New water treatment calculator

(That's water to the rest of us!) Beer is about 95% water, so if you want to discuss water treatment, filtering etc this is the place to do it!
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Graham

Post by Graham » Thu Apr 24, 2008 2:25 pm

brale wrote:Sorry to repost this, but I'm still confused, and if anyone has any insight I would be really grateful!

The Brupaks water treatment website has the following suggestions for water profiles for different styles:

Bitter and Pale Ale. Alkalinity as CaC03 - up to 50 p.p.m. Calcium - 180 to 220 p.p.m.

Mild Ale. Alkalinity as CaC03 - 100 to 150 p.p.m. Calcium - 90 to 110 p.p.m.

Porter and Stout. Alkalinity as CaC03 - 100 to 150 p.p.m. Calcium - 100 to 120 p.p.m.

Pale Lager. Alkalinity as CaC03 - up to 30 p.p.m. Calcium - 100 to 120 p.p.m.

I just wondered why their alkalinity (carbonate) suggestions are so different to your software's suggestions. Your software suggests removing all carbonates, and then adjusting calcium, sulphate and choride for different beer styles. Brupaks seem to suggest keeping a high level of carbonates for dark ales, presumably to balance the acidity inherent in the malt.

I wondered whether you might be able to clear up my confusion! Thanks again for a great piece of software.
I remember seeing your original post, made a mental note to reply to it then promptly forgot. Sorry. I am always losing track of things on here anyway; things that I meant to follow and then can't find again.

To your question:
I suppose it is a matter of opinion really. My view is that no beer likes carbonates; as long as mash pH is okay. I have never had a problem with mash pH being too low, but then I live in a hard water area, and there will still be a bit of residual carbonate left in my water after boiling (my preferred method).

Many of these assumptions on carbonates in water stem from Victorian analyses that were made when they first realised why some waters made better beers. It is an erroneous assumption made by many that the brewers actually brewed with this water - they didn't. It was standard practice in those days to boil all the water used in brewing; they realised that boiling the water made better beers, but probably not why; although it is too easy to underestimate our forefathers. This would have substantially reduced the carbonates.

The water compositions in the list of water areas in the calculator are those that would exist after the boil, and are closer to what the brewers would have actually brewed with. Perusal of this list is quite revealing, and does give some credence to the carbonate theory in the Brupaks stuff.

If you go to that calculator and select London Well Water, you will observe that (after the boil, remember) there is a substantial amount of carbonate left and no calcium. This is because there is insufficient calcium to bond with all the carbonate and precipitate it as chalk. Thus all the calcium has gone and there is still carbonate left. Munich is similar.

However, this causes some to say (or think) that this makes the water ideal for dark beers. That is wrong, It is obvious from this water composition, particularly the lack of calcium, that they would not have been able to brew a decent pale ale in a million years. They would not have been able to match Burton, and they would dearly have loved to give Burton a run for its money.

London specialised in dark beers because they were stuck with them - they couldn't brew anything else. They were forced to hide their inherent cloudiness behind half-a-ton of black malt. In fact their water was not ideal for anything. Strangely, the heritage of this lingers on, mainly, I think, because beer enthusiasts who write histories do not understand brewing that well, and get the wrong end of the stick.

The calculator has to assume no carbonate after boiling (as long as there is sufficient calcium) because there is no way of knowing how much is left. There will always be a little bit left.

So, the answer is, if you are having trouble maintaining a high enough pH in your mash, you may need some carbonate, otherwise you don't. Why didn't I just say that in the first place?

brale

Post by brale » Thu Apr 24, 2008 4:08 pm

Great. Thanks so much for the reply - that helps a lot.

So basically you think they are massively overstating the amount of carbonate needed to keep the mash pH right in darker beers, essentially due to reading too much into the water profiles of where these dark beers were historically produced?

Graham

Post by Graham » Fri Apr 25, 2008 7:43 am

brale wrote:Great. Thanks so much for the reply - that helps a lot.

So basically you think they are massively overstating the amount of carbonate needed to keep the mash pH right in darker beers, essentially due to reading too much into the water profiles of where these dark beers were historically produced?
Yes, that is basically my take on it. There is a case with some types of water (soft) to have a bit of carbonate, but it is difficult to control absolute levels anyway, no matter how you treat your water. If mash pH is okay, then that is really all there is to it. Bit of a chicken and egg situation really.

eskimobob

Post by eskimobob » Fri Apr 25, 2008 8:48 pm

Graham wrote:That's right. Do a calculation for the mash liquor so that the mash gets it's correct dose. Do another calculation for the rest and add it to the copper. That is what most people do, particularly if they are using CRS.
So the water that I sparge with will be untreated then - is that right?

Graham

Post by Graham » Fri Apr 25, 2008 11:52 pm

eskimobob wrote:
Graham wrote:That's right. Do a calculation for the mash liquor so that the mash gets it's correct dose. Do another calculation for the rest and add it to the copper. That is what most people do, particularly if they are using CRS.
So the water that I sparge with will be untreated then - is that right?
That is a moot point. Because I boil, I treat all the water. There is a problem with CRS (which up to now I have never used) inasmuch as it is a bugger to get calcium sulphate into solution in cold water. The thing is that you do not want the pH of your run-off to raise too much. CRS users shove some CRS into the sparge liquor to keep the pH low. But that is outside of my personal experience.

AT

Post by AT » Sat Apr 26, 2008 12:09 am

I'm not gonna bother treating my water :oops: i'm a bit confused after DaaB vs Graham on this subject. I'm happy with the quality of my ales and if things have to get so heated for small improvements i''ll happily drink my shite beer :lol:

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Doingatun
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Post by Doingatun » Mon Apr 28, 2008 1:32 pm

Hi

Think I’m off the plot :roll: , when/how should I be adding the above additions…Mash, sparge liquor or boiler???

Brewed today – BlueBird, thought I would try treating the water

Calcium 7.8 mgCal/l
Magnesium 1.28 mg mg/l
Sodium 4.98 mg Na/l
Sulphate 8.19 mg So4/l
Cholride 6.88mg Cl/l
Alkalinity 13.4

Treating full 35 Litres at the start for Bitter gives additions -

11.86g Calcium Sulphate
14.58g Calcium Chloride
1.32g Magnesium Sulphate

Blended in 350ml of hot water, added 250ml to 25 litre of sparge liquor and 100ml to 10 Litres mash liquor.

Mash ph 4.9 – 5.0 (usually achieve 5.3 without treating) then sparged also with treated liquor.

Cheers

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landy813
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Post by landy813 » Mon Apr 28, 2008 8:44 pm

I used Graham's water treatment calculator yesterday for the Hogsback Brewery TEA clone to calculate the amount of CRS to add. The only figure i could not find was sulphates of which anglian water recommended a guide figure of 250mg/l. It indicated not adding any salts just 43ml of CRS.
My efficency for that brew was 86% which is 10-15% better than previous brews and that was all i did different, apart from buying a sack of Muntons pearl pale malt and not using the 3kg bags.

I treated all my water 38 litres the night before brewing.

Lets hope it wasn't just a fluke and the stuff actually worked.
Landy.

Graham

Post by Graham » Mon Apr 28, 2008 9:45 pm

landy813 wrote:Lets hope it wasn't just a fluke and the stuff actually worked.
So do I, old chap!

The water treatment calculator works on first principles and, apart from bugs that still have to be revealed, it can probably be trusted.

However, there are serious flaws in the teachings of Wheeler when it comes to people that live in soft-water areas. Wheeler assumed that these people had been given a gift from the gods, as far as brewing was concerned, because they could tailor their water, from a blank sheet, to anything they liked. Wheeler got that one wrong - it isn't that easy.

I am that Wheeler of course.

If it was not for posts on JBK I would not have given it another thought; received a bit of a wake-up call. Special rules / techniques are obviously required for softies.

Too late to address that now - 18-years too late, but, if you live in a soft-water area - treat Wheeler with a fair degree of caution.

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edit1now
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Post by edit1now » Mon Apr 28, 2008 10:31 pm

I think we should offer Wheeler a glass of beer, if anything :beer:

eskimobob

Post by eskimobob » Tue Apr 29, 2008 10:04 pm

I brewed a Bitter on the weekend and treated the water for the first time. I'm in a soft water area and had to add Gypsum, Calcium Chloride and a small amount of Epsom Salts.

I didn't notice any increase in efficiency - if anything it seemed a bit lower :? - I normally achieve about 85% but recently I have been deliberately under sparging and achieving 80% - This time I sparged with the full amount of liquor and only achieved 80%. It was a new sack of malt though so the potential extract could be different now.

Will be interesting to see if it affects the taste...

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Doingatun
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Post by Doingatun » Wed Apr 30, 2008 11:04 am

Yep...fermentation appears more vigorous, healthy and quite a bit faster for my set up, dropping 31 points 45 to 14 in 36 hours.

With my mash normally at ph5.3 without treatment dropping to ph4.9 after treating, should I leave the 10 litres mash liquor untreated and add the full treatment mix for 35 litres to 25 litres of sparge liquor or boiler after sparging?.

Cheers

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Jim
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Post by Jim » Mon May 12, 2008 5:35 pm

I've made this thread a sticky, so that we don't lose the link to the calculator.
NURSE!! He's out of bed again!

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SteveD

Post by SteveD » Fri May 16, 2008 1:52 am

A lovely calculator. Thanks, Graham. My only concern is something that is nothing to do with the calculator at all - How do we know that the figures we enter as per the water company reports are accurate enough unless we test the water ourselves, which then negates the need for the reports in the first place. :roll: Even the Water Company (Three Valleys) says they are only averages at a given point in time. I'm in north Surrey and the alkalinity in my water changes quite frequently, and noticeably, as the supply can be drawn from a number of areas. One week I treated with CRS and the PH came out just right. The week after, same treatment, same grist, PH wildly off. Mr LaPensee published his findings on water composition and showed how it can vary during the course of a day, never mind a month or a year!

So now with each brew I've resorted to treating the total liquor incrementally with CRS until the PH drops to 7 or just below. Is this sensible? Once mash liquor is drawn off, I treat the rest until between PH5.5 and 5.8 for sparging. For that I use whatever I find in the cupboard first - Phosphoric or lactic acid. Sometimes more CRS, though it's easier to cock it up. Once I used 5.2 stabiliser just to see if it worked - no, it threw a loose white precipitate instead turning the liquor quite milky - Calcium Phosphate?.

As to DLS addition - guesswork based on keeping within sensible limits for the beer type - 6g -9g for Pale Ale, nothing for Stouts, etc

Beer usually attenuates well, clears fine, and tastes as it should.

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Andy
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Post by Andy » Fri May 16, 2008 8:55 am

:lol:
Dan!

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