Just wondering how you guys measure your brewing salt additions.
I’m finally going to try my best to correct my water for each brew,
Short/story/long, my water comes out of my cistern, which is filled with a random mix of rain water and water that I haul and put into it 350 gallons at a time.
So my best shot is to start from scratch, distilled.
I think I now have everything I need salt wise, calcium (chloride, carbonate, and sulfate), epsom salt, baking soda, chalk.
I finally got some colorphast strips, and also a # of acidulated malt to add as needed. And I always use Wyeast nutrient.
I’m trying to “clone” pilsener water, and the PPM are so small.
I realize that this is only going to be so hard for this specific type of water, the PPM per gallon are going to be hard/ expensive to measure at 1/10 of a gram. I can understand the chart at How To Brew as to how much 1 teaspoon adds how many PPM to 1 gallon of water.
But when were talking 1/8 or 1/16 teaspoon, thats like 1/10 of a gram,1/20 of a gram, is it better to have a scale with enough resolution to measure that or do you guys use a nice set of spoons that go that small ?
Just bought a mill too, so this is already $6.50/ 12 oz pils. Stupid money saving hobby.
I use a reloading scale that weighs in grains. 15.4 grains to the gram.
I use EZ Water 3.0 for calculations
and this scale
Oh, well, $9 isn’t bad at all.
Stupid money saving hobby, just need to know where to google look. 
I use a set of Acculab PP-250B scales to weigh salts.
[quote=“gregscsu”]I use EZ Water 3.0 for calculations
and this scale
Holy crap, that looks like an impressive scale for $9! I must’ve spent like $25 for the basic Escali scale that measures with 1gm resolution, but weighing salts on it even at 1gm increments is very shaky.
Like many things (data converters and audio equipment come to mind), I guess the real limiting factor is the dynamic range, and since the Escali can weigh up to 10# or so, makes sense that the resolution is not as good. Still, on paper that’s still a better scale for about 1/3 the cost!
[quote=“rustyhoover”][quote=“gregscsu”]I use EZ Water 3.0 for calculations
and this scale
Holy crap, that looks like an impressive scale for $9! I must’ve spent like $25 for the basic Escali scale that measures with 1gm resolution, but weighing salts on it even at 1gm increments is very shaky.
Like many things (data converters and audio equipment come to mind), I guess the real limiting factor is the dynamic range, and since the Escali can weigh up to 10# or so, makes sense that the resolution is not as good. Still, on paper that’s still a better scale for about 1/3 the cost![/quote]
This scale maxes out at 2.25 Lbs, so it is really only useful for salts and hops and other small items.
Sure, but that’s pretty much all I use my scale for anyway. Wish I’d known about this baby a few months back!
Also, it might be a PITA if you had to do it all the time, but for the odd occasion where I might want to measure several pounds of grain or whatever, it wouldn’t be so bad to just do it in increments of 2# or so 8)
Thats why I have two different sets of scales. One for hops/salts, one for grain. I don’t need anything slowing down my brewday.
Thanks guys.
Looks like a nice scale for the price with a lot of good reviews, I ordered one.
I’m going to give that EZ spreadsheet a shot, I think I can figure it out.
Anything else that I might be missing that I’ll need to build distilled water?
Gram scale.
This. Also, don’t go nuts. 3x Ninkasi winner Gordon Strong talked about this in his book. I’m paraphrasing here, but he basically said that water chemistry isn’t an exact science, so you’re wasting your time if you measure out everything to .0001 or 100% accurately. Just be reasonably consistent and adjust from batch-to-batch using your palate.
Personally, I use a $10 gram scale I got on eBay that measures to .01 grams. It’s kind of a POS with its sensitivity to weight change, but it works. I had a better one that I got from NB a few years back that was closer to $30. I liked that scale more, but it broke.
One last note, I have two scales. One for malt, one for hops/salts. The malt scale is “accurate” to 1 gram, the hops/salts scale is “accurate” to .01 gram. Quoting those because it’s BS, again, so long as it’s consistent.
[quote=“Scott Miller”]Thanks guys.
I’m going to give that EZ spreadsheet a shot[/quote]
Take look at this one, too…https://sites.google.com/site/brunwater/ . I tried pretty much everything out there and found Bru’nwater to be the most accurate. It also includes some great general info about water. It’s written by a professional water engineer who does work for several large breweries.
For what it’s worth I recently started building my brewing water from RO water and I’ve been using the same American Weigh scale the OP ordered and the Bru’n Water application in Denny’s link. It’s been several batches now and so far so good, the scale seems to work pretty well and I really like Bru’n Water.
I use a triple beam balance I’ve had for years.
