High chloride level after using CRS.

[Dave S]

Appreciate your input Dave, that is useful to know. I will do some more sums tonight and have another play with Bru 'n Water.
The Murphys report doesn't give sodium, they tested:
pH 7.02
Nitrate 19.8
Calcium 85
Magnesium 7
Chloride 31.91
Sulphate 113.41
Alkalinity 125 as CaCO3

The raw liquor ratio of chloride:sulphate is 1:3.55, which (from my readings) is a touch higher than ideal.

After their suggested treatment with CRS and DWB it should give chloride of 173.9 and sulphate of 385.4. This looks better at a ratio of 1:2.21, but still gave me rank bad beer the last time I brewed.
Thanks again for your input

I wouldn't worry too much about sodium as long as it's not ridiculously high, which I'm sure it won't be. What I do is take the average values from my local water report, put the alk and calcium values in, (hopefully accurate vales from a Salifert test) and tweak the rest until I get equal cations and anions. Not very scientific I know but there is necessarily an element of guess work in it at best. The most important thing is to get the alkalinity to a sensible level. I also don't use DWB. I prefer to use separate salts, mainly just gypsum.

[IPA]

He's talking about chloride not chlorine. That's one of the reasons I don't use CRS as my chloride levels are already on the high side at around 100 ppm. I switched to phosphoric acid which does not affect SO4 or Cl levels. You could also use sulphuric which will affect SO4 but not Cl.

Oops! must read things more thoroughly in future

[mabrungard]

Appreciate your input Dave, that is useful to know. I will do some more sums tonight and have another play with Bru 'n Water.
The Murphys report doesn't give sodium, they tested:
pH 7.02
Nitrate 19.8
Calcium 85
Magnesium 7
Chloride 31.91
Sulphate 113.41
Alkalinity 125 as CaCO3

The raw liquor ratio of chloride:sulphate is 1:3.55, which (from my readings) is a touch higher than ideal.

After their suggested treatment with CRS and DWB it should give chloride of 173.9 and sulphate of 385.4. This looks better at a ratio of 1:2.21, but still gave me rank bad beer the last time I brewed.
Thanks again for your input

Although its far from exact, you can infer what the sodium content is from that water report. Input all those values into Bru'n Water and you SHOULD see that the sum of the cations is lower than the anions. Then you try differing concentration of sodium in the input table until the cations and anions 'balance' and their sums are equal. It won't be truly accurate, but it should be an acceptable guess for most drinking water.

[Dave S]

Appreciate your input Dave, that is useful to know. I will do some more sums tonight and have another play with Bru 'n Water.
The Murphys report doesn't give sodium, they tested:
pH 7.02
Nitrate 19.8
Calcium 85
Magnesium 7
Chloride 31.91
Sulphate 113.41
Alkalinity 125 as CaCO3

The raw liquor ratio of chloride:sulphate is 1:3.55, which (from my readings) is a touch higher than ideal.

After their suggested treatment with CRS and DWB it should give chloride of 173.9 and sulphate of 385.4. This looks better at a ratio of 1:2.21, but still gave me rank bad beer the last time I brewed.
Thanks again for your input

Although its far from exact, you can infer what the sodium content is from that water report. Input all those values into Bru'n Water and you SHOULD see that the sum of the cations is lower than the anions. Then you try differing concentration of sodium in the input table until the cations and anions 'balance' and their sums are equal. It won't be truly accurate, but it should be an acceptable guess for most drinking water.

That's pretty much what I do. As you say, it's not exact since the other values, apart hopefully from alkalinity are averages, but it should be close enough.

[Mr. Dripping]

Thanks also for your input mabrungard.
Dave, I had a little play around with some figures last night and even without the sodium the ion balance was very close after I'd worked out the carbonate content.
It looks like I will be best served using phosphoric acid with some gypsum and calcium chloride additions.

One further point if someone could clarify.
Bru 'n Water throws up salt additions for the mash and the sparge. I am used to adding salts to the mash but never to my sparge water.....could I add the suggested sparge salts to the top of the mash once the mash is complete and then just sparge them through to the wort to be boiled??

[Eric]

One further point if someone could clarify.
Bru 'n Water throws up salt additions for the mash and the sparge. I am used to adding salts to the mash but never to my sparge water.....could I add the suggested sparge salts to the top of the mash once the mash is complete and then just sparge them through to the wort to be boiled??

There would be differences in outcomes from those options, but minor and might be of little concern when brewing for home consumption. The more calcium salts in a mash of given acidic grist and alkaline liquor, the lower will be its pH which in turn will influence the way and rate starch is converted to sugar. This change in pH can be counteracted by more alkaline mash water, which can later be compensated with reduced alkalinity of the sparge water. But what's the point of manual intervention if the object of the software is to simplify the task at hand?

It's disappointing to hear that Murphy's treatment with your water is considered the cause of rank beer. Our waters are similar in most respects save for alkalinity where mine is double that in yours, and while I'm not Murphy's greatest fan, I didn't expected your findings. I would have thought your water with no more treatment than some gypsum in the mash and again in the kettle would make a decent enough hoppy pale beer. The only changes I would expect from the advised treatment would be a reduction in astringency and more delicate hop aromas. Have you taken your own alkalinity measurements after water treatment and did you use much amber malt in those brews? I've found some of the less dark malts can in high sulphate waters have a big impact during maturation.

[TheSheeprug]

From what Martin (BruNwater) has mentioned you should try to avoid having both sulphate and chloride levels above 100 as it can lead to an overly minerally taste.
As Dave S mentioned you can use an alternative acid or filter/RO/bottled water to dilute your tap water.
Dilution may be a good option as your water is high in most areas to start with.

Yes, I think you're right, a dilution with RO water would definitely improve matters.

Yes - that looks like good advice. Thanks. A dilution by 50% with RA water gives a much easier 'base' to work with. Is the water from aquarium shops suitable?

I like the phosphoric acid approach too. How about the other acids? Presumably they add their own flavour? is there a useful description anywhere of their impact? B'nW gives some brief data but more info would be interesting.

SR

[TheSheeprug]

He's talking about chloride not chlorine. That's one of the reasons I don't use CRS as my chloride levels are already on the high side at around 100 ppm. I switched to phosphoric acid which does not affect SO4 or Cl levels. You could also use sulphuric which will affect SO4 but not Cl.

Oops! must read things more thoroughly in future

It's a good point though. I'm not doing any filtering at the moment. The water report says the total chlorine is 0.69mg/L. Is this worth worrying about?

SR

[AnthonyUK]

It's a good point though. I'm not doing any filtering at the moment. The water report says the total chlorine is 0.69mg/L. Is this worth worrying about?

SR

Definitely. You do not want any Chlorines in your brewing water at all. Treat water with campden powder before adding your acid/mineral additions.
I would be wary of filters especially ion replacement (Brita) as they add additional salts which may impact your water profile again.
You can use active carbon but TBH campden is 100% effective, cheap and doesn't overly affect the composition.

[TheSheeprug]

Appreciate your input Dave, that is useful to know. I will do some more sums tonight and have another play with Bru 'n Water.
The Murphys report doesn't give sodium, they tested:
pH 7.02
Nitrate 19.8
Calcium 85
Magnesium 7
Chloride 31.91
Sulphate 113.41
Alkalinity 125 as CaCO3

The raw liquor ratio of chloride:sulphate is 1:3.55, which (from my readings) is a touch higher than ideal.

After their suggested treatment with CRS and DWB it should give chloride of 173.9 and sulphate of 385.4. This looks better at a ratio of 1:2.21, but still gave me rank bad beer the last time I brewed.
Thanks again for your input

Although its far from exact, you can infer what the sodium content is from that water report. Input all those values into Bru'n Water and you SHOULD see that the sum of the cations is lower than the anions. Then you try differing concentration of sodium in the input table until the cations and anions 'balance' and their sums are equal. It won't be truly accurate, but it should be an acceptable guess for most drinking water.

i'm trying to understand the cations/anions bit at the moment (this electrical engineer has no chemistry background at all!) Using the data from my water report I get a cation/anion difference of 0.35. how significant is this?

SR

[WallyBrew]

i'm trying to understand the cations/anions bit at the moment (this electrical engineer has no chemistry background at all!) Using the data from my water report I get a cation/anion difference of 0.35. how significant is this?

SR

Whilst it is always nice to have an exact balance if 0.35 is within +/- 5% of the total do not worry about it as it will be within the margins of error for the analysis.

Plus - unless B'nW has changed since I last looked at it your balance will be thrown out on the water adjustments page because it disregards the nitrate and potassium. These have been removed from the list of desired water profiles which all have perfect ionic balance. So really you need to fiddle your water on the water report input page to have ) potassium and 0 nitrate, then adjust other bits to get a 0 meq difference. (I'm sure this probably doesn't make any sense)

[Mr. Dripping]

Thanks for your comments Eric, and before I go any further I feel I must apologise to TheSheeprug for somewhat hijacking your thread......I hope my questions have added to the discussion rather than detract from your original question

Eric, I too was disappointed that I concluded the Murphys treatment gave me bad beer the last time I brewed, particularly so having done two previous brews following their suggested treatments that were very good indeed. The only real difference in the malt bill for the third brew as a very small inclusion (150g in 40 litre recipe) of pale crystal malt.
Whilst I have no doubt that Murphys are 'doing things right' so to say, I think it is a bit of a 'cover all' approach and maybe does not take in to account some unusual features that may crop up in certain water supplies.

I do test the alkalinity myself with a Salifert kit and my results are always pretty close to Murphys test result of 125 ppm.

I had another good play with Bru 'n Water last night (made much more sense second time round) and I think I am on the right track with phosphoric acid and separate additions of gypsum and CaCl......for pales and bitters at any rate.

Thanks again for everyones useful input and apologies again to TheSheeprug.

[TheSheeprug]

Thanks for your comments Eric, and before I go any further I feel I must apologise to TheSheeprug for somewhat hijacking your thread......I hope my questions have added to the discussion rather than detract from your original question

.

Oh don't worry about that - it's all interesting stuff, and to be honest i was congratulating myself on creating my longest thread so far.

SR

[Dave S]

Yes, I think you're right, a dilution with RO water would definitely improve matters.

Yes - that looks like good advice. Thanks. A dilution by 50% with RA water gives a much easier 'base' to work with. Is the water from aquarium shops suitable?

SR

Yes, apparently aquarium centres are the most readily available places to get it, and it's dirt cheap too. I was quoted £2.50 for 25 litres a couple of weeks ago.

[Mr. Dripping]

Just in case anyone following this discussion is interested.....I brewed on Saturday evening and with the new water treatment that I worked through and my resulting wort smells very good indeed. No hint of the nasty harsh phenolics that have plagued a few brews before Christmas
Tested my alkalinity at 120ppm - Murphys test report 125ppm........and I know my water can be variable.
Bru 'n Water calculated that I use 0.12ml/l of 75% phosphoric. Mash and sparge salts were a mixture of gypsum and calcium chloride that gave a sulphate to chloride ratio of 1:2.1.
I added a third of the sparge salts before topping up the mash tun for my first batch sparge run off and added the remaining two thirds with the second lot of sparge water.

I would have liked to check the mash pH, but my pH meter decided to give up the ghost last week and I still haven't decided on a replacement yet.....will be interested to take a few readings next brew, but things are heading in the right direction.