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Post #26 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
deebo wrote:A few quick questions I hope are relevant:
1. What does a carbon water filter change in your water exactly? (I know they reduce chlorine, but was wondering what, if any, adjustments would need to be made from the local water report)
2. Does anyone know if the grays distilled water in the supermarket is suitable for brewing?
3. I read someplace that temperature effects ph? How much of a difference does this make, should I be taking mash ph of the cooled liquid or at mash temp?
1)Pretty sure it won't affect any of the brewing-related stuff (bicarbonate, calcium, magnesium).
2)Distilled water, without any additions of salts, is unsuitable. Distilled water is void of the essential minerals needed for different processes (enzyme activity, yeast health/function, and others).
3)The word on the street says 0.3 pH units decrease at mash temps vs. room temp. If you're using a meter, you could be shortening the life of the electrode by using it at elevated temps. Definitely measure at room temp.
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 14 Mar 2012, 10:43, edited 3 times in total.

Post #27 made 12 years ago
by deebo
Thanks for the quick reply.

Regarding the distilled water I was going to make the salt additions but was mainly not sure if this particular brand that seems commonly available in Australia is suitable (Just did a bit of a search and it is apparently de-ionised water, even though it has distilled on the label) http://modelsteam.myfreeforum.org/archi ... 16490.html

Edit found msds and discussion on ahb which says it isnt intended for human consumption so I think i will avoid that one.. SWALLOWED: Not harmful if swallowed although the product is not intended for human consumption.

Post #28 made 12 years ago
by kostass
Amazing post, I really like when experiments like that happen, especially when BIAB is such a "new" technique compared to traditional brewing and hasn't been tasted that much...

Post #29 made 12 years ago
by Yeasty
I've just recieved one of these Here and tested my RA in my tap water.. It returned a result of around 22 ppm CaCO3 which is pretty low. infact it only took 2 drops of reagent to change the colour. I used This to convert my readings.

As a point of interest I had done this before with a different make of test kit and got the same result but I wasn't confident with these because my water supply company had previously quoted RA as 47.98 CaCO3. Twice the figures I was getting. :think: I'm happier with this new kit as it seems to be well proven in brewing circles and comes with a bottle of check solution so you can practice your technique on a known quantity.

One thing on the Carbon filter Question: I think they will remove certain metals and as Calcium and Magnesium are metals which are good for your brew I would research this further.

Yeasty
Last edited by Yeasty on 14 Mar 2012, 20:31, edited 3 times in total.
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Post #30 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
Yeasty wrote:I've just recieved one of these Here and tested my RA in my tap water.. It returned a result of around 22 ppm CaCO3 which is pretty low. infact it only took 2 drops of reagent to change the colour. I used This to convert my readings.
Was the measured alkalinity from the test 22 ppm as CaCO3, or did you calculate a RA of 22 using Ca and Mg concentrations from your water report? Or does this kit measure Ca and Mg in addition to alkalinity?
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 15 Mar 2012, 00:43, edited 3 times in total.

Post #31 made 12 years ago
by Yeasty
BrickBrewHaus wrote:Was the measured alkalinity from the test 22 ppm as CaCO3, or did you calculate a RA of 22 using Ca and Mg concentrations from your water report? Or does this kit measure Ca and Mg in addition to alkalinity?
:argh: :argh: :headhit: :headhit: :dunno: The first one !!! fecking talking water always makes my head hurt :lol:

The kit has a bottle of indicator that you add to your sample, to this you add a measured amount of reagent until you get a colour change. The amount od reagent is then compared to a chart giving either a KH value in dKH or Alkalinity in meq/L.
I then used the calculator as per the link to give me the CaCO3 value.

Hope that was what you were asking ..?
Last edited by Yeasty on 15 Mar 2012, 01:03, edited 3 times in total.
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Post #33 made 12 years ago
by Yeasty
BrickBrewHaus wrote:Yep, just making sure you weren't confusing alkalinity with residual alkalinity, they are different things. Once you account for Ca and Mg, your RA will be less than 22, really low.
So your saying if my Tested RA is 22ppm CaCO3 it will be effected even more by the Ca and Mg..any good links ?
Last edited by Yeasty on 15 Mar 2012, 04:33, edited 3 times in total.
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Post #34 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
Yeasty wrote:So your saying if my Tested RA is 22ppm CaCO3 it will be effected even more by the Ca and Mg..any good links ?
Sorry, shoulda been more specific...The thing that you're testing with that test kit is ALKALINITY. Alkalinity is different from RESIDUAL ALKALINITY (RA).

Residual Alkalinity is calculated by taking the alkalinity of your water and subtracting the effects of Ca and Mg. Read Section 2.0 here.

Not much time here. Ask more ?s if you have em.
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 15 Mar 2012, 04:50, edited 3 times in total.

Post #35 made 12 years ago
by Yeasty
BrickBrewHaus wrote:
Yeasty wrote:So your saying if my Tested RA is 22ppm CaCO3 it will be effected even more by the Ca and Mg..any good links ?
Sorry, shoulda been more specific...The thing that you're testing with that test kit is ALKALINITY. Alkalinity is different from RESIDUAL ALKALINITY (RA).

Residual Alkalinity is calculated by taking the alkalinity of your water and subtracting the effects of Ca and Mg. Read Section 2.0 here.

Not much time here. Ask more ?s if you have em.
Got ya now :headhit: well getting there :lol: told you it made my head hurt.

Just dug out J. Palmer for a re-read. :idiot:
Last edited by Yeasty on 15 Mar 2012, 05:15, edited 3 times in total.
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Post #36 made 12 years ago
by mankang
Brewing a foreign stout with left over malts tomorrow (weirdest malt bill so far).
Using my normal water adjustment routine (Ez water calc + Palmer sheet) except I won't add the baking soda unless I need to raise the pH.

Post #37 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
mankang wrote:Brewing a foreign stout with left over malts tomorrow (weirdest malt bill so far).
Using my normal water adjustment routine (Ez water calc + Palmer sheet) except I won't add the baking soda unless I need to raise the pH.
Very nice. Out of curiosity, what is your RA? I'd be interested to know the grain bill and mash pH once you're finished.

Slightly different topic...What I would like to do in the future is a collaborative experiment repeating the same (or similar) experiment in the original post. If anyone is interested let me know and we can work out some details. Mankang, if you're comfortable with checking pH with your new meter, you might be a good candidate ;)
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 31 Mar 2012, 04:41, edited 3 times in total.

Post #38 made 12 years ago
by mankang
The RA is a bit confusing since EZ v2, v3 and Palmer V3 disagrees with 185, 142 and 321 respectively with 5.5g baking soda.
Without the numbers are: 64, 21 and 199. I never noticed that large difference before so I suspect I entered something wrong.

The malt bill is complicated since I plan to get rid of all my old pre-crushed malt, so it's 10 different.

Experiment: Sure, why not as long as I can convince my brewing buddy and it fits into the brews we have planned ahead.

Now it's time to start the actual brewing.

Post #39 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
mankang wrote:The RA is a bit confusing since EZ v2, v3 and Palmer V3 disagrees with 185, 142 and 321 respectively with 5.5g baking soda.
Without the numbers are: 64, 21 and 199. I never noticed that large difference before so I suspect I entered something wrong.
When you get a minute, post your water profile. I'll show you how to calculate it pretty easily.

Happy brewing.
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 31 Mar 2012, 20:18, edited 3 times in total.

Post #40 made 12 years ago
by mankang
Linköping, Sweden water report:
Ca: 18,6 ppm
Mg: 2,5 ppm
Na: 8,9 ppm
Cl: 10,9 ppm
Alkalinity CaCO3: 45,6 ppm
pH: 8,4

To this I added for 27,5l of mash water:
7,2 g CaCO3
3,1 g CaCl 77%
2,1 g MgSO4

with a malt bill estimated by BeerSmith to be 108 EBC.

After 15 minutes of mashing I had pH (room temp 25C) of 5,38.

And the actual brew went on record time, just under 5 hours including 1+ hour of cleaning in the end.

Regarding the malt bill, we had to tweak it a bit since we did not want to brew with moths together with the melanoiden malt but we found the similar amount of Special B instead that I missed during the inventory.
11 types of grain in total.

Post #41 made 12 years ago
by BrickBrewHaus
mankang wrote:Linköping, Sweden water report:
Ca: 18,6 ppm
Mg: 2,5 ppm
Na: 8,9 ppm
Cl: 10,9 ppm
Alkalinity CaCO3: 45,6 ppm
pH: 8,4

To this I added for 27,5l of mash water:
7,2 g CaCO3
3,1 g CaCl 77%
2,1 g MgSO4
Hmmm...Any idea what the units were for Ca and Mg? Were they ppm or ppm as CaCO3?

If ppm, then the Ca hardness is (18.6 ppm (mg/L) / (40 g/mol / 2)) x 50 = 46.5 ppm as CaCO3. Mg hardness is (2.5 ppm / (24.3/2)) x 50 = 10.3 ppm as CaCO3.

Then, RA = Alk (as CaCO3) - ((Ca/3.5) + (Mg/7)) = 45.6 - ((46.5/3.5) + (10.3/7)) = 45.6 - 15.5 - 1.5 = 28.6

If the values are ppm as CaCO3, then plug those values directly into the RA equation. So RA = 45.6 - ((18.6/3.5) + (2.5/7)) = 45.6 - 5.3 - .35 = 40

Of course, this is before any salt additions. Either way, your RA is very low. Perfect for brewing.
Last edited by BrickBrewHaus on 01 Apr 2012, 10:49, edited 3 times in total.

Post #42 made 12 years ago
by mankang
Thanks for the calculations BBH. I think I have some more homework to do.
BrickBrewHaus wrote: Hmmm...Any idea what the units were for Ca and Mg? Were they ppm or ppm as CaCO3?
Well, the water reports states: Magnesium(ICP) SS-EN ISO 11885 and the same for calcium. For what I can deduct from googling I would say the units are in ppm.

BTW here is the crazy malt bill:
2,50 kg Viking Pale Ale (4,6 EBC) 33,1 %
1,63 kg Biscuit malt (Castle Malting) (60,0 EBC) 21,6 %
0,80 kg Unmalted barley (3,3 EBC) 10,6 %
0,70 kg Viking Caraplus 10 (9,0 EBC) 9,3 %
0,50 kg Café Light (Castle Malting) (250,0 EBC) 6,6 %
0,50 kg Viking Enzym Malt (5,9 EBC) 6,6 %
0,30 kg Viking Crystal 300 (300,0 EBC) 4,0 %
0,25 kg Chokladmalt (Castle Malting) (900,0 EBC) 3,3 %
0,18 kg Viking Black Malt (1500,0 EBC) 2,4 %
0,11 kg Special B (Castle Malting) (300,0 EBC) 1,5 %
0,09 kg Viking Roasted barley (1400,0 EBC) 1,2 %
Last edited by mankang on 01 Apr 2012, 17:09, edited 3 times in total.

Post #43 made 12 years ago
by nik
BrickBrewHaus wrote:
mankang wrote:Linköping, Sweden water report:
Ca: 18,6 ppm
Mg: 2,5 ppm
Na: 8,9 ppm
Cl: 10,9 ppm
Alkalinity CaCO3: 45,6 ppm
pH: 8,4

To this I added for 27,5l of mash water:
7,2 g CaCO3
3,1 g CaCl 77%
2,1 g MgSO4
Hmmm...Any idea what the units were for Ca and Mg? Were they ppm or ppm as CaCO3?

If ppm, then the Ca hardness is (18.6 ppm (mg/L) / (40 g/mol / 2)) x 50 = 46.5 ppm as CaCO3. Mg hardness is (2.5 ppm / (24.3/2)) x 50 = 10.3 ppm as CaCO3.

Then, RA = Alk (as CaCO3) - ((Ca/3.5) + (Mg/7)) = 45.6 - ((46.5/3.5) + (10.3/7)) = 45.6 - 15.5 - 1.5 = 28.6

If the values are ppm as CaCO3, then plug those values directly into the RA equation. So RA = 45.6 - ((18.6/3.5) + (2.5/7)) = 45.6 - 5.3 - .35 = 40

Of course, this is before any salt additions. Either way, your RA is very low. Perfect for brewing.
I have to agree ,with this type of water you can brew almost everything without any trouble.Probably on very pale styles (lager,pilsner) you should add some grams of acidulated malt and you're ok!
Last edited by nik on 01 Apr 2012, 21:15, edited 3 times in total.
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