Water Question -- again
John Oberley
across state lines here in Kansas City, and will have a totally
different source for water in the new location. I've done a little work
based on John Palmer's "How To Brew" water information, but I'm looking
for reassurance as much as anything.
The water analysis isn't complete, but I include everything they have
online here. Please note that there are two water plants, and these
numbers are an average of the two, which in most cases are fairly close
to one another. All readings are ppm unless otherwise noted.
Alkalinity as CaCO3 -- 96.3
Calcium -- 44
Chloride -- 70
Magnesium -- ND
pH -- 7.5
Sulfate -- 94.5
Total Hardness - 157.5
No reading for Sodium or bicarbonate.
Now, if I'm reading Palmer correctly, my Alk as CaCO3 can be used to
obtain my bicarbonate by dividing by 50, then multiplying by 61? That
gives me roughly 117.5 ppm HCO3. No idea what the sodium content is,
however.
So here's where I want the reassurance. I used Palmer's graph, and came
up with about 5.8 pH in a 100% base malt mash. Would that mean that,
say, a half pound of crystal, or an ounce or two of chocolate <should I
be so inclined> in a pale ale would be enough dark malt to bring me into
mash pH without fiddling with salts? 117.5 bicarbonate doesn't seem high
in comparison with published water profiles of other cities. In fact, I
gather my water is fairly close to the commonly published water profile
for London, but higher in both sulfates and especially chloride. Would
that both accentuate and yet round out hop bitterness? Does my "non-
detectable" magnesium reading make it necessary for me to add some sort
of yeast nutrient, or will the little beasties get what they need from
the malt? Should I boost calcium, and if so, how can I without boosting
already slightly elevated sulfates or chlorides? In general, can I make
a decent gold to amber to copper pale ale or bitter without mucking
around with my water?
I'm still new at the water stuff, so please forgive all the questions.
I'm certainly not worried about it, since I brewed with Kansas City
municipal water and made decent beer. I'm just trying to learn a bit
more so I have a better understanding of the hobby and all that goes
into it. Thanks in advance for any input!
--
---
John
---
Please remove all "stains" from e-mail address before replying
---
Deja Fu: The feeling that somehow, somewhere,
you've been kicked in the head like this before.
garyK
butt. My water, which is really high in bicarbonates, is hard to
correct. I finally said screw it. For the last 3 all-grain batches,
I bought distilled water and added all of the salts that I needed. I
use BeerSmith and a mineral chart for the beer style that I am brewing
at the time. This method is not cheap, $16 extra per 10 gallon batch,
but it works great and is well worth the extra money.
gary
John Oberley <jobe...@yaSTAINShoo.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.1aefa0123...@news-server.kc.rr.com>...
riverkeeper
>
> Calcium -- 44
> Chloride -- 70
> Magnesium -- ND
> pH -- 7.5
> Sulfate -- 94.5
> Total Hardness - 157.5
> John
> ---
John, Magnesium is necessary to yeast in extremely small quantities.
The grist will supply it.
Tim
Tom Meier
You can get rid of your alkalinity by pre=boiling or adding slaked
lime. Of the two preboiling is easiest, just add a teaspoon of CaCl
to get excess Ca for seeding it and aerate while it boils
Or, just buy an RO water filter, it will pay for itself in less than
10 batches.
Tom Meier
I calculate your residual alkalinity as
Residual Alkalinity (RA) = Alkalinity - Ca x 0.714 - Mg x
0.585
where alkalinities are in ppm as CaCO3, Ca in ppm, and Mg in ppm
RA = 64.9 (ph shift of +0.11)
This means you are slightly on the alkaline side when compared to
Munich and Edinburgh water, so amber to dark beers would be perfect.
Here is a rough graph I created to correlate residual alkalinity with
the usual SRM (color) or world water supplies, you can still make good
beer with water outside these ranges, but maybe not world class, and
you might have to wait a while for it to convert..
http://personal.atl.bellsouth.net/m/e/meier331/Alkalinity/SRMvsRA.htm
Keep in mind John Palmer's pH calc is only good for 100% pilsner
malts!
Even pale ale malt will help lower the pH below what it predicts due
to its slightly higher kiln.
The old brewer's rule of thumb is to keep the RA below 50 for 100%
pale
malt mashes, so you'd probably need to cut with distilled water for a
pilsner.
Your sulfate and chloride are both so high, it is not ideal to add
CaCl or gypsum to adjust your mash pH. Better to cut with distilled,
which would also dilute them out.
50% distilled lowers your RA to 32 (pH shift of +.055), BUT at the
expense of the calcium level, which should ideally be 50-100ppm to
prolong mash enzyme life. They denature easier in low Calcium mashes.
I'd risk adding back in enough CaCl to bump up the calcium ppm a
little.
You have good water for just about anything from amber ales to
porters. All but the driest stout and palest beer will be fine with
no additions.
-Tom Meier
garyK
expensive, plus you don't really know the final mineral content of the
water after the boil unless you have it tested.
A fellow homebrewer has an RO system, but they don't produce
mineral-less water so again you don't know the water's mineral content
either. For $16 my method is well worth it.
What I really need to do is find a source of wholesale, bulk distilled
water instead of buying it at the grocery store. And I need to reduce
my water consumption. I use 20 gallons for a 10 gallon batch!!! :(
gary
omom...@excite.com (Tom Meier) wrote in message news:<3bc034bc.04042...@posting.google.com>...
Christopher S. Swingley
> I calculate your residual alkalinity as Residual Alkalinity (RA) =
> Alkalinity - Ca x 0.714 - Mg x 0.585
> where alkalinities are in ppm as CaCO3, Ca in ppm, and Mg in ppm
> RA = 64.9 (ph shift of +0.11)
I use the following equations when contemplating water treatment for a
particular brew. It's a pretty coarse approach (the style is defined by
the color), but it works well:
* Calculate residual alkalinity, as Tom posted above:
RA = Alk - 0.7 Ca - 0.6 Mg
* Calculate what you'd like the RA to be in order for the mash pH
to be appropriate:
Desired_RA = 5.6 x color - 50
* With my water, I've usually got too much residual alkalinity, so I
first see how much Calcium I'd need to add:
(RA - Desired_RA) x 0.7
* Then I see how much gypsym I'd need to get that level of Calcium,
and determine how much SO4 will be added (1 gram of gypsum adds
244 ppm Ca and 588 ppm SO4 to 1 quart of water). If that level of
sulfate isn't appropriate for the style (i.e. it's not a
british-style ale of some sort), I reduce the gypsum addition and
determine how much lactic acid I'll need to make up the
difference:
lactic acid = quarts water x (RA - (Desired_RA + (0.7 x Ca)))
(ml 88%) --------------------------------
559
(a combination of these four steps is possible by solving this
equation):
559 (mL acid)
------------- = Alk - 0.7 x Ca - 0.6 x Mg - 5.6 x Color + 50
water (quarts)
where Alk, Ca and Mg are in ppm, and Color is degrees SRM.
* For the rare case where I don't have enough alkalinity, this can
be fixed by adding calcium carbonate (chalk) or baking soda. This
equation estimates how much carbonate needs to be added:
(Desired_RA - RA) x 0.82
And if you used calcium carbonate, you'd need to account for the
calcium you were adding (so overall you're increasing the
alkalinity, but not as much as you might think at first).
The purpose of all this is to get your mash pH in the right range. The
darker color typically comes from roasted grains which help acidify the
mash. Most of these formulas are from standard sources (HBD, Palmer,
this newsgroup). The Desired_RA equation is a straight line fit of
Palmer's nomographs, and is a different way of expressing the graph Tom
posted:
> http://personal.atl.bellsouth.net/m/e/meier331/Alkalinity/SRMvsRA.htm
All of this is for your mash water only. If the "flavor" salts (SO4,
Cl, Na) need adjustment, you'd also want to treat the sparge water. So
I often add gypsum to my sparge water to make my water taste more like
Burton water might.
Chris
--
Christopher S. Swingley email: cswi...@iarc.uaf.edu
Intl. Arctic Research Center Please use encryption. GPG key at:
University of Alaska Fairbanks www.frontier.iarc.uaf.edu/~cswingle/