Water Chem for new electric brewer

[Mreagan79]

Hey all,
New to HBT but I have been brewing for almost 4 years and just completed a garage makeover that houses 3, 20 gallon pots with a 50 amp control panel running a HERMS system. My first run will be in a few weeks with the new electric system and am wondering how to add salts to my water previous to the mash in. Do I have to no sparge and just use one round of water? I know you can add salts directly to the mash when doing water calcs in Bru n Water but I am just curious if anyone has any other ideas? I have also thought about using the boil kettle for water simultaneously but don't know if it's necessary. Thanks!

 

[CadiBrewer]

I make up all my water in the HLT and add all of the salts except for what goes only in the mash, like baking soda. I then heat it. I put my grain in the MLT and add the salts to the dry grain. I then underlet the grain with water and stir like crazy before I start recirculating.

 

[stonebrewer]

+1 to how CadiBrewer does it.

 

[BrunDog]

You can add all of your salts to the mash. Just pay attention to the mash pH and your resulting water profile (ultimate flavor) going into the BK. I do this as I sparge with RO only.

 

[Mreagan79]

So Cadi,
I think I a bit confused... are you heating the water in the HLT and adding the salts to the heated water and then pumping the treated water to underlet your grains? If so are you then refilling the HLT and having to reheat that to recirculate or am I misunderstanding? Thanks and sorry for all of the questions.

 

[mabrungard]

Even with the salts mixed into the dry grains, there is little chance that the ionic content will be as well-distributed as if you had first dissolved those salts into the water and added that to the dry grain. Add all the salts to each batch of water and you will be better off. The pH in the mash will be more even with this approach.

 

[CadiBrewer]

I agree, Martin, but I like to underlet my grain bed because it gets rid of dough balls and makes mixing really easy. Maybe I need to pump my dough in water to my BK and then add the baking soda or lime, then pump to my MLT.

 

[Dcpcooks]

I heat my hlt and my strike water and adjust the liquor before dough in. Since your under letting your mash I would heat and treat the mash liquor in the boil kettle, then transfer it via your pump to the mash tun. If you follow the primer in the science section you'll see they recommend treating all the water ( mash and sparge) the same.

I think this is the easiest and shortest way to get it done. You can heat your hlt and herms water to your mash temp and you can simultaneously heat your strike water to dough in temps. Since all your water is at the temps you need you don't need to refill your hlt and get it back up to temps for your herms coil to be effective.

So I start my brew day by heating both kettles to their temps, I mill the grain while everything is heating up. I may make some PBW and star San and by then I'm ready to dough in and brew! Good luck on the new system!

 

[Mreagan79]

Thank dcpcooks! That makes sense to me. Thank you everyone else for sharing. Still learning this new process.