Water Chemistry-Use Home water or buy distilled

[kmb21]

Hey all,

I've had about 7 all grain recipes under my belt, and I feel like my dark colored beers come out with better quality than the lighter beers with how might my pH and alkalinity is. With as high as some of these numbers are would you consider cutting water in half and using distilled or using all distilled from the beginning which is something I have not done yet. I haven't played with adding salts or lactic acid because of my inexperience, just looking for a place to start/any recommendations. Water report is below. I am looking to make a NEIPA/hazy IPA next. I appreciate all the help!

 

[Jag75]

I found the same thing when it comes to dark beers . They come out great and the lighter beers not great . I started using Bru N Water and building water profiles using RO water . So much easier then trying to adjust my water .

 

[flyfishorbrew]

I'm very far from an expert on water chemistry which is exactly why I started buying distilled water and building my profiles from there. My water report didn't look a ton different than yours (although your bicarbonate is much higher). You can mess around with cutting it in half with distilled RO water but at that point, you may as well just go all RO/distilled. It's much easier to start from a blank slate, in my opinion, than try to adjust from your profile, and even then I think you might not be able to adjust to all the water profiles you may want.

I started buying two 5 gallon jugs of Primo since that's what I have available closest to me and going from there. It's a bit of a pain, and maybe one day I'll have my own RO system, but I immediately got beer that was better than when I was trying to adjust my water.

 

[kmb21]

I found the same thing when it comes to dark beers . They come out great and the lighter beers not great . I started using Bru N Water and building water profiles using RO water . So much easier then trying to adjust my water .

Thank you appreciate the insight!

 

[kmb21]

I'm very far from an expert on water chemistry which is exactly why I started buying distilled water and building my profiles from there. My water report didn't look a ton different than yours (although your bicarbonate is much higher). You can mess around with cutting it in half with distilled RO water but at that point, you may as well just go all RO/distilled. It's much easier to start from a blank slate, in my opinion, than try to adjust from your profile, and even then I think you might not be able to adjust to all the water profiles you may want.

I started buying two 5 gallon jugs of Primo since that's what I have available closest to me and going from there. It's a bit of a pain, and maybe one day I'll have my own RO system, but I immediately got beer that was better than when I was trying to adjust my water.

thanks for this, I think I will probably just try this route for my next batch considering I would like to make a few lighter beers. I appreciate you input and time!

 

[Tom Foolery]

After comparing your water profile to a balanced profile I found online.. Cutting your water in half with distilled would be a good place to start. Sans a RO system.

 

[jdauria]

With Ward Labs, you need to multiply the SO4-S by 3 to get Sulfate (SO4)...so that puts Sulfate at 51, Chloride at 88...so that gives you a 0.58 Sulfate/Chloride ration, which = very full or very malt.y. So no surprise that your dark beers come out better than your lighter (and presumed hoppier) beers. You sodium is pretty high too in my opinion. As Tom said above, I would at least cut your water in half with distilled or RO water.

My water is horrible, with Chloride at 165 and sodium at 99...both too high for me. So I have been using 100% distilled or RO for years. With Covid this year, instead of going to stores and dealing with limits on water, I signed up with a water company and get RO water delivered every two weeks.

 

[Holden Caulfield]

Your bicarbonates (alkalinity) are extremely high amongst other things and your water is poor for brewing light and amber colored beers unless you add quite a bit of acid. Even cutting it in half with RO water will still make it poor for brewing paler beers. You may want to considered using 100% RO (just buy from one of the supermarket vending machines - about $1.50 for 5 gals) and build you water up from there. It won't cost you much more and you will end up with much better water for brewing paler styles. There are many calculators that can help you with the salts to add - Brun Water, MashMadeEasy, etc.

 

[mabrungard]

Your water presents evidence of being drawn from an aquifer with sodium bicarbonate. It's not an ideal brewing water, but might work for some styles. If you would like to explore a wide variety of beer styles and you want them to have a chance of coming out well...you should consider an alternate water for brewing.

 

[KDogg]

I am pretty new to brewing, and had only brewed with my friend who had many more batches under his belt. That said, we planned a NEIPA kit and my reading confirmed what you all know, water quality matters most for certain beers, this being one of them. I urged him to splurge on a large Costco barrel of water and also had him not simply add a gas station bag of ice to cool the wort, further adding to the poor overall water quality. I think those were solid recommendations from a n00b and he's been more water quality conscious since. That area of Minnesota has hard water and I think the beer turned out fantastic by not using the tap water. I have to think it was the difference maker (biased as I am). Cheers!

 

[wallyLOZ]

I've switched to distilled water after struggling to get the profile right with an ever changing water profile from tap water. Results were greatly improved right out of the gate.

 

[kmb21]

Appreciate the advice from all of you! Looking forward to my next batch!

 

[bu_gee]

Mabrungard is the man when it comes to water quality and he's behind the Bru N Water just in case you missed it in his sig block. I use it to plan out all of my brews these days. It has made a huge difference in the flavor outcomes and the mash efficiencies that I get and I can't give Martin enough credit for that.

I have pretty hard water, although only about half your total alkalinity, but in general I like how it tastes after it has been filtered so I have wanted to use it for any beer that I can get away with and it is 100% fine for darker beers. For brewing lighter beers I will mix my filtered tap water with distilled water and the calculator helps me figure out the sweet spot in the ratio so that I don't have to build up all of the minerals from zero that I would otherwise have to if I used 100% distilled or RO. It also doesn't hurt that I'm a fan of lower IBUs and the lower mineral levels for whichever is responsible for that just happens to work out for me.

I should point out that I like to tinker with spreadsheets so messing with it for an hour (or several) to perfect the mix is fun for me. You'll have to decide how you feel about that. If that isn't your thing, once you get the hang of it you can definitely get a good setup reasonably quickly, especially if you don't want to tinker with ratios.