grain batch of Edworts Haus Pale this weekend.

I will be using 100% RO water.

I downloaded the Bru'nWater spreadsheet and started working on it. Could someone just take a peak and see if I'm in the right neighborhood with the additions. I don't want to over due it.

I was slightly concerned about using the pale ale profile with the sulfates being high and this not being that hoppy of a beer. What do you think?

thanks for your help with this.

 

[murphyslaw]

I plan on brewing up an all grain batch of Edworts Haus Pale this weekend.

I will be using 100% RO water.

I downloaded the Bru'nWater spreadsheet and started working on it. Could someone just take a peak and see if I'm in the right neighborhood with the additions. I don't want to over due it.

I was slightly concerned about using the pale ale profile with the sulfates being high and this not being that hoppy of a beer. What do you think?
View attachment 587623

thanks for your help with this.

I would skip everything but the gypsum and lactic acid. The so4 is what you're after. I think the mg and other mineral levels are just sort of indicating that you want minimal levels. As long as you have enough ca, which it looks like you do.

I've found that if I go much over 200ppm on the so4 it gets too minerally. It's the sort of thing youve got to experiment with and see what works on your setup and with your palate. But I generally use the same profile for a pale ale and IPA.

 

[mabrungard]

Assuming that you prefer that sulfate level, your additions look appropriate. I strongly recommend that anyone producing hoppy pale ales use at least 200 ppm sulfate to produce an adequate drying for the beer finish. I do like the roughly 300 ppm sulfate content in my pale ales, but that's me. Including the decent dose of epsom is an important feature for improving the bittering perception in pale ales and IPAs. I strongly recommend that you retain that component since it does make a difference.

As you found, a bit of baking soda is often needed to keep the wort pH up when you're dosing a lot of calcium to the wort. I find that the baking soda is needed based on my tens of trials of brewing with that profile. The pH depression effect of a high calcium dose is true.

 

[GPP33]

As you found, a bit of baking soda is often needed to keep the wort pH up when you're dosing a lot of calcium to the wort. I find that the baking soda is needed based on my tens of trials of brewing with that profile. The pH depression effect of a high calcium dose is true.

Why not just drop the baking soda and pickling lime which will allow him to reduce/eliminate the lactic acid. Those additions are just fighting each other. Or are they actually bringing something to the beer that I'm not aware of?

 

[mabrungard]

Why not just drop the baking soda and pickling lime which will allow him to reduce/eliminate the lactic acid. Those additions are just fighting each other. Or are they actually bringing something to the beer that I'm not aware of?

Oops! I didn't see that. Yes, its counterproductive to add both acid and base. However, there can be reasons why we might want to do it. The primary I sometimes do it is for Weizens where I want to boost the amount of lactate in my resulting beer to better mimic the results that Southern Bavarian brewers would have with their more alkaline water (I start with RO).

But beside that point, using the highly mineralized pale ale profile with RO or distilled water is likely to need a touch of alkalinity in it due to the high added calcium content in the water profile.

 

[Jsheaffer25]

Ok I think I got it sorted out. I was adding the pickling lime to raise the bicarbonate amount but the more I read I guess that's not really necessary. So after taking the lime out and dropping the lactic acid slightly. All minerals seem about where they should be and the bicarbonate is very low. Is this any sort of issue? I attached my new profile if you could take a peak. Brewing up this weekend, will keep you posted. thanks for the help.

 

[GPP33]

Why are you adding baking soda? Take the baking soda out and take the acid out. If your ph is high add some acid back in, if it’s low add some baking soda in. There’s no reason to use both.

 

[Jsheaffer25]

I just wanted to say thanks for the help with the brunwater spreadsheet. Beers boiling away right now. Mash temps were hit spot on, dropped 1 degree in an hour. Checked ph at 15 min and it was exactly 5.3. Worked perfectly!