Sheffield - Fullwood Zone

[Shoit]

I get the following details for my water supply and want to try and understand this whole water treatment thing before my next all grain brew. I've fed all the details into the water treatment calculator and get a couple of errors. Anyway for starters here are the details:

Alkalinity as CaCO3 - 35.4
Calcium - 4.71
Magnesium - 2.403
Sodium - 27.77
Sulphate - 50.64
Carbonate - 21.22
Chloride - 11.31

This gives Cations - 1.64
This gives Anions - 2.08
(The calculator suggests these should be within 10% of each other - they're not but i'm not sure what that means)

When the target liquor is set to general purpose I get the following error - Your target carbonate is too low. Click the CO3 button on the right to correct. When I click this, it then gives the next error - Your target Na is too low. Click the Mg/ Na button on the right to correct it.

When I click that i get no more errors. I'm going to confess that I want a simple alternative to buying bottled water - can someone help me out!

To adjust the water for a bitter it suggests the following additions to 33l of water -

Calcium Sulphate - 11.4g
Calcium Chloride - 7.29g
Magnesium Sulphate - 2.54g
Sodium Chloride - 1.03g

Does this sound anywhere near right'?

[Graham]

The difference between the cations and the anions is because the figures that your water company supplied do noes not represent a real water. That is no surprise; they are independent averages and the water company does not try to make them represent a balanced water. One of those errors was because the general-purpose water suggests a lower amount of carbonate than you already naturally have in your water. It has to start with something, so pushing the button forces it to change its mind and adjust things accordingly. The second error is probably because your water is unbalanced, when it does its sums it has some stuff left over that it doesn't know what to do with. It's no big deal in either case.

The final water has sufficient calcium and the carbonate is within an acceptable range. All the rest is optional anyway. No need to use CRS or anything.

It will be fine.

[Shoit]

Sorry to bump this thread back up! I've been treating my water according to the suggested profile for the last couple of brews. With the last two brews I've noticed a dry almost chalky aftertaste. Could this be due to my water treatment. However, both of the last two brews had fermented at higher temps, and fermented down to 1006. Is it more likely that these conditions are the culprit?

Could someone suggest a very simple set of additions to start at so that I know what i'm doing - I've used the calculator but find it means i'm not sure what effect each thing has on the final brew. If someone could suggest a simple set of additions and when to add them that would be great. (I prefer a less malty taste to my beers)

Thanks in advance

Kev