Hi. This question has probably been asked before, but I couldn't find exactly what I need to know, so will ask. I've always boiled my water to remove hardness a day or so before brewing, but this has become a little inconvenient recently, not least because my boiler's very unreliable. So, a few weeks ago while not really paying full attention, I read a bit about and ordered 1 litre of CRS, thinking that would be a good alternative. It was only this morning that I looked at the bottle for dosage rates and found none.
Having looked at the Brupaks website, it seems it's not as easy as that. It seems if I use CRS, I also have to use DLS. At the moment, I want to brew some decent beer without much complication.
So, I guess I want to know:
1. Can I just use CRS to reduce hardness in my liquor
2. If not, what do I need (I can probably pick up some gypsum easily enough and have a big bag of epsom salts I bought for getting rid of fritz in my leeks)?
I contacted my water company Essex & Suffolk whose customer services department got someone in the department that looks after water quality to call me back in about 30 minutes (very impressive). The chap told me that yesterday the alkalinity was 260 measured in HC03. Having looked at the Brupaks website, I think this translates to approximately 213 CaC03. Maths and science are definitely not my strong points, does this sound about right?
Alternatively, I guess I could just brew stout or porter?
Using CRS
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Eric
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Re: Using CRS
Don't rely on the water company's figures. They could be right but you need to know what alkalinity your treated liquor has, so get a Salifert kit that you might measure it.
The strength of CRS is generally consistent when compared with some other acids and 1ml will neutralise 183mg of alkalinity as CaCO3. That would mean using 1ml CRS per litre of your liquor would reduce alkalinity to a suitable level for a pale beer if it's alkalinity was as you were informed.
No, you don't need to use DLS, using gypsum, calcium chloride flake and Epsum salts will allow you more flexibility. Whether you need any salts at all will depend what salts already exist in your water, but to be on the safe side and as you already have gypsum I'd be inclined to add some of that to the mash and boil to ensure there is sufficient calcium available in both stages to deposit what calcium does to improve those processes and still have sufficient for fermentation.
The strength of CRS is generally consistent when compared with some other acids and 1ml will neutralise 183mg of alkalinity as CaCO3. That would mean using 1ml CRS per litre of your liquor would reduce alkalinity to a suitable level for a pale beer if it's alkalinity was as you were informed.
No, you don't need to use DLS, using gypsum, calcium chloride flake and Epsum salts will allow you more flexibility. Whether you need any salts at all will depend what salts already exist in your water, but to be on the safe side and as you already have gypsum I'd be inclined to add some of that to the mash and boil to ensure there is sufficient calcium available in both stages to deposit what calcium does to improve those processes and still have sufficient for fermentation.
Last edited by Eric on Wed Nov 25, 2015 8:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Matt in Birdham
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Re: Using CRS
I can't help with your CRS question, but have you considered slaked lime as an alternative to boiling? I have done it for 4 brew now and got my alkalinity down from 230ppm to ~50ppm without putting anything back into the water. Cheap, relatively easy, the only downside is that you need to do it about 48 hours before you brew.
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Eric
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Re: Using CRS
By the way, your maths are spot on for converting the measurement of alkalinity from bicarbonate to calcium carbonate, divide by 1.22.mshergold wrote:Thanks guys.
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Jocky
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Re: Using CRS
As Eric says, you need to get an alkalinity test kit.
Once you have that then CRS is great for reducing alkalinity, and you can just add some gypsum or calcium chloride to help push the final balance towards hoppy or malty.
When you've played with that a bit you might want to get a water report done, and even later start playing with water calculators, a pH meter etc... But you can leave that for quite a while.
Once you have that then CRS is great for reducing alkalinity, and you can just add some gypsum or calcium chloride to help push the final balance towards hoppy or malty.
When you've played with that a bit you might want to get a water report done, and even later start playing with water calculators, a pH meter etc... But you can leave that for quite a while.
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