NEED HELP with IIPA water profile

[willey146]

Here is my water that i adjusted for my Double IPA need to know if this will be ok?

Ca 304, Mg 59, Na 71, S04 721, Cl 19, HCO3 293

This is what Beersmith is giving me for a final profile.

Please help, new to water chem and im brewing this on staurday.

 

[Yooper]

Wow- too high in everything (except chloride)!

What is your standard water? We can help you adjust it if we know where you're starting.

 

[willey146]

The water is already adjusted 11 gallons ready for mash ans sparge. How much RO water would bring it to were i want. Why did beer smith tell me to do this much. I was trying to mach burton on trent water profile? i heard it was good for the hop flavor and aroma.

 

[Johnnyhitch1]

IMO water chemistry is not something you need to mess with being such a new brewer.
Use filtered tap water and add burton water salts, you can find it at most LHBS and all online retailers.
IMO adjusting each individually is to much of a pain in the ass as not really needed till you master a certain recipe and want more mouthfeel/profile out of it.

 

[HopsMan]

Like Johnny said, water profile is one of the last things you should be messing with during your homebrew career. The main issue is that you won't really know what the profile is doing to your beer until you've brewed that recipe multiple times and have had consistent success doing it. That being said, if you still want to mess around with the water profile, we would really need to see a water report from your tap water to give you a good idea of what to add and change.

 

[willey146]

Here is the city's response
Thank you for your inquiry. Our finished water has the following concentrations of these specific parameters…
Calcium: 1.6 mg/L (equivalent to parts per million)
Magnesium: 0.42 mg/L (ppm)
Sulfate: 2 mg/L (ppm)
Sodium: 13 mg/L (ppm)
Chlorine: Instead of having free chlorine in our water, we have monochloramine, a combination of chlorine and ammonia with the chemical formula NH2Cl, one of the ammonia’s hydrogen atoms is replaced with a chlorine atom and the resulting combination is a great disinfectant without the taste and smell associated with free chlorine, the amount of monochloramine in our finished water varies depending on where in the system you are, our treated water starts out with a concentration at 3.50 mg/L (ppm), but can get as low as 0.50 mg/L at the far ends of the system. An average level observed last month based on 40 points in the system was 2.16 mg/L. If you want to call me with your location, I can give you a better idea of what to expect where you plan to brew. Please note that when the water first leaves the treatment plant with a 3.50 mg/L (ppm) monochloramine concentration, the ammonia portion of that amounts to approximately 0.60 mg/L (ppm). The chorine outweighs the ammonia by 6 : 1. We generally end up with about 0.10 mg/L (ppm) of free ammonia in our finished water once it has traveled through the distribution system because the monochloramine compound breaks down over time. None of these levels are noticeable, of course. These are all very low concentrations, and again, unlike free chlorine which most people can taste and smell even at low concentrations, monochloramine is undetectable at the levels we have in our water.
Bicarbonate: While this is not something that we measure directly per se, it is important to note that we have extremely soft water with hardness less than 6 mg/L (ppm). To counteract the natural corrosiveness of water, the Bangor Water District adds sodium carbonate (Na2CO3) during the treatment process to reduce the natural acidity of the water and increase its alkalinity making it more resistive to changes in pH.
Alkalinity: Alkalinity in our system is around 24 – 26 mg/L (ppm) with the exception of one isolated area at the far end where we boost alkalinity to 36 – 38 mg/L to further reduce the potential corrosivity of our water to internal home plumbing. I can better delineate that area for you if you wish to call, but in general, it is outer Broadway and the area around Judson Heights. Please note that before the water is treated, its natural alkalinity is very low at 3 – 4 mg/L (ppm).
I hope that this information helps, and again, feel free to follow-up at any point if you wish.
Best of luck with your brewing,
Dina

 

[Yooper]

Your tap water isn't bad. But you need to treat for the chloramine in it. Otherwise, your regular water is far preferable to the mess you've got now.

Use 1 crushed campden tablet for 20 gallons of water. Stir it in the water before getting the water ready for brewing.

As far as what you've got now, with that water profile you've got a mess.

You never want to go over 300-350 ppm of sulfate, and even that is very high. High levels of magnesium have a laxative effect. The HCO3, depending on how you got it, may really be a huge issue.

I'd toss that water, and start over with the campden tablet and plain water, and then add maybe some gypsum to the water. That's about it. We have a lot of information on water in the Brewing Science forum that you may find very helpful, including why you shouldn't (and can't) duplicate that water profile.

 

[willey146]

I have posted the email i received from the city with all the info

 

[Jwood]

Sweet Jesus lawd almighty have mercy on that IIPA. Dont use that water profile. If you want to make correct adjustments, download Bru'nwater and aim for the pale ale profile. And see how you like that. I would only work with gypsum/calcium chloride additions and maybe some pickling lime if the predicted pH was way too low (most likely it will be ok).

 

[bobbrews]

Listen to Yooper.

Invest in Campden tablets. Gypsum and Calcium Chloride would probably be safe bets as well.

In ppm, a more desirable water profile for this style would be something like this (ballparking it):

Ca: 70-160
Mg: 10-20
Na: 10-20
S04: 150-300
Cl: 50-100
HCO3 (alkalinity): 25-50, or as low as possible

High alkalinity = bad
High hardness = good

Hardness is due to Ca and Mg content.