red sea alkalinity test kit- HELP PLS

[Vossy1]

The Cl enhances hop aroma and flavour, with it being a dry pale that's exactly what you want.
There are good reasons for adding certain salts/minerals to the mash and boil, but the way I see it, when trying to replicate a water you do just that, it's not as if the original breweries separated salts from their for different parts of the process
In any case, all we can do is 'guesstimate' the waters, based on averages for areas at a particular point in time.

Will be glad to know what you think Steve and if there's a difference to your brews, keep us informed :thumb:

 

[Aleman]

EDIT, our water is near perfect for stouts but can give rise to problems with fermentation due to the low mineral content.

Sorry Vossy, but our water is ok for Pale ales, and Lagers with calcium additions . . .it's totally crap for dark beers like porters and stouts (which require a higher alkalinity to balance the acidity of the darker malts).

As Vossy says though while you can use our water for pale ales you will find issues with fermentation and beer clarity, as calcium is important throughout the brewing process.

I take a very much simplified approach to water treatment having spent 15 years chasing 'perfect' water profiles for towns/ beer styles

1) reduce chlorine/chloramine by adding a campden tablet per 20 Gallons
2) Adjust the alkalinity to that for the beer style, Pale beers reduce it to 30 (It's normally 24-50, but has jumped to 137), Darker beers use a sliding scale from 50-75 for milds up to 125 for stouts, depending on the amount of dark grain
3) Increase the calcium content to a max of 150 (100 for lagers) using calcium sulphate and or calcium chloride (using mostly calcium chloride for malty beers and lagers, and calcium sulphate for hoppy beers)

Unlike vossy I do treat my mash and sparge liquor separately. I treat the total volume for alkalinity, using sodium carbonate not calcium carbonate as unless you treat it in a specific manner it does not dissolve even if you put it straight into the mash.

I then add a proportion of my salts to the dry grist in the mash tun and mash in. at this point I am aiming for a calcium level of 150ppm in the liquor volume.

Before running off the sweet wort I add the remaining amount of salts directly to the boiler Targeting a calcium level of 75-100ppm. . . . The actual sparge liquor gets no treatment

I normally hit my mash pH around 5.3-5.4, and have no issues with beer clarity or fermentation.

 

[Vossy1]

Sorry Vossy, but our water is ok for Pale ales, and Lagers with calcium additions . . .it's totally crap for dark beers like porters and stouts

:lol: Thanks Tony :thumb: It's such a complicated subject (though it shouldn't be) that it's hard to remember what you've learnt when you haven't put it into practice for nearly a year Apologies for any confusion caused

Ps, where were you in my hour of need :lol:

 

[Aleman]

Where were you in my hour of need :lol:

Shovelling Sh!t . . . Literally, it was my turn to muck out the horse

 

[graysalchemy]

I think I am right that some parts of southern cheshire the wirral and liverpool have harder water as some of the supply comes from lake bala via the river dee. Also during the summer the alkalinity increases as aleman says. I like Vossy use the average figure from united utilities and test for alkalinty before each brew and use the forum calculator. However remebering to put the gypsom in the mash is another matter. I forgot last weejk.

Vossy you said that softwater can cause problems with fermentation could this why I am experiencing problems with carton juice wines not fermenting out and no matter how much cajoling I can never get the yeast to restart.

 

[dennisking]

Slightly off topic, Vossy I've been to Timperley a few times, my wife lived there as a child and her late nan lived on the Stockport road for years. Can remember having a pint in a Hydes pub behind her house.

 

[steve963]

ok think ive got it now,

alkalinity ok at present for my pale ales
need a lot more calcium sulphate, as prefer hoppy at present
and some table salt :thumb:

sweet, think I can manage that