Is there a market for determining specific lots of malts DI-pH and titration derived buffering value?

[Silver_Is_Money]

The title says it all. Would you pay to have these two values determined for your particular lots of malts and/or un-malted grains? And if you would be willing to pay, what would you perceive to be a reasonable price to charge for such a service?

 

[VikeMan]

That's a fascinating question. Personally, I probably wouldn't, because if I cared enough to determine these values per lot, I would probably do it myself. And thruthfully, although lot to lot variation is a real thing, I don't know if it's important enough to me to do something about it. (Well, I haven't so far.)

I could see where it might be attractive to some mid-sized commercial brewers. I would say large commercial brewers, but the big boys are typically equipped/staffed for this kind of work if they want to do it.

I'm curious to see what other home brewers have to say.

 

[cire]

No. I'm in UK and brew mostly ales that benfit from a minimum calcium level of 100 ppm..

My current base malt specifies EBC wort pH to be 6.0 max. My water has 100 ppm calcium with alkalinity circa 255 ppm as CaCO3 which is reduced with mineral acid to typically 20 ppm.

Mash pH of first brew with this bag of malt, which contained crystal but no additional calcium salts, was 5.3. Last runnings were 1007 at pH 5.47 and the planned calcium salt additions, were put into the kettle. With those reading I didn't bother measuring pH of boiled wort.

Next brew with no crystal malt used similar water to the first and had a mash pH of 5.57. The planned calcium salt mash additions brought pH down to 5.47. The alkalinity of sparge liquor was, with acid, further reduced to that originally intended. Last runnings were 1.004 at pH 5.33. pH. After the boil, wort was pH 5.22.

Why would I pay someone to tell me their opinon of what I can measure and control? Further, what is all the fuss about any particular pH? Is it not a moving target?

Further, I've yet to hear someone expressing their joy sinking a wonderful beer saying, "Wow, that was a fabulous pH 5.xy mash.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

My current base malt specifies EBC wort pH to be 6.0 max.

Might I ask what it specifies as the min?

 

[cire]

Might I ask what it specifies as the min?

Sadly, as in the link, it gives no more detail. It would be nice to know the range of pH one might of from various malts and grains. I suspect each would be larger than we might care to think.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

And thus the need to know rather than presume.

 

[Big Monk]

The title says it all. Would you pay to have these two values determined for your particular lots of malts and/or un-malted grains? And if you would be willing to pay, what would you perceive to be a reasonable price to charge for such a service?

This would be fantastic information to have but I fear it's just too labor intensive for maltsters. Think of it this way: When Weyermann is the only maltster i know of releasing ACTUAL useful malt analysis sheets, and they don;t include that info, you can bet that none of the others will either. It's a chore just getting DI pH from a maltster, let a lone a 1, 2, or 3 term set of titration/buffering coefficients.

I think the best we can hope for is to use the data we have already for titration and alter the co-efficients in reasonable ways based on experience to get the desired results. That is of course if you want to use the charge based method, which no one other than me and A.J. are doing anyway.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I wasn't expecting the maltsters to do it. I was considering the offering of this service to home brewers who would submit samples for assesment, along the lines of sending water samples to Ward Labs for analysis.

 

[Big Monk]

I wasn't expecting the maltsters to do it. I was considering the offering of this service to home brewers who would submit samples for assesment, along the lines of sending water samples to Ward Labs for analysis.

That’s way too much hassle.

If maltsters wouldn’t be the ones doing it on a lot to lot basis, I would just learn to do it myself. Again, there is only one algorithm setup to take that data anyway so I can’t imagine the masses being interested in that service.

Furthermore, even if they were, it would for sure be cheaper to do it yourself.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I was contemplating the addition of an additional grist entry column within 'Mash Made Easy' (sitting directly alongside the current DI_pH manual override column) whereby the titrated buffering value could similarly be added as a manual override, and thus both values could be applied if known for any given grist component.

 

[Big Monk]

I was contemplating the addition of an additional grist entry column within 'Mash Made Easy' (sitting directly alongside the current DI_pH manual override column) whereby the titrated buffering value could similarly be added as a manual override, and thus both values could be applied if known for any given grist component.

The only viable way, outside of measuring for yourself, to get a1, a2 or a3 is to have the maltsters provide that info to you with a lot analysis.

It's not a workable solution to pay to get that data.