Minimum water treatment

[dreaddan]

I've started to look at water treatment but the amounts of Gypsum and calcium brewfather is suggesting are iro <2 grams..
Is that level of adjustment really worth it?

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Yes probably but without knowing the beer water profile and your source water hard to tell.

 

[Agentgonzo]

It'll make a small difference. It's up to you if you think it's worth it. The chances of the noticing the difference are small, but it's not like it's an arduous step of the brewing process

 

[dreaddan]

I guess it would but is is really noticeable it is..
I've I've included a screenshot of an example adjustment.

 

[YeastFace]

How much liquor/water are you using? I don't think I've ever used more than 2g of any one water salt.

Look at the difference between the calcium (which is beneficial to the mash and generally you'd want at least 50ppm) and sulfate (which aids hoppiness and a dryer moutfeel in the final beer) by that small addition.

It *should* certainly be noticeable from a Chloride-Sulfate ratio perspective which pushes the adjusted water into very hoppy levels from a balanced starting point.

 

[dreaddan]

That was for a 8l mash/total
But have had 0.5g for a 10l mash - 12l total water.

If that's in the right range I'll carry on :)

 

[Agentgonzo]

It sounds like the right range to me.

 

[Agentgonzo]

An easy to do experiment (if you have accurate scales and small measures) is to weigh out about a teaspoon of the salts. From memory, it's a few grams or so (I can't actually remember). If you have small measuring spoons, you can then work roughly what weight your smallest measuring spoon is. Mine was 1/16th of a teaspoon, so using roughly half of that gets 1/32 teaspoon.

You can then put that much of the salts (or whatever rate you need that would be the same as your amount per litre you calculated above) and fully dissolve in a small amount of beer. Then top it up to a pint/500ml (do this so you don't noticeably lose carbonation on your beer).
Then do a side by side comparison with a fresh bottle and see if you can taste the difference.

I did this. Looking for it, it made a slight difference in flavour, but not a huge amount when I did it.

 

[Sadfield]

Worth it purely for ensuring you've enough calcium in your wort for every part of the brewing process, and the end result.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mu...echnical-articles/water-water-everywhere/amp/

 

[Pennine]

I guess it would but is is really noticeable it is..
I've I've included a screenshot of an example adjustment.

I brew 10l and that's basically the max additions I do, 2g of gypsum and 1g CaCl for a hoppy beer. I don't do epsom much anymore though. I am surprised that gets you to 300 sulphate though.

 

[dreaddan]

Cheers, I'll carry on adding the additions.
I'll also try one of my older beers that I didn't add anything to so I can tell the difference..
I'll have to get/workout how to weigh less than a gram...