Really Struggling with Water Chemistry

[keelanfish]

So, I believe I have tackled just about everything with brewing to success except water. I'm lucky enough to brew in metro Atlanta where our water is fairly neutral and thus far makes fairly good beers of many different styles. I have been a little dissapointed in the maltiness of my malty brews and also been dissapointed in the hoppiness of my hoppy brews. I'm 99% sure that the next step I need to take as a brewer is mastering water adjustment. Below is a water analysis for Ward Labs someone on the forum was kind enough to share with me. I've seen three other analyses from different municipalities around and they are all very close to this one.

pH 7.9
Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) Est 71
Electrical Conductivity, mmho/cm 0.12
Cations / Anions, me/L 1.0 / 0.8
ppm
Sodium, Na 9
Potassium, K 2
Calcium, Ca 9
Magnesium, Mg 2
Total Hardness, CaCO3 31
Nitrate, NO3-N 0.5 (SAFE)
Sulfate, SO4-S 4
Chloride, Cl 9
Carbonate, CO3 < 1
Bicarbonate, HCO3 16
Total Alkalinity, CaCO3 13
"<" - Not Detected / Below Detection Limit

[keelanfish]

Sorry about the fragmented post, my computer starts doing strange things if the posts get too long. Anyhow, I've spent the last two weeks immersed in reading about water from as many sources as I can get my hands on. I've got a math and science background as a physics and civil engineering graduate, but I've always struggled in chemistry and it seems especially water chemistry. At this point I feel like I'm more confused than ever and that I can't determine what's important and what's not. There are so many parameters that I think some of them must be insignificant and can therefore be ignored, but again, I'm not sure of that. I've read most the articles on http://ajdel.wetnewf.org:81/ and have found those helpful, but somewhat overwhelming, A.J. is obviously a genious. I've given many hours to reading the NUBWS user manual and been playing with the spreadsheet, but again, it seems like I'm missing information that the water report doesn't provide and I don't know if it's important or not...

I've also been playing around with the EZ_Water_Calculator spreadsheet found at http://www.ezwatercalculator.com/. It's obviously much simpler, but even it is making me second guess what I'm supposed to do.

Long story short, I'm going to be brewing my ass off for three weeks starting this Sunday February 5, in preparation for a couple home brew competitions that are important to me. I don't want to F-up the beers, but I also want them to be as good as they possibly can be and therefore I'm inclined to implement water adjustments. As I'm not getting anywhere tackling the whole subject of water chemistry and adjustment, I'm going to try to focus on one beer at a time starting with the next post.

[keelanfish]

So, first batch is going to be a Kolsch (JZ Fruh from BCS). I'm not scaling this recipe up, going to stick with the standard BCS brewing parameters with the exception of two things. I'm brewing the all-grain version and my mash efficiency is 75% instead of the 70% BCS assumes. Therefore the grain bill is slightly less than BCS.

I've input the following information into the EZ Water Calculator spreadsheet:

Base Water - Ca 9 ppm Mg 2 ppm Na 9 ppm Cl 9 ppm SO4 12 ppm HCO3 16 ppm
Mash Water - 3.5 gallons, 0% Distilled or RO
Sparge Water - 5.4 gallons, 0% Distilled or RO
Pilsner Malt - 10 lbs
Vienna Malt - 0.5 lbs

This gives the result that without doing any water adjustments, the Effective Alkalinity (CaCO3 ppm) will be 13, the Residual Alkalinity is 6, the Estimated Room-Temp Mash pH will be 5.75, and that my Chloride to Sulfate Ratio will be 0.75.

I realize that the mash pH is too high and that the Chloride to Sulfate Ratio is low and will therefore enhance bitterness, which is not what I want for this style of beer.

[spiderwrangler]

Edit ** I misread, and your followups popped up as 'reserved', so I didn't see your clarification that things were in ppm, and not millequiv. So nevermind what I said...

[ajdelange]

You are blessed with low mineral content water which gives you lots of flexibility and also makes it possible to brew very fine beers. What is often not apprecuated is that beer requires acid in some form in order that the pH of the mash is within the range where the ezymes can do their magic. Your problems are, based on your description, quite possibly caused by a mash pH which is too high, not by a lack of anything in your water. I've had multiple reports of "all the flavors are brighter" when brewers start controlling mash pH. OTOH British style ales depend on sulfate for a lot of their hop character. I recommend starting off with mash pH control (your beers will be better) and then moving on to manipulation of sulfate levels if you want still more hops.

Have a look at
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewin ... er-198460/
This will give you some tips on how to get started down the road towards better beers.

[keelanfish]

Sorry about having to fragment again, and sorry Spider, I'm going to skip over you to complete the post. When I get that many lines, the window just starts jumping all over the place when I'm typing making it impossible to focus or see what I've typed.

I believe, with this style of beer (kolsch) that it is appropriate to target the Koln water profile, although that may be partially eroneous since the brewers may have adjusted that water in some way, but for starters, let's stick with the widely published Koln Water profile of:

Ca 9 ppm Mg 15 ppm Na 52 ppm Cl 109 ppm SO4 86 ppm

Using the spreadsheet I find that if I add 0.4 grams of Gypsum, 2.7 grams of Calcium Chloride, and 1.9 grams of Epsom Salt to the mash I will achieve a Mash pH of 5.69. Adding 2 ml of 88% Lactic Acid achieves a Mash pH of 5.52, which appears to be in the range the spreadsheet suggests.

If I then add a further 0.6 grams of Gypsum, 4.2 grams of Calcium Chloride, 2.9 grams of Epsom Salt, 2.0 grams of Slaked Lime and 5.1 grams of Baking Soda directly to the boil kettle (to avoid screwing with the mash pH) then the spreadsheet gives the following resulting water profile:

Ca 104 ppm Mg 15 ppm Na 50 ppm Cl 107 ppm SO4 85 ppm Chloride to Sulfate Ratio 1.27 (Balanced)

Am I doing this right? Suggestions, comments, critisms, etc are all welcome as I feel I'm flying blind.

[spiderwrangler]

Sorry about having to fragment again, and sorry Spider, I'm going to skip over you to complete the post. When I get that many lines, the window just starts jumping all over the place when I'm typing making it impossible to focus or see what I've typed.

No worries, I didn't say anything useful anyway, so I cut it out. I'm gonna sit back and try to learn too.

[Quin]

Your water is very "soft". You should only have to adjust mash ph and boil ph to brew most styles, but you may want to increase sulfates for hoppier styles.

Also forget city water profiles. Brewers are diluting/adjusting their water all over the world.

I see AJ posted before I could complete my post.