Water report

[gdtechvw]

What do you guys think?

Ph 7.8
Tds. 630
Sodium na. 89
Potassium 2
Calcium 114
Magnesium 21
Total hardness caco3 373
Nitrate. 2
Sulfate. 71
Chloride. 93
Carbonate <1
Bicarbonate. 280
Total alkalinity caco3. 230

So I was messing around on bru’n water and for a simple DIPA grain bill I can added 1lb of acid malt (7%) to reach 5.4 ph in the mash and 5.9ml latic acid to the sparge water to get to 6.0 ph. Is that to much latic acid. Will the flavor come through?

Any help is appreciated. I’m still trying to figure all this out and want to know if this water is worth it or if I should get RO or distilled water

[chuck]

I’m not a water expert but man that is some hard water. Never use distilled water cutting it with RO water is the best way to go.
Using too much lactic acid will give you some off flavors that you will not like. I’ll step aside and let one of the other guys help you.
I also do not treat my sparge water any more since the mash is say 5.2 and it should stay there.

[mabrungard]

That is highly mineralized water and could be problematic for brewing many styles. The main problem is the alkalinity and you noted that you are adding 7% acid malt. That would almost certainly be notable in the flavor. A better alternative is to dilute that tap water substantially (say 1 to 1) with RO or distilled water. That will bring all ions down to reasonable levels and give you room to adjust those ion totals. If dilution is not feasible for you, moving to neutralizing the bicarbonate with phosphoric acid would present less off-flavor in the finished beer than using acid malt or lactic acid.

[gdtechvw]

Thanks for the help guys. I figured I would have to cut the water but wanted to check what you guys think is the best way to go.

[gdtechvw]

@mabrungard

That is highly mineralized water and could be problematic for brewing many styles. The main problem is the alkalinity and you noted that you are adding 7% acid malt. That would almost certainly be notable in the flavor. A better alternative is to dilute that tap water substantially (say 1 to 1) with RO or distilled water. That will bring all ions down to reasonable levels and give you room to adjust those ion totals. If dilution is not feasible for you, moving to neutralizing the bicarbonate with phosphoric acid would present less off-flavor in the finished beer than using acid malt or lactic acid.

If i dilute the tap water 50/50 I can drop the acid malt to 3.5% to get to 5.4 mash ph. Will that be low enough to not effect the flavor of the beer?

[mabrungard]

[quote=“gdtechvw”]

If i dilute the tap water 50/50 I can drop the acid malt to 3.5% to get to 5.4 mash ph. Will that be low enough to not effect the flavor of the beer?[/quote]

That brings the bicarbonate content to around 140 ppm and that level is not likely to incur a lactic twang from the acid malt.

[gdtechvw]

Cool thanks for the help. I am going to brew this weekend and have never messed with my water before, I’m interested how it will effect the final product.

[gdtechvw]

Do u guys think I should cut my sparge water 50/50 also?

[mabrungard]

@gdtechvw

Do u guys think I should cut my sparge water 50/50 also?

Absolutely. High alkalinity in the sparging water is a very bad thing. On top of that, reducing the overall mineral content of that water would help avoid minerally flavor that this water might have.

[kcbeersnob]

[quote=“chuck”]Never use distilled water cutting it with RO water is the best way to go.
[/quote]
Chuck - can you elaborate on this? Personally I don’t see a reason to use one over the other, unless one is less expensive.

[gdtechvw]

Cool thanks guys for all the help. Gonna fire up the kettle in a few, hope this helps the final product!

[silentknyght]

[quote=“kcbeersnob”][quote=“chuck”]Never use distilled water cutting it with RO water is the best way to go.
[/quote]
Chuck - can you elaborate on this? Personally I don’t see a reason to use one over the other, unless one is less expensive.[/quote]

Ditto. RO water is going to be only very marginally mineralized, whereas DI will have zero. I think Martin’s spreadsheet even has some default values for RO water, and it has only a little effect on the outcome of the water profile. Just by the numbers, they should be about the same.

I’m interested to hear why you recommend RO over DI.

[bhanson]

You can precipitate some of the calcium by pre-boiling your mash water, and then letting it settle. Boiling drives off the CO2, which holds calcium in solution, and it precipitates as chalk.

http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/f ... pic=5792.0

[ken_lenard]

In this case, distilled water is the way to go because you want the biggest bang for your dilution buck and distilled water is zeroes across the board. If you had RO where all of the water ions were very close to zero, that would be fine. But with numbers this high (TDS of 630 and Na of 89 along with bicarb of 280! Holy smokes!), dilution is necessary. My TDS is 264 and my bicarb is 138 and if I make a delicate pale beer like helles, pilsner, blonde or cream ale, American wheat, etc., I dilute 75% or more with distilled.