Beginners Guide to Water Treatment (plus links to more advanced water treatment in post #1)

[strange-steve]

After another afternoon of reading and playing with the Brunwater spreadsheets, I think my answer may lie in diluting my tap water with bottled water by around 50% and dosing with Phosphoric acid rather than CRS to reduce the alkalinity.

For Burton style IPAs you could probably use CRS for alkalinity reduction, but for more delicate pale beers then yes dilution would probably be your best option.

 

[Crystal_Ball]

A big thanks to @strange-steve for this guide. I’ve only read you first post but I’m going for it straight away!

My water report states the following:

358 ppm alkalinity
153 ppm calcium
45 ppm chloride (mean)
71 ppm sulphate (mean)

After using the Salifert KH/Alk & Ca kits I have the following results:

245 ppm alkalinity (13.7KH x 17.9)
150 ppm calcium

Questions I have are:

For the brew im planning on doing ill need 31.7L of water in total which I intend to treat all together.

I need to remove around 215 ppm alkalinity which is above the figures in the table so how much CRS should I add?

Do I need to adjust my calcium?

I tend to brew hoppy pales or NEIPA style beers.

So my shopping list as I understand is:

Campden tablets (current ones I have are considerably past BB date)

CRS

Calcium chloride

Anything I've missed?

Thanks in advance.

 

[braziliain]

My water report states the following:

358 ppm alkalinity
153 ppm calcium
45 ppm chloride (mean)
71 ppm sulphate (mean)

After using the Salifert KH/Alk & Ca kits I have the following results:

245 ppm alkalinity (13.7KH x 17.9)
150 ppm calcium

I need to remove around 215 ppm alkalinity which is above the figures in the table so how much CRS should I add?

You are in a similar boat to me, as per my post on the previous page.

It seems the best course of action is to dilute the tap water with a soft bottled water such as Tesco Ashbeck before attempting to acidify. This brings your alkalinity into the range which CRS can cope with. Or, you can use phosphoric acid like myself as it doesn't increase the sulphate levels in the way the CRS does.

I am cutting my water 50:50 with Asda Spring Water and then acidifying with 75% concentration phosphoric acid.

 

[braziliain]

My Salifert kits turned up today and my results are not as expected!

Yorkshire water sent me a report stating that the CACO3 content was 262ppm. I multiplied this by 1.22 to get 320ppm HCO3.

Using my Salifert kit, the solution first noticeably turned pink at 0.56 on the syringe and then darkened up to 0.53 before it stopped changing colour.

0.56 is 6.7dKH which is 120ppm CACO3 which is 146.3ppm HCO3

0.53 is 7.0dKH which is 125ppm CACO3 which is 153ppm CACO3

My Calcium test kit indicated 100ppm Ca which is bang on the Yorkshire Water report.

Which value should I be using and have I ballsed this up?!!

Edit:
I performed the alkalinity test again and got exactly the same result.
I understood that you could estimate CACO3 using the formula (2.5xCa)+(4.1xMg).
Even if my Mg value was 0, the above formula wouldn't hold true for 100ppm of Ca. aunsure....

Edit Edit :
More reading and I think I'm getting a handle on this. The equation above is an estimation of Total Hardness.
The Salifert kit does not measure Total Hardness, it measures Alkalinity.
For most domestic water supplies, Total Hardness minus Alkalinity is a good estimation of Permanent Hardness.

So, Yorkshire Water are reporting my Total Hardness as 265ppm CACO3.

I have measured my Alkalinity as 125ppm CACO3.

Permanent hardness of my water is around 140ppm CACO3.

The value I should use for my brewing is 125ppm CACO3 multiplied by 1.22 = 153ppm HCO3.

This is much more manageable than I first thought and shouldn't require so much dilution with bottled water. Looks like I could get away by acidifying with Phosphoric acid.

 

[dan125]

I need to remove around 215 ppm alkalinity which is above the figures in the table so how much CRS should I add?

If your alkalinity is 358ppm I think you need to be removing about 315 rather than 215 for pale beers, which will add an awful lot of sulphates & chlorides if you use CRS to remove. As @braziliain says, its much better to dilute with Tesco Ashbeck water and use less CRS (or alternative acid - I use phosphoric). You can then adjust with gypsun or calc. choride to get the profile you want.

 

[Crystal_Ball]

So having now read through the whole thread I have realised the following.....
My water report state
Alkalinity mgHCO3/l 358
Hardness (total) mcCaCO3/l 383

Does this contradict what I have read on this thread to convert HCO3 to CaCO3 by 1.22?

My Salifert result was 245 ppm but I will repeat this as it was my first time using it.

As suggested by @dan125 and @braziliain i will look into cutting with ashbeck water.
I use Beersmith for recipe creation so looked at the water calculator there and it wants magnesium which isn’t on my report. Should I worry about it?

 

[braziliain]

Does this contradict what I have read on this thread to convert HCO3 to CaCO3 by 1.22?

From my reading, this is what I understand.

No, Total hardness and Alkalinity are not the same thing. This is important.

The 1.22 factor will not convert Total Hardness to Alkalinity. It will only convert Alkalinity in CACO3 to Alkalinity in HCO3.

Both Total Hardness and Alkalinity can be reported in the units ppm CACO3, but they are not the same thing.

Total hardness consists of both Permanent Hardness and Temporary Hardness. Total Hardness minus Alkalinity is generally considered to be a fair approximation of Permanent Hardness.

 

[Crystal_Ball]

From my reading, this is what I understand.

No, Total harness and Alkalinity are not the same thing. This is important.

The 1.22 factor will not convert Total Hardness to Alkalinity. It will only convert Alkalinity in CACO3 to Alkalinity in HCO3.

Both Total Hardness and Alkalinity can be reported in the units ppm CACO3, but they are not the same thing.

Total hardness consitis of both Permanent Hardness and Temporary Hardness. Total Hardness minus Alkalinity is generally considered to be a fair approximation of Permanent Hardness.

That’s took a couple of reads to understand but I’ve got it now! Thanks!

 

[strange-steve]

@Crystal_Ball
Sorry for the delay, but the advice given by the others is spot on. Ignore whatever your report says about hardness, it's not really required for our purposes and as @braziliain shows above, only serves to confuse. And since you have the salifert test kit you can ignore the alkalinity values from the report also.

So if your alkalinity is 245 ppm then as suggested, you might be better off diluting 50:50 with Ashbeck or RO water if you can get it. This'll bring it down to about 125 ppm which is much more manageable and means you won't be adding a ton of sulphate and chloride through the CRS addition.

 

[strange-steve]

@braziliain
Your edit edit is correct, that formula is for hardness not alkalinity.

When carrying out the alkalinity test, you should stop adding the KH solution as soon as the colour changes from green/blue to a dark pink colour like the pic below. If the sample turns bright pink you've added too much.

 

[Crystal_Ball]

As mentioned above I use Beersmith so would like to keep track of water profiles using the software, but there is currently no way of using CRS!
So my sums are for 31 litres for a NEIPA style with a target of 20ppm.....
I’ll be using 15 litres ashbeck so roughly 125 alkalinity. (Originally 245 before dilution)
CRS addition 0.53ml/L to reach 25 alkalinity.
How do I work out the increase of sulphate and chloride?
Water report says they are ......
Chloride: min 24, max 57, mean 45
Sulphate: min 35, max 71, mean 90
How does the ashbeck affect these?

 

[braziliain]

As mentioned above I use Beersmith so would like to keep track of water profiles using the software, but there is currently no way of using CRS!
So my sums are for 31 litres for a NEIPA style with a target of 20ppm.....
I’ll be using 15 litres ashbeck so roughly 125 alkalinity. (Originally 245 before dilution)
CRS addition 0.53ml/L to reach 25 alkalinity.
How do I work out the increase of sulphate and chloride?
Water report says they are ......
Chloride: min 24, max 57, mean 45
Sulphate: min 35, max 71, mean 90
How does the ashbeck affect these?

Below is a table that has the chloride and sulphate increases for CRS. In the table it actually says AMS but it's the same stuff.

If you are diluting your liquor by 50% with Ashbeck then add the chloride value on the Ashbeck bottle to your water report value and then divide by 2. Same for the sulphate values.

 

[HarryFlatters]

Hello,

I'm looking to brew a German style Schwarz Weiss for Christmas, and am looking for some direction as to what I require my water to end up like.

I've ordered the test kits, so if I know what I'm aiming for, I will know what to adjust :)

Cheers

H

 

[strange-steve]

@HarryFlatters
Not a style I'm familiar with tbh, presumably it's not the same as a dunkelweizen?

 

[HarryFlatters]

I'd imagine so, Steve.

 

[strange-steve]

Well for a dunkelweizen I would go for around 50-75 ppm alkalinity and 100-150 ppm calcium using calcium chloride.

 

[HarryFlatters]

Cheers Steve, thanks for that

 

[TomR]

Hi at the risk of sounding like a numpty I'm going to ask here. I have the dreaded tcp flavour. I used one campden tablet in the original water but didn't put anything in the sparging water.
Wondering if I should try that next and or would you suggest I pre boil the water I use?
Sorry if this is a basic question

 

[strange-steve]

Hi at the risk of sounding like a numpty I'm going to ask here. I have the dreaded tcp flavour. I used one campden tablet in the original water but didn't put anything in the sparging water.
Wondering if I should try that next and or would you suggest I pre boil the water I use?
Sorry if this is a basic question

Sorry to hear that.
There's no need to pre-boil the water, Campden tablets are very effective on their own, but you should definitely treat the sparge water as well as the mash water.
You've been rather unlucky if chlorine in the sparge water is the cause. Some wild yeast infections can also cause those medicinal flavours though.

 

[TomR]

Thanks. I've used Camden tablets here's hoping.
I've 40 pints of Batemans xxxb bubbling away at the mo