Sorry, another mash pH question

[Galena]

My current practice is to make salt additions to the total water for the brew, decant off the sparge water for later use and then mash at 3 litres/Kg
Will this be affecting my measured mash pH significantly? My mash pH has always come out higher than Brewfather predicts and yet the beer pH after fermentation seems to be about bang on

 

[strange-steve]

I've never used Brewfather and don't know anything about it. Does it tell you to treat the mash and sparge water separately? Can you give me an example grain bill and water treatment? Do you have a water report?
Post-fermentation pH is unrelated to mash pH so doesn't really tell you anything about it.

 

[Galena]

@strange-steve I think to clarify my question having researched more since this post, is that when I make additions to the Total Water I add salts and when needed lactic acid to the Total water volume. So when I mash with lets say half of the water I am only getting half of the acid and hence perhaps my mash pH is too high.
I have also seen plenty of discussion on sparge pH which it seems should be a pH of 6 in the runnings, so I can test this easily on my next brew.
It seems there are several schools of thought, but my question is simply, should I add the acid to the sparge water as well?
I'm not sure as Brewfather does treat it separately I shall ask, the developer is pretty good at responding.
Thank you

 

[strange-steve]

So when I mash with lets say half of the water I am only getting half of the acid and hence perhaps my mash pH is too high.

Well this depends on how Brewfather works, but most calculators work out acid additions in ml per litre of water, so as long as you enter the full volume of water then it wont make any difference because the concentration is still the same.

I have also seen plenty of discussion on sparge pH which it seems should be a pH of 6 in the runnings, so I can test this easily on my next brew.

Rather than measuring the pH of the runnings many people reduce the alkalinity to around 20ppm or less which should help reduce tannin extraction during the sparge. This might be a different alkalinity than the mash water requires in which case it should be treated separately.

It seems there are several schools of thought, but my question is simply, should I add the acid to the sparge water as well

I'm not sure what you mean by this, but sparge water should always have a low alkalinity and so unless your water is already very low in alkalinity it requires an acid addition.

I might be reading your posts wrong, but it seems like what you're doing is working out the required additions for the mash but adding those to the mash and sparge water together and so diluting the additions?

 

[Galena]

Rather than measuring the pH of the runnings many people reduce the alkalinity to around 20ppm or less which should help reduce tannin extraction during the sparge. This might be a different alkalinity than the mash water requires in which case it should be treated separately.

My alkalinity is 15 so unless I have increased due to a recipe or water profile then I guess I don't need any

I might be reading your posts wrong, but it seems like what you're doing is working out the required additions for the mash but adding those to the mash and sparge water together and so diluting the additions?

Yes I think that is what I have been doing, I have asked Brewfather for clarity on how this is calculated but this seems to be what I have been doing, especially as my mash pH has always been higher than target, beer pH though has always been about right.

 

[strange-steve]

My alkalinity is 15 so unless I have increased due to a recipe or water profile then I guess I don't need any

In that case you probably don't need to use acids at all, maybe for a pilsner or something else with low calcium. My tap water has an alkalinity of about 30 and I don't acidify it at all. I add a touch of lactic acid to my sparge water but it's probably not needed.

my mash pH has always been higher than target

How high are you talking, and what sort of calcium levels do you aim for?

Regarding Brewfather, presumably it asks you to input a water volume, so if you enter the volume of mash and sparge water combined then it'll tell you how much gypsum/CaCl2 or whatever is required to treat the lot. There's no problem with treating all the water together, the mash and sparge salt additions will be the same concentration, ie. the same mg per litre.

 

[Galena]

@strange-steve
I usually target a mah pH of around 5.3 or perhaps 5.2 but when taking a 15 minute sample from the mash the pH at room temperature has always been around 5.5 or 5.6
Some calcium levels from past brews have been 144, 94, 88, 126

Brewfather gives you the choice to add salts to the total water or you can split the sparge and mash and it will give you amounts for each to equal the total.
Acid additions though appear to be just for the mash volume

 

[strange-steve]

I wouldn't be at all worried about a mash pH of 5.5 - 5.6 and in fact it could be argued that 5.5 is optimal. Personally I aim for 5.4 and if I'm within a couple of tenths of that then I'm happy, it's notoriously difficult to accurately predict pH. Your calcium levels look OK, but you could keep them a bit higher (maybe up to around 150ppm) that would help drive down the pH.

Brewfather gives you the choice to add salts to the total water or you can split the sparge and mash and it will give you amounts for each to equal the total.
Acid additions though appear to be just for the mash volume

As I said with such a low alkalinity I probably wouldn't worry about acidifing the sparge water personally.

 

[Galena]

I wouldn't be at all worried about a mash pH of 5.5 - 5.6 and in fact it could be argued that 5.5 is optimal. Personally I aim for 5.4 and if I'm within a couple of tenths of that then I'm happy, it's notoriously difficult to accurately predict pH. Your calcium levels look OK, but you could keep them a bit higher (maybe up to around 150ppm) that would help drive down the pH.

As I said with such a low alkalinity I probably wouldn't worry about acidifing the sparge water personally.

OK and thank you, I will experiment over the next few brews and see where I end up. I think I will forget about acid additions to the sparge water though, good advice.