RO Water

[Arbe0]

Just wondering .. What do you RO water users add to RO water for a light beer like a Pilsner, FestBier, or Marsen?

 

[Magnus314]

Calcium Chloride and if I want it malty, NaCl also.

 

[Yooper]

Just wondering .. What do you RO water users add to RO water for a light beer like a Pilsner, FestBier, or Marsen?

For lagers, I don't add anything usually but 5 grams of calcium chloride won't hurt if you want to use it.

 

[Arbe0]

so just using the RO water for light lagers works for you? And I am assuming that the 5 grams of calcium chloride is for 5 gallon batch?
What does the NaCl (salt ) do for the beer?

 

[augustgarage]

Generally, I'd keep water adjustments to a minimum for these types of beers - I would add Calcium Chloride (maybe 1.2 grams per gallon of brewing water) depending on the style, and use sauermalz or lactic acid in the mash to get pH down to a reasonable place.

I've heard some brewers get good results with just straight RO water even, but I haven't done a comparison yet with my own system.

I think malt selection, mash temps/techniques, hop schedule, and fermentation management are all much more important for most continental-style lagers...

 

[Arbe0]

last year I started brewing lagers, had a Marsen that did ok in a local competition with filtered city water, a little gypsum, Ward labs, Brun water and Ez water calculaters. I just would like to try out the RO water to try to get it to be a better beer. With a little help from all you guys I am sure I will reach my goal.

 

[Magnus314]

What does the NaCl (salt ) do for the beer?

Calcium for mash efficiency and yeast health. Chloride and Sodium for malty-ness, malt sweetness, and fullness.

 

[Yooper]

last year I started brewing lagers, had a Marsen that did ok in a local competition with filtered city water, a little gypsum, Ward labs, Brun water and Ez water calculaters. I just would like to try out the RO water to try to get it to be a better beer. With a little help from all you guys I am sure I will reach my goal.

For most German style lagers, or at least beers with noble hops, you want to leave out the gypsum or at least minimize it. The sulfate sort of makes the noble hops sort of harsh.

You could add some calcium chloride, to increase the calcium to 40 ppm or so, but it's not necessary. It will also help to decrease the mash pH, so it could be useful in that way as well. If you target a mash pH of 5.3-5.4, you should be all set.

 

[sky4meplease]

Just wondering .. What do you RO water users add to RO water for a light beer like a Pilsner, FestBier, or Marsen?

For extract or all grain?

If for extract everything you need should be in the extract itself otherwise for all grain some minor additions would be helpful.
For all grain try a calculator like Brewers Friend and play around with the additions.
Additionally, think about using a yeast nutrient with R/O water and all grain. There are a few things missing from R/O water that you won't get from the grain that are beneficial to the yeast.

 

[Arbe0]

what do you guys think about using the 5.2 yeast stabilizer? Would it be beneficial in RO water?

 

[mabrungard]

what do you guys think about using the 5.2 yeast stabilizer? Would it be beneficial in RO water?

If you were brewing a dark beer, it could be helpful. But for the typical pale lager, it would be a terrible addition.

For delicate lagers, adding about 0.2 grams/gal calcium chloride is helpful to keeping the water in the background, but not bland. If you want the beer a little bit drier in the finish, changing that to 0.1 gram/gal each of calcium chloride and gypsum is effective.

These are really low addition rates that keep calcium nice and low. To boost the calcium in the mash to help with oxalate removal, calculating the total additions based on the mashing and sparging water volume and then adding all the salts to the mash will help.

 

[Aotidae]

This is my cheat sheet after scouring the internet and reading several books.

View attachment Brewing Water Recommendations When Using R.xml