Understanding My Water Report

[mcurtis431]

I have always used city water for brewing without water treatments and seem to brew pretty good beers. As with any hobby, I am trying to take it to the next level. I would like to continue using city water, but am curious as to what additions may or may not be needed.

I requested a water report from the city (Cumming, GA) and this is what i received:

Calcium and Magnesium are measured as Hardness and its 19.0mg CaCO
Sodium 4.1 mg/L
Chloride and Sulfate come from water source and will show up in hardness, which we have
non detected in the water but it can be a problem in water from a hot water heater
Alkalinity and pH will vary leaving the production Plant Alk 8.0 --12.0
pH 7.0 - -7.50

The Bru'N Water spreadsheet requires individual values for Ca and Mg, however I was only given the hardness value.

Can someone smarter than me help? I'm just trying to define a baseline at the moment.

 

[friarsmith]

Hit this link, then CTRL-F and scoll through all the ", GA" to find towns close to you, or areas that share your water source.

http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/water-profiles/

This should get you pretty close. The profile listed for Cumming looks to be incomplete. If you don't get any responses, perhaps start a new thread entitled "Alpharetta/Cumming/Forsyth etc water profile needed" There's bound to be a helpful homebrewer in your area.

For a more precise evaluation, get a Brewer's Test from Ward Labs. You fill and send a 16oz bottle, and they'll send a pdf email in a week or two with a complete breakdown.

http://wardlab.com/FeeSchedule/WardLabs_FeeSchedule_Web.pdf#page=10

 

[mabrungard]

Cumming water is from Lake Lanier. Most of the Atlanta metro area uses that source. It is soft and lightly mineralized. Do some searching and you should get pretty close.

 

[ajdelange]

Calcium and Magnesium are measured as Hardness and its 19.0mg CaCO


The Bru'N Water spreadsheet requires individual values for Ca and Mg, however I was only given the hardness value.

If separate values are given for magnesium hardness and calcium hardness divide each by 50. Multiply the result for magnesium by 12.15. That is the mg/L magnesium. Multiply the calcium result by 20. That is the mg/L calcium.

If only the total hardness is given then you really can't know what the separate calcium and magnesium ion concentrations are so the best you can do is guess that say 2/3 (a typical number) of the total hardness is from calcium and the rest from magnesium. Making this assumption

[Ca] = (2/3)*19*20/50
[Mg] = (1/3)*19*12.15/50

Clearly the guy who sent you the info doesn't know what he is talking about as hardnesses are measured 'as CaCO3' and sulfate do not 'show up in hardness' nor are they problems for water heaters (its the calcium bicarbonate that is the problem there) so the advice to get an outside (Ward Labs) analysis done is probably good.