Water Frustration

[Loetz]

Beersmith has water quality reports for various cities already included with it as a package, but I'm not quite sure how accurate they are. Have any of you had any experience comparing Beersmith's stats to actual water reports?

According to Beersmith, this is my water profile:
pH: 8
Calcium: 200ppm
Magnesium: 60ppm
Sodium: 8ppm
Sulphate: 125ppm
Chloride: 12ppm
Bicarbonate: 120ppm

But I recently found these stats on the city webpage:
pH: 7.5 to 8.3
Total Hardness: 7-12 (German Hardness Degree)
Carbonate Hardness: 7-12 (German Hardness Degree)
Calcium: 43-58
Magnesium: 6-16
Nitrate: 4-8
Sulphate: 9-12
Chloride: 1-5
Source: http://www.wien.gv.at/english/environment/watersupply/quality/result.html
I'm also guessing that nitrate refers to sodium nitrate or just sodium? Any thoughts on this?

These numbers are very different! I've tried to contact the water company to get a more detailed report from them, but they only refer to the webpage. I know a guy on the German forum that got the same response when he called. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

EDIT:
I found a converter online for the German Hardness and I got these results for 12 and 7 degrees:

EDIT: This gives me a bicarbonate count of between 152-261. Wow, how informative! :wha:

 

[Loetz]

Ugh, my brain is fried. :sick:

I've been messing with the water calculator and trying out different numbers, but at this point I just don't know what to do and I have plans to make a stout and an IPA next week. What would you guys add? I have liquid 33% Calciumchloride on hand, but if I hurry I could order something else.

 

[Mark1964]

beersmiths water results are not accurate its always best to obtain the report from your local water supplier

 

[The Goatreich]

I couldn't work out beersmith's water profiling tool AT ALL, even when I had a good water report from my supplier! I found the one on this website a much better calculator.

 

[Russ146]

I use a small Reverse osmosis system that filters out 99.999% of everything in tap water leaving pure H2o

I use this water for brewing and its perfect everytime so i dont have to worry about water quality.

Its pure water :drink:

 

[Loetz]

I use a small Reverse osmosis system that filters out 99.999% of everything in tap water leaving pure H2o

That's probably leaving you without a lot of minerals that you need.

 

[Mark1964]

I use a small Reverse osmosis system that filters out 99.999% of everything in tap water leaving pure H2o

I use this water for brewing and its perfect everytime so i dont have to worry about water quality.

Its pure water :drink:

Different types of ale require different water profiles some more additives than others. I cant see how your getting perfect beer every time if your not adding the right minerals to your beer profiles??

 

[Loetz]

Russ, you might be interested to read the information on this page:

http://www.howtobrew.com/section3/chapter15-1.html

Especially the section under the table.

 

[Loetz]

I use a small Reverse osmosis system

I'm currently reading the book Brewing Better Beer by Gordon Strong, and I noticed that he writes that he too uses a reverse osmosis system. He says that he then adds back minerals to form the water profile that he desires. Maybe that would be worth your consideration?

 

[Swazi]

I love beersmith but I too can't use the water calculator on there. I've never used the one on this site (I will be giving it a go soon) but use one that is very similar. The water profile on beersmith for my area is completely wrong and the water company one is very close but I still test my water for CaCo3 myself. From that figure a lot of the most important stuff can be worked out. If you do a search on here and the web you'll find instructions on how to test alkalinity, this is what you want to start with. Forget about the waters pH, this is of no concern and will actually change as soon as you add grains to mash in. How much it will change is determined by the CaCo3 figure, which is why that's the one you really want to find out.

 

[Russ146]

Hi Guys

Thanks for your replies

I use R/O water simply because it pure and not full of chlorine and all the other nasties including soon to be added Fluoride.

I only make beer with two can kits so the ro water ensures consistency and makes a perfect brew everytime. My current Nelsons Revenge has been compared to 6X by a Real ale expert so i'm not arguing with anybody about that.

Water from the tap here tastes and smells like its taken from the local swimming pool. As for minerals etc its already in the cans of malt.

If your water is coming from a source thats downstream of a sewage works there will guaranteed be miniscule traces of feces in it. Thats why the put the chlorine in to kill any bacteria, Nice!

So for me its Reverse Osmosis everytime thank you very much

 

[Loetz]

I'm doing water additions for the first time, and I would like it if someone would check my work for me and give me some input.

Here in Vienna, the water report is fairly vague and it expresses the contents in ranges like this:

pH: 7.5 to 8.3
Total Hardness: 6-11 (German Hardness Degree)
Carbonate Hardness: 6-11 (German Hardness Degree)
Calcium: 43-58ppm
Magnesium: 6-16ppm
Nitrate: 4-8ppm
Sulphate: 9-12ppm
Chloride: 1-5ppm

I went with the averages of all of those ranges, so for a chloride content of 1-5 I used 3ppm, etc.
I also did an aquarium water test and a few conversions, and I think it's telling me that the water has a bicarbonate (HCO3-1) count of 140pmm or alkalinity (CaCO3) of 116.
______________________________________________________________

There are two beers I would like to brew: one a slightly malty stout and the other a balanced pale ale.

Pale Ale:
12gal batch
11kg pale
.5kg cara40
40IBU/1.054OG = .73ratio
7SRM

I'm thinking about adding 21ml of carbonate reducing solution (CRS) and I think that should cut the bicarbonate down to about 30ppm. I imagine that it will lower my pH as well, but I don't know how much.
The calcium content here is a little low, but I don't know if I should add calcium chloride or epsom salts or both. The calculator on this webpage suggests using 6 grams of epsom, but wouldn't that lead to a huge sulfate imbalance? That would give me a ratio of around 3chloride/88sulfate.

Stout
15gal batch
18kg pale
1.8kg oats
1.35kg chocolate malt
1kg roasted barley
.75kg black
.6kg cara40
58IBU/1.088OG= .65 ratio
50SRM

For this I think I would keep the bicarbonate at 140. I think I should add around 5grams of calcium chloride which should bump up the calcium content to about 100 and the chloride to 83; This would give a ratio of 83chloride/10sulfate. That seems a little high to me, but I don't know.


So do any of you have any input on this? I appreciate the help!

Oh, and I plan on using campden tabs in both of those brews, but I don't think that effects any of the other additions, right?

 

[Swazi]

Ok, I'll give this a go. Firstly, if you want to raise the Calcium in your water, you need to add a salt that contains calcium. Gypsum is good, it will add calcium and sulphate to the mix. Adding Epsom salt won't add any calcium, it will add Magnesium and sulphate to the mix.
It's difficult to say exactly how much without knowing how much water you plan on treating and how much of that water will be going into the mash. My guess is that your CRS calculation maybe a little light and that you will want to add gypsum for calcium and not any epsom salt. Whenever I add epsom to my brew, it is only ever in tiny amounts compared to the gypsum.

 

[Swazi]

Last night it was getting late and my reply was somewhat lazy. I'm doing the calculation for the Pale ale using this forums calculator.
To calculate your CRS and salt additions you need to know the total volume of water that will go into your brew. I'm going to assume in this case that you are using 12 Gallons/ 55 litres of water total as this is the only figure you've given. Using the simple calculator on this site with the figures you've given I get told to add 38ml CRS, 18.78g Gypsum and 5g Epsom salts. The CRS would go into the water in the HLT and some of the salts would go into the mash and the rest then into the boil.
In following this method I don't even know what the chloride/sulphate ratio is and neither do I care. At this point I'm just looking to improve my beer, the science can wait. I'll judge the results with my palate and go from there.

My only concern at this stage is that the alkalinity and calcium will be in the correct ranges to give me a favourable mash pH, good fermentation and a clear beer.

I hope that was a little more helpful.