Salifert Water spreadsheet sanity check

[DerbyshireNick]

Afternoon all,

I know this isn't the ideal way and there are issues with it, but lets take that off the table for now. This is after all a first, rough step into water additions.

Because of waiting on Severn Trent to get back to me with missing values and additionally not actually trusting their values anyway (mixed source water) I have used the Brupaks maths combined with the salifert conversion table on here to build up a, what I appreciate is rough, CRS/DLS additions sheet that I am using for my personal use only and in no way suggesting others should follow its recommendations. I am treating this very much as a "better than nothing" first step.

Would a kind soul be open to sanity checking it for me?

Essentially I have aligned the salifert reading with the alkalinity ppm that it converts to along with an ESTIMATION of calcium in the water based on that reading. For pale, brown and dark beers I then calculate the alkalinity that needs removing and the CRS required to do it. Additionally using the estimation of calcium and brupaks guide I calculate the DLS required.

From the cross referencing I have done it seems to add up. But I welcome a second pair of eyes, under the understanding of course that this is a first step and very much a layman rule of thumb look at the topic when the only information you have is your alkalinity test result.

EDIT: Updated sheet to use reading to meq/l from latest salifert kit which differs to that in the tutorial. Alkalinity mg/l or indeed ppm is now calculated with a *50.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

Cheers!

[nigelsch]

I did a quick scan, as shortly going out. The figure I was looking for is 1ml CRS removing approx. 180ppm/L and your sheet shows that:)

[BenB]

This is my html based java calculator. Does the job for me....

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B3GCaKT ... cslist_api

[DerbyshireNick]

The interesting thing I can deduct from this is no matter what your water is like the DLS additions far outstrip the teaspoon that is normally recommended.

We can see that the DLS additions for a pale range from 6.85g to 15.53g based on a 13.75L mash water volume (5.5KG of grain with a ratio of 1kg:2.5L).

Given that compounds such as DLS come in at around 2g per teaspoon, according to this you would be looking at between 3 and 8 teaspoons in the mash regardless of where your water sits in the math. This suggests to me that the tried and tested advice is ... out by quite a bit.

This would tie in with a massive volume of DWB (DLS) that Murphys advised me to add on my previous water supply when I had it professionally looked at.

[Aleman]

The Brupaks maths is derived (copied really) from the Murphys recommendations so I'm not surprised to see that the levels required are as large as they appear to be.

Murphys appear to put a massive emphasis on calcium additions, which I am not sure is correct. I am fully aware of the importance of calcium in all the brewing reactions, but, requiring a minimum of 200-300 for pretty much all styles is just plain wrong . . . They appear to be a very strong advocate for 'Burtonisation' of any liquor regardless of where any particular style originated from.

Indeed some of the advice i have seen recently strikes me as completely counter intuitive.

Murphys state Lots of calcium prevents the formation of beer stone in boilers and fermentors.
Beer stone is calcium oxalate
Beer stone is formed when calcium from the liquor and the malt combines with oxalic acid liberated from the malt.
Beer stone is insoluble to precipitates on the sides of the boiler and fermentor.

If you add calcium then you get less beer stone No sorry don't see it. According to le Chetaliers principle is you have more reactants on one side of a reaction it drives the equilibrium to the opposite side (and all chemical reactions are an equilibrium, it's just that some are much more likely to move one way or another due to thermodynamics). So according to le Chatalier if you have more calcium you should/will end up with more beer stone, unless the amount of oxalate in the malt is limited. I brew with water that is very low in calcium, I do increase it (when I remember), but no where near to the limits that Murphys suggest, my FV's and boilers should be caked with beer stone, and yet I have never had to scrape beer stone from any of them. A brewery I know in Essex with a lot of cacium in the water, that follows Murphys recommendations, regarding additions, has a liquor pH of less than 3.0 (all alkalinity is reduced by pH 4.3 so the CRS reductions must be wrong!), and regularly has to scrape beer stone from the FV's and kettle . . . and even the mash tun on occasions.

[DerbyshireNick]

Ah I have been waiting for you to show up Aleman

So... I can certainly follow you in terms of burtonisation and allowing a scaleback on the DLS recommendation.

CRS is a curious one. I have never needed to brew with it before because my old water had next to no alkalinity. I am having an issue on this new supply with a not totally unpleasant but "wrong" taste with AG mashing. I would define it as raw grainy, almost as if a pale beer tastes like a stout. Its different to astringent or "off" as if I was blind tasting I would say it tasted right for a dark beer. From the FV the taste is quite pronounced, by week 2-3 has moved to the back as an after taste and by about week 8 has almost matured out.

Aleman I bow to your science, what would you suggest? maybe going for a 50% CRS addition and seeing where it lands? I was pretty confident but you have knocked that back a bit. I am a bit nervous to do a full as recommended treatment based on what you are saying.I think I will start by using this sheet and going with 50% of what it recommends and take it from there.


Edit: Note that I have had no problems with a run of extract brews I did as "quickies" after moving when I didn't have time to AG. In fact some were the best beers I have ever made! Hence things starting to point towards water and the mash.

[DerbyshireNick]

Update: I have amended the sheet to use the values from the salifert kit that just got delivered.

[BenB]

Brupak just repackage Murphy's AMS and call it CRS. Same stuff. So their info is indeed the same.
DerbyshireNick I'd suggest getting a pH meter. Test strips are rubbish and all the calculations in the world are only going to get you so far. If you brew blind and it works it's great but when there are problems it's good to have ways of measuring to see where it might be going wrong.

My first AG had a horrible grainy vomity flavour but then my mash pH was <5 and I sparged with 90+ degree water. Doh! Think I know what caused that then! Massive tannin hit from the super hot sparge.

I'm also beginning to wonder whether the recommended DLS is a bit on the high side- my beers come out very dry (in flavour). Even the ones I've brewed for more dextrins (mash temp wise) and choosing yeast with lower attenuation come out fairly dry- I'm beginning to wonder whether the DLS is reducing the sweet malty flavour (of which I have virtually none). On the palette it starts bitter, the flavour lifts and then the hoppy bitter length comes in. I've tested the beer FG at serving and it's not losing points in the bottle due to wild yeasts and with the last brew I started with a new FV etc etc. No chance of off-loading it to my friends as "Belgian".

I'm beginning to think it's too much DLS! If I had time to do a side-by-side brewing I'd do one with DLS and one with a "proper" water treatment. Try and narrow it down a bit more.... What I'm probably going to do is the next two times I brew do the same recipe, one building up from Ashbeck and the other using my water profile (cheers Wallybrew! top service) and working down with CRS/DLS and see what happens.

[Jocky]

Ben - I think that DLS is also a repackaged Murphys product called DWB.

The DWB data sheet says that 0.09g/l increases:
Calcium 15.6 mg/l
Chloride 15.4 mg/l
Sulphate 32.1 mg/l

Hopefully you can figure out from that what your previous brew ended up with. When I did my calculations from the Brupaks suggestions I found what they were suggesting wasn't far out (as long as I wasn't brewing a lager), but I may just be lucky.

[DerbyshireNick]

I am hopefully brewing tonight but its a stout and from my math my water is almost mathematically perfect for it (minus a very small amount of DLS) So I wont be able to test it for a few weeks.

I have the ingredients on hand for a pale so will do one as soon as this stout is out of the FV. I think, I am going to go with 50% of the recommended CRS/DLS and see what the impact is and take it from there. I am a bit reluctant to go with the full additions are they are quite a lot. (0.4ml of CRS/L and just shy of 1g of DLS per L)

[Jocky]

0.4ml of CRS doesn't sound high, but 1g/l of DLS is on the higher side.

What additions are required if you use the water calculator on this site?

[DerbyshireNick]

0.4ml of CRS doesn't sound high, but 1g/l of DLS is on the higher side.

What additions are required if you use the water calculator on this site?

I am not sure as currently all I have to go on is the alkalinity and my water report is missing most of the values I need otherwise.

[DerbyshireNick]

Ok, so I put in the alkalinity only (which is all I have) and the calculator here says 0.42ml/l which is exactly one step up from my reading on my graph for a pale so that gives me some confidence.

EDIT: Ah I left the residual alkalinity as 20 and my sheet bases it on 25 for a pale, so my sheet for CRS is bang on the money compared to the calculator on here at least.

[Jocky]

0.4ml of CRS doesn't sound high, but 1g/l of DLS is on the higher side.

What additions are required if you use the water calculator on this site?

I am not sure as currently all I have to go on is the alkalinity and my water report is missing most of the values I need otherwise.

Does your water report have Sodium, Sulphate and Chloride on it? My water report had these, but was missing Calcium, Magnesium and Carbonate. It was pretty close for Sodium, Sulphate and Chloride for those to the proper water analysis I eventually got, and for my rudimentary understanding, these are the main ones you need to deal with. Calcium can be very roughly approximated by multiplying your total alkalinity by 0.4.

As you've already discovered, the water calculator will tell you how much CRS to use, but if you put in the figures you do have it will also tell you what additions you need.

As I've put below, I believe DLS is actually Murphy's DWB, and they say that 0.09g/l increases:
Calcium 15.6 mg/l
Chloride 15.4 mg/l
Sulphate 32.1 mg/l

[DerbyshireNick]

Cheers for this Jocky,

Calcium - not reported (assumed 38.6 mg/l based on alkalinity of 96.5 mg/l)
Sodium - 9.375 mg/l
Sulphate - 26.878 mg/l
Chloride - 26.884 mg/l
Carbonate - 57.86 mg/l (seems to populate automagically)

Leaving magnesium blank gives me the result of

Result:
CRS 0.39 ml/l <
Calcium Sulphate (as gypsum) - 205.29 mg/l
Calcium Chloride (dihydrate) - 313.06 mg/l
Magnesium Sulphate (Epsom salts) - 152.14 mg/l
Sodium Chloride (common salt) - 52.43 mg/l