It's in the full analysis...
Parameter Min Average Max Units
Alkalinity as CaCO3 13.4 16.2 17.7 mg/l
Sulphate 5.03 10.7 62.0 mg SO4/l
Chloride 4.24 6.51 12.6 mg Cl/l
It makes beer that tastes nice, what's not to like???
Sorry to OP for thread derailment!
Phosphoric acid - supply
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
I did have water, that appeared to make beer. Good beer. For years.
Last year, because of the hot summer it all went astray. Murphy's & Eric helped tremendously, problem solved and I now make better beer. Win win.
But I still haven't bought a proper alk test meter....
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Serious question. Is there much difference between AMS & phosphoric acid?
And when would you use one in preference to the other?
And when would you use one in preference to the other?
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
They are different things and will change your ‘flavour ions’ in different ways. Also using too much phosphoric acid may make your beer reminiscent of coke.MashBag wrote:Serious question. Is there much difference between AMS & phosphoric acid?
And when would you use one in preference to the other?
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clarets7
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Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
I thought we'd solved that in a previous thread, nothing to do with the gypsum more the very hot weather we had last summer. PeeBee sussed it.
"The paradise of the rich is made out of the hell of the poor" - Victor Hugo
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Eric wrote: ↑Wed Mar 01, 2023 5:49 pm80ppm?
Quoting Murphy and Son on Alkalinity.
It should be noted that bicarbonate ions are rather more effective at raising wort pH than calcium ions are at reducing it.
The conversion of bicarbonate to carbonic acid is reversible until heat is applied, which drives off the carbon dioxide. This effectively removes the acidic hydrogen ion from the system by using it to form a stable water molecule. The wort pH therefore remains high and all the advantages derived from the presence of adequate calcium levels and reduced pH are lost.
We therefore see the following:
Harsh after-tastes in the finished beer
Extract will be reduced due to lower ß-amylase activity
Reduced protein precipitation due to high pH
Worts and beer more prone to infection
Increased extract of undesirable materials in the sparge, notably silicates, polyphenols and tannins
Hop utilisation will also be increased, giving more bitter beers.
The net result of this is then to decrease beer stability and shelf life and to increase the likelihood of troublesome hazes. Colour will be darker, and flavour will be detrimentally affected. It is then also essential to ensure removal of excess bicarbonate. As shown in the table at the top of this article, hard water may contain 250 mgs/l of bicarbonate. However, the maximum level that can be tolerated without adverse effect for the production of pale ales is 50 mgs/l and the preferred level would be about 25 mgs/l. It should also be noted that whilst additions of calcium may be made to HLT, grist and copper, the removal of bicarbonate must be achieved in the Hot Liquor Tank.
I find this recommendation about aiming for a specific pre-mash alkalinity of <50 or <25 a bit confusing ...
My water is pretty high alkalinity, anywhere between around 150 and 180ppm and I use the Bru n Water spreadsheet to calculate the acid addition needed prior to mashing, and it clearly states that you are trying to achieve a specific mash pH, not targeting a pre-mash alkalinity value for your liquor.
The last brew I did, which contained some dark malt - on the spreadsheet I was aiming for mash pH 5.4 and it gave me an alkalinity figure after adding acid of 70, although it does say that this is for information, not a target.
The reading I had was 95 so, thinking maybe my acid was getting old and loosing it's strength, I mistakenly decided to add more acid to get a 70 reading.
When the mash had settled the pH was down at 5.1 and I had to mess about adding calcium hydroxide to raise it.
My point is - if I followed the Murphys advice and lowered the liquor alkalinity to 50 or even 25, my mash pH would have been much too low.
Maybe someone can explain this to me, or let me know if I'm barking up the wrong tree with my methodology. Thanks a lot
Cheers,
Jon
Jon
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Let me correct my own post now.
I adjust my liquor (for hoppy IPA) to 80ppm alk, after considering Murphy's guides.
So we are both barking up the wrong tree with this methodology ??
"as per" was my bad. It perhaps should had been along the lines of...
I adjust my liquor (for hoppy IPA) to 80ppm alk, after considering Murphy's guides.
@JonA,That is spot on what I found. My water is 'hard as nails" and I found <50 ppm just odd. After a few brews I have settled at 80. Mainly on taste. For a hop forward IPA or a ale. My thinking (right or wrong) was I was correcting an issue with the incoming water not setting up ingredients in the recipe.My point is - if I followed the Murphys advice and lowered the liquor alkalinity to 50 or even 25, my mash pH would have been much too low.
Maybe someone can explain this to me, or let me know if I'm barking up the wrong tree with my methodology. Thanks a lot
So we are both barking up the wrong tree with this methodology ??
Last edited by MashBag on Fri Mar 03, 2023 3:43 pm, edited 4 times in total.
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Yes indeed I had trouble because of the very hot weather we had last summer. Cloudy and beer rock inside the bottles. Before that I had not used (rightly or wrongly) any water treatment.
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Eric
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Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
drjim,
using the average values of the anions in your second table shows an 18% imbalance with the cations in the previous list suggesting the maximum figures are a better fit. That isn't unusual with water company data, they have other concerns than their product's influence on beer quality. The levels present are all very small compared to those used by British brewers brewing British style beers. As I wrote, if that how you wish to brew, there is no more to be said, but those ion levels without acidification would typically result in mash pH ranging from 5.8 to 6.1 with pale malted barleys and greater when using malted wheat.
My water is very hard and gypsum doesn't readily dissolve in it, so I throw the salts into the grains. Gypsum doesn't readily dissolve in warmer water, it dissolves more easily in cold water, it dissolves more easily in wort.
Mashbag,
AMS is an equi-normal mix of food safe hydrochloric and sulphuric acids whose effect on alkalinity in water is highly predictable while phosphoric acid is a relatively weak triprotic acid whose effect on alkalinity in water isn't similar to mineral acids. Hydrochloric acid has one hydrogen atom in each molecule and releases that when reacting with alkalinity, sulphuric has two and releases both in such a reaction, while phosphoric has 3 and releases, well I'll leave that to be argued over by chemists to see if they might agree. We know that hydrochloric acid and calcium carbonate produce calcium chloride (an acknowledged brewing salt) and hydrogen, sulphuric similarly produce hydrogen and calcium sulphate (we add it as gypsum) and phosphoric acid and calcium carbonate produces various forms of calcium phosphate and whatever is left of the bits of phosphoric acid that don't release their hydrogen atoms.
Phosphoric acid is advised because it is said to be neutral, and it is neutral because there is already lots of phosphates in beer from grains, typically 400 ppm, although I have analyses of American and Austrailian beer with more than 700ppm phosphate, I assume the extra above normal content in those beers is from phosphoric acid additions. Phosphoric acid is a major flavour ingredient in Coke as advised by F00b4r and further it will combine with calcium to form Apatite, an insoluble phosphate that is a major constituent of fishbone. Calcium was first isolated by Sir Humphry Davy when working on fishbone.
The only other ion likely to be present at greater level in beer than PO4 is Potassium, K, again from grain, derived from the soil or fertiliser.
Now phosphate is considered by some as innocuous to beer, and it might be with taste, part of a vast sea of it, but it is a known powerful buffer. I've discussed this with those using phosphoric acid, their only retort being that phosphate has least buffering power at mash pH and is therefore not relevant. Sadly for those, finished beer pH should be 3.8 to 4.2, not pH 5.3 and is the very likely reason Americans advise beer after fermentation will be 4.4 to 4.7. Such alters perception of taste and reduces bacterial protection, increases potential infection and thereby reduces shelf life.
In brief, AMS and phosphoric acid are very different in both effect and influence. I'll ignore your later comments for the time being.
JonA,
We have lots in common, maybe the only difference between our is 40 years of brewing experience. Alkalinity at my latest brew was a little lower than usual at 232ppm as CaCO3. I didn't measure mash pH, so can't augment my thrust, but it was a dark beer with 100g of Black and 200g of home roasted barley and I mashed with 20ppm alkalinity and added 20g of gypsum during the brew, but there was an adjunct included that would raise pH more than pale malt can. All in all there are many factors at play, all of which need to be taken into consideration.
Mash pH is but one reading, overall American belief still is that you take this at 15 minutes into the mash, but they are slowly changing that belief. AJ deLange, before he went missing from the American Homebrewer scene, realised Paul Kolbach's readings to understand why German Pilsners were not like those brewed in Pilsen were take at mashout, a fact Wallybrew told me a long time ago.
For me, pH 5.1 is fine, I'll keep my salts or balance of salts for the kettle and not reduce the sparge liquor alkalinity as much as initially planned. The object is to keep pH within bounds and after the boil, during which pH will drop as more phosphates will combine with calcium, if there is any left, to deposit with break, resulting in pH 5.2 for optimum performance by copper finings. Of course if you don't sparge you can't make that gentle correction and adding slaked lime is like using a sledge hammer to crack a nut and I am as surprised as you if with a full volume mash you had pH 5.1 in the conditions you describe.
The difference between US and UK brewing would seem to have come about because in UK, brewers had cracked the water problem when in 1880 they were allowed to treat brewing liquor without the excise men claiming they were avoiding tax levied on malt. That was before the pH scale and when they made a pH meter small enough to transport to, and be found space in a brewing chemist's lab in Fullers, they measured wort from their mash tun to be 5.4 before boil and 5.2 after, simply the result of their preparation. At that time the brewing scene in US was different due to certain legislation, so when homebrewing arrived late after Feds stopped searching for the local speakeasy, there were hand held pH meters. So why not mash in, then chuck in phosphoric acid until your meter, right or wrong, shows the numbers you desire. Even better, why not have an Excel spreadsheet that saves you the trouble of having a meter at all. Better again, with algorithms with limited extrapolation ability, advise high mineral levels are undesirable. Using any is easier than the effort necessary reading and understanding some of the more essential chemistry and biology of one of the most complex product you are ever likely to attempt to make.
JonA, I think your troubles would be best tackled in a separate conversation with those who have overcome the complexities of brewing in the current world of conflicting beliefs.
Guy and anyone else, would you be up for a session with JonA
using the average values of the anions in your second table shows an 18% imbalance with the cations in the previous list suggesting the maximum figures are a better fit. That isn't unusual with water company data, they have other concerns than their product's influence on beer quality. The levels present are all very small compared to those used by British brewers brewing British style beers. As I wrote, if that how you wish to brew, there is no more to be said, but those ion levels without acidification would typically result in mash pH ranging from 5.8 to 6.1 with pale malted barleys and greater when using malted wheat.
My water is very hard and gypsum doesn't readily dissolve in it, so I throw the salts into the grains. Gypsum doesn't readily dissolve in warmer water, it dissolves more easily in cold water, it dissolves more easily in wort.
Mashbag,
AMS is an equi-normal mix of food safe hydrochloric and sulphuric acids whose effect on alkalinity in water is highly predictable while phosphoric acid is a relatively weak triprotic acid whose effect on alkalinity in water isn't similar to mineral acids. Hydrochloric acid has one hydrogen atom in each molecule and releases that when reacting with alkalinity, sulphuric has two and releases both in such a reaction, while phosphoric has 3 and releases, well I'll leave that to be argued over by chemists to see if they might agree. We know that hydrochloric acid and calcium carbonate produce calcium chloride (an acknowledged brewing salt) and hydrogen, sulphuric similarly produce hydrogen and calcium sulphate (we add it as gypsum) and phosphoric acid and calcium carbonate produces various forms of calcium phosphate and whatever is left of the bits of phosphoric acid that don't release their hydrogen atoms.
Phosphoric acid is advised because it is said to be neutral, and it is neutral because there is already lots of phosphates in beer from grains, typically 400 ppm, although I have analyses of American and Austrailian beer with more than 700ppm phosphate, I assume the extra above normal content in those beers is from phosphoric acid additions. Phosphoric acid is a major flavour ingredient in Coke as advised by F00b4r and further it will combine with calcium to form Apatite, an insoluble phosphate that is a major constituent of fishbone. Calcium was first isolated by Sir Humphry Davy when working on fishbone.
The only other ion likely to be present at greater level in beer than PO4 is Potassium, K, again from grain, derived from the soil or fertiliser.
Now phosphate is considered by some as innocuous to beer, and it might be with taste, part of a vast sea of it, but it is a known powerful buffer. I've discussed this with those using phosphoric acid, their only retort being that phosphate has least buffering power at mash pH and is therefore not relevant. Sadly for those, finished beer pH should be 3.8 to 4.2, not pH 5.3 and is the very likely reason Americans advise beer after fermentation will be 4.4 to 4.7. Such alters perception of taste and reduces bacterial protection, increases potential infection and thereby reduces shelf life.
In brief, AMS and phosphoric acid are very different in both effect and influence. I'll ignore your later comments for the time being.
JonA,
We have lots in common, maybe the only difference between our is 40 years of brewing experience. Alkalinity at my latest brew was a little lower than usual at 232ppm as CaCO3. I didn't measure mash pH, so can't augment my thrust, but it was a dark beer with 100g of Black and 200g of home roasted barley and I mashed with 20ppm alkalinity and added 20g of gypsum during the brew, but there was an adjunct included that would raise pH more than pale malt can. All in all there are many factors at play, all of which need to be taken into consideration.
Mash pH is but one reading, overall American belief still is that you take this at 15 minutes into the mash, but they are slowly changing that belief. AJ deLange, before he went missing from the American Homebrewer scene, realised Paul Kolbach's readings to understand why German Pilsners were not like those brewed in Pilsen were take at mashout, a fact Wallybrew told me a long time ago.
For me, pH 5.1 is fine, I'll keep my salts or balance of salts for the kettle and not reduce the sparge liquor alkalinity as much as initially planned. The object is to keep pH within bounds and after the boil, during which pH will drop as more phosphates will combine with calcium, if there is any left, to deposit with break, resulting in pH 5.2 for optimum performance by copper finings. Of course if you don't sparge you can't make that gentle correction and adding slaked lime is like using a sledge hammer to crack a nut and I am as surprised as you if with a full volume mash you had pH 5.1 in the conditions you describe.
The difference between US and UK brewing would seem to have come about because in UK, brewers had cracked the water problem when in 1880 they were allowed to treat brewing liquor without the excise men claiming they were avoiding tax levied on malt. That was before the pH scale and when they made a pH meter small enough to transport to, and be found space in a brewing chemist's lab in Fullers, they measured wort from their mash tun to be 5.4 before boil and 5.2 after, simply the result of their preparation. At that time the brewing scene in US was different due to certain legislation, so when homebrewing arrived late after Feds stopped searching for the local speakeasy, there were hand held pH meters. So why not mash in, then chuck in phosphoric acid until your meter, right or wrong, shows the numbers you desire. Even better, why not have an Excel spreadsheet that saves you the trouble of having a meter at all. Better again, with algorithms with limited extrapolation ability, advise high mineral levels are undesirable. Using any is easier than the effort necessary reading and understanding some of the more essential chemistry and biology of one of the most complex product you are ever likely to attempt to make.
JonA, I think your troubles would be best tackled in a separate conversation with those who have overcome the complexities of brewing in the current world of conflicting beliefs.
Guy and anyone else, would you be up for a session with JonA
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Would it help if I posted a copy of my water analysis from the water company?
Cheers,
Jon
Jon
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
I'm not denying that there is always room for improvement and experimentation. At the moment it basically works though. I'll experiment as the brews progress.
Also yes we did come up with the warm weather theory for the cloudy beer, but I still associate it with the gypsum. I'm planning a double batch of bitter to get ahead of consumption so maybe I'll do one with and one without. Proper scientific method etc!
Also yes we did come up with the warm weather theory for the cloudy beer, but I still associate it with the gypsum. I'm planning a double batch of bitter to get ahead of consumption so maybe I'll do one with and one without. Proper scientific method etc!
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Eric
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Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
All information will be a help.
Can you give the recipe as well, I don't use a spread sheet to estimate pH, but determine what water would suit that profile for my own consumption.
What equipment do you have and a rough outline of how you mash and sparge including rough idea of duration.
drjim, in something like six months time will be sixty years after my first brew. I'm still making changes, sometimes for the better.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
Is there a water profile advice section Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
And Eric, being a slightly old Doctor (53 next week) I appreciate the value of experience, so I've put my average/max water numbers into Graham's calculator and am contemplating some gypsum and a bit of salt in a brew tomorrow!
Re: Phosphoric acid - supply
First I should say that I don't brew lots of different syles, I just try to brew what I like to drink, 8A or 8B English standard or special bitters.Eric wrote: ↑Fri Mar 03, 2023 7:30 pmAll information will be a help.
Can you give the recipe as well, I don't use a spread sheet to estimate pH, but determine what water would suit that profile for my own consumption.
What equipment do you have and a rough outline of how you mash and sparge including rough idea of duration.
drjim, in something like six months time will be sixty years after my first brew. I'm still making changes, sometimes for the better.
I've been brewing clone recipes of things like Abbot, London Pride, Landlord etc.
I have an electric 3-vessel system and I normally brew a 50l batch.
I normally mash for 1 hour, fly sparge for about an hour or until the runnings gravity drops too low, followed by a 70minute boil.
The recipe which I've been using for the last couple of brews is supposed to be an Abbot(ish) clone
9.4kg Marris Otter 4.7 EBC
670g Amber 62 EBC
530g Dark crystal 265 EBC
Challenger 70 mins 21 IBU
EKG 10 mins 4 IBU
Fuggles 10 mins 4 IBU
Fuggles steep 2 IBU
Total IBU 32
Water profile is
Calcium 108
Magnesium 8
Sodium 47
Sulphate 116
Chloride 67
Nitrate 21
pH 7.4
The last total alkalinity on the water report was 165 which was from summer 2022. I have a little Hanna alkalinity meter and before the last brew is showed 152 out of the tap. I also have an ok quality pH meter which I calibrate before each brew.
Thanks a lot for your help.
Cheers,
Jon
Jon