Potential Water Pitfalls in All Grain Brewing

[ScrewyBrewer]

is there a way an occasional brewer can use a PH meter without worrying about ruining it?

After cleaning it put the meter in a small glass with two inches of storage solution, then seal the opening tight with plastic wrap and small elastic bands. You will never need to worry about the probe drying out. It is a good practice to recalibrate pH meters at least once or every month or two though.

 

[couchsending]

Any problem with using a little lemon juice to adjust mash pH? I almost always have fresh lemons on hand for cocktails, and I doubt the small amount needed would affect the beer's flavor too much.

Depends on the beer... Rowley Farmhouse used lemons in the mash for pH adjustment and won gold at GABF for Berliner or Gose with this process...

 

[couchsending]

After cleaning it put the meter in a small glass with two inches of storage solution, then seal the opening tight with plastic wrap and small elastic bands. You will never need to worry about the probe drying out. It is a good practice to recalibrate pH meters at least once or every month or two though.

Milwaukee MW102. Has a nice little container that seals around the probe. Would take a really long time for it to dry out.

 

[mabrungard]

Milwaukee MW102. Has a nice little container that seals around the probe. Would take a really long time for it to dry out.

Agreed! I replaced the probe on my MW101 a couple of years ago and the new probe does have a very nice 'rigid condom' fitting that keeps the probe wet. I just checked the probe after about 6 months of inactivity and its still full of storage solution. More regular use will have no problem. Thanks to Milwaukee for configuring a durable system.

 

[Buckeye_Hydro]

Our Milwaukee MW102 is on sale to HBT peeps only. Use coupon code HBT MW102 for $15 off.

Russ

 

[RufusBrewer]

If you find a recipe that includes water treatment, ignore it, unless you know you are starting with the same water source. The recipe author's source water profile might be the same or different from your source water profile. If you match their treatment without verification, you are just guessing.

If the author uses distilled or reverse osmosis source and you are using the same, you can follow their recipe.

FWIW, For brewing purposes, I consider RO water and distilled water to be equal. If and when I trust water labeled RO is true RO.

However, you are strongly advised to run the treatment and recipe through a water calculator as a double check.

 

[earachemyeye69]

Been controlling my mash PH and getting 5.2-5.4 consistently but then read something on the internet that says I need to also adjust sparge water. I assumed the starch to sugar conversion was complete and didn’t need to worry about it. My fermentation SG seems to finish higher than I’d like.
Possible cause or am I just crazy?

 

[doug293cz]

Been controlling my mash PH and getting 5.2-5.4 consistently but then read something on the internet that says I need to also adjust sparge water. I assumed the starch to sugar conversion was complete and didn’t need to worry about it. My fermentation SG seems to finish higher than I’d like.
Possible cause or am I just crazy?

The reason for acidifying the sparge water is to prevent alkalinity in the sparge water from raising the grain bed pH above about 6, which in combination with high temps can extract tannins and silicates. RO or distilled water does not need acidification for sparging, as it has no alkalinity, so cannot raise the pH during sparging.

Brew on

 

[RM-MN]

The reason for acidifying the sparge water is to prevent alkalinity in the sparge water from raising the grain bed pH above about 6, which in combination with high temps can extract tannins and silicates. RO or distilled water does not need acidification for sparging, as it has no alkalinity, so cannot raise the pH during sparging.

Brew on

It does take a high temperature of sparge water to extract meaningful tannins so sparge with cool water and you avoid that problem. Cool water will extract nearly the same sugars from the mash as hot water.

 

[jerrylotto]

Admittedly I only scanned this thread but I'm really surprised that I did not see any mention of Campden (potassium or sodium metabisulfite) to oxidize free chlorine and chloramines to chloride ion. If you use tap water from any municipal source, you are going to find some there as a sterilization agent and it plays havoc with yeast. If you use distilled, RO or well water, you probably don't need to worry about this.

 

[Jag75]

For what it's worth I use Bru n water. I use RO water 100% on some brews or a dilution of tap and RO and the program always calls for treating my sparge water .

 

[day_trippr]

I do 100% RO and fly sparge and agree Bru'n Water still recommends adjustments for both strike and sparge liquors...

Cheers!

 

[mabrungard]

I do 100% RO and fly sparge and agree Bru'n Water still recommends adjustments for both strike and sparge liquors...

Cheers!

Treating both mashing and sparging water is the 'default' approach in Bru'n Water, but you can employ alternate approaches in which salt adjustments are added at other points in the brewing process. The one thing that should not be skipped, is that the alkalinity of both the mashing and sparging water MUST be adjusted to end up with a good brewing outcome. If you're starting with very low alkalinity water like RO or distilled, that need may be reduced.

 

[scogan]

While I agree with everything in the original post , if you dont get your pH spot on you dont get full extraction and miss the og by ,but probably but only a bit .
Obviously better to maximise your grains but a small loss might not have a massive impact on the final taste ???
Having written this I have just bought a pH meter and in 48 hrs my first ever assessment of mash ph will be done ,though i am going to add 2.5g of citric acid (its all I have on hand) even before I measure it based on my alkalinity .