"It's the water..."

[z-bob]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hhyjkHJ3Xo (sorry!)

I just got the water analysis from the local water company. I know the water is hard (soap does not suds at all) but from this I can't tell if how much is carbonate and how much bicarbonate.

pH = 7.6
Alkalinity = 261 ppm
Calcium = 83 ppm
Chloride = 14 ppm
Total hardness = 283 ppm (also 17 grains per gallon)
Iron = 0.19 ppm
Magnesium = 26.1 ppm
Sodium = 6.7 ppm
Sulfate = 26 ppm
Total dissolved solids = 330 ppm

They also gave manganese, copper, and lead numbers, but those were vanishingly small.

I think this is probably good because I want to brew darker beers. Does it mean anything specifically? I can still use American 2-row malt for most of the grain bill as long as I add some dark malt or roasted grain, right? Or will I specifically need pale ale or Vienna malt? I don't want to boil/decant the water to remove calcium carbonate (takes too much time and energy) I'm okay with mixing in a little reverse osmosis water.

 

[z-bob]

Done a little more reading. This water has both high hardness and high alkalinity, so boiling (which I don't want to do) would help some but not enough.

I'm getting back in the game after having not brewed anything in many years. And I want to try doing it all-grain.

How to proceed? I want to brew British-style ales. For this first brew should I just buy distilled or RO water and add a little gypsum? Or can I overcome this with dark malt? Or try dealkilizing the water with lime? (I don't have a pH meter yet) I kind of like the idea of treating the water, but doubt that's the place to start...

(I think I'm just intimidated by all-grain, and pretty sure this water is a handicap) It might even be good water for porter or stout, but I'm not fond of porter and stout.

 

[TheBeerDetective]

Wow! That it quite the hard water.

I'm in Bend, Ore. so I'm not totally sure (our water is pretty much distilled water), but I've been interested in water mineral quality's effect of beer for a while. I would try picking up John Palmer's book Water: A comprehensive guide Or go here. Good Luck!

 

[z-bob]

Thanks for the links.
There's a local microbrewery that's been in business about a year. I should stop by there after work and buy a pint, and talk to the brewer to see how they deal with the local water.

With the magnesium level well over 20 ppm, I'll need to at least dilute the tap water 50% with distilled or RO water to get something decent.

When I was doing partial-mash brews a long time ago, I used filtered tap water for the mash, and distilled water (plus 1/2 tsp vinegar per gallon) for fly-sparging. The acidified sparge water kept it from picking up tannins, and diluted the total iron and magnesium (etc.) I have no idea what my efficiency was; I made up for that with malt extract. I want to try all-grain now, using that new-fangled BIAB process.

I might just buy me a pH meter and play with lime treatment while I'm waiting for my wine and cider to finish so I can bottle them. That gives me an excuse to buy a new toy, and I can use the treated water for making coffee and tea, watering houseplants, etc.

 

[JKaranka]

Isn't that really low in sulphates? I'd expect at least 80ppm around here. I should get my water tested, though...

 

[JKaranka]

I was wrong, I think. Not sure if anybody can shed light on these: Sulphate 20-25mg/l, Chloride 9mg/l, CaCO3 60mg/l, Ca 24mg/l, Sodium 7mg/l. PH 7.5.

 

[z-bob]

Isn't that really low in sulphates? I'd expect at least 80ppm around here. I should get my water tested, though...

It's kind of low, but the chloride is even lower. I will probably need to add both gypsum and CaCl2 (or HCl) once I get rid of the alkalinity.

It is also possible that city's the water report is wrong. Maybe I should buy a pint and a growler from the microbrewery, and have a long talk with the brewer.

 

[poptarts]

Just suck it up and buy RO at the store its like $3-4 a batch and you know exactly what you are working with and can build up the perfect profile everytime for any beer.

 

[grathan]

this is for all-grain brewing?

You could use some lactic acid, maybe start with 5ml into the strike water and probably end up at about 8-10ml once it's dialed in.

 

[cannman]

I used to rock 330ppm beers when I was on a well. I don't know a whole lot about water analysis (yet), but I never brewed a better dry stout than when I lived on that well...

 

[jfr1111]

You can go a long way with lactic acid/acid malt along with dilution and careful beer selection. I brew with hard well water that still tastes very good and I manage to keep the pH in check, both on the mash and sparge side, even using pils malt.

 

[z-bob]

I may be overthinking this. (I do that sometimes)

 

[Qhrumphf]

I'm far from calling myself an expert on the subject (you might want to direct this over to the Brew Science section where actual water experts aka AJ DeLange and Martin Brungard hang out), but my understanding is that the way it's listed, that's "Alkalinity as CaCO3", and at that pH you could safely assume it's almost entirely bicarbonate with a very small (nearly negligible) amount of carbonate, and get a close enough figure by multiplying by 61 and dividing by 50 to get the bicarbonate figure.

That said, yeah, that's some pretty stupidly hard and alkaline water. Unless you're only brewing dark beers or feel like using a lot of lactic or phosphoric acid, I'd start either brewing with straight RO water and building it back up to something more manageable, or at least cutting your tap water substantially with RO or distilled water.

 

[mozart4898]

I'm not a water expert by any means, but just looking over your water analysis, I honestly don't think you're in that bad of a situation. Maybe I'm missing something blatantly obvious that others are picking up on, but if I were you, I'd suggest basically pre-boiling your water to eliminate chlorine in the water and then letting it cool to mash temps (you can even do this the night before, or if you're really patient you can just put the water in your kettle(s) and leave it sit uncovered for a day or two to let the chlorine dissipate). Chlorine is, I believe, the #1 water issue most people deal with (not to be confused with chloride, the mineral/ion that shows up in your water report).

I use this when I brew to calculate mineral additions or RO water dilution, but at first I'd suggest just playing around with the "target profile" choices and comparing them to what your water looks like, and what you want to brew. Your magnesium level might be a bit high but not too high to be a big problem I wouldn't think. Other than that, unless you're looking to brew very light beers (pilseners, etc.) you might just give it a shot with your water. Or to keep it simple, just cut it 50/50 with store bought RO water. At my old house (I've yet to brew a beer at the new one actually, been a month and a half since I moved and probably close to 3 months since I've brewed at all), I used to use something like 1 gallon of tap water to 8 gallons of RO water and build it up...the reason for the tap water was just to get the trace minerals that are nearly all lost in RO water. I suspect some of my beers would have been just fine with just a mix of tap and RO and no additions but I frequently added gypsum, calcium chloride, salt, and sometimes baking soda in an effort to chase a "perfect" water. FYI, my levels were higher pretty much across the board than yours and I made one beer with tap water (an amber ale) when I first started brewing a number of years ago, extract + grains at that, and it placed in a competition. I made a number of others with straight tap water that while maybe not perfect, were still pretty drinkable. I didn't even do anything to drive off the chlorine in many of those. (FYI, on a total dissolved solids meter that read up to a max of 400, the water there maxed out the meter...even when run through a sink-mounted purifier. It was hard enough it was a wonder it didn't break a glass, and made horrible coffee - I didn't realize how much better my coffee could be until I used some RO water to make it.)

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

the only way to real way to get the water right is buy or make ro water and add the necessary minerals or adjustments for your beer. in most cases 50% filtered water and 50% distilled water does fine with yeast nutrient.

I personally use 2 charcoal filters with city water, yeast nutrient and a starter with a lot of oxygen and all beers no mater what type turn out good

the basic rule of thumb is the lighter the beer the softer the water, the darker beers can have harder water "unless" your looking for a sweet beer then the middle of the road is fine

 

[JKaranka]

Didn't Burton have hard and high in sulphate waters for pale ales and London / Dublin soft and alkaline for porter and stout? Still trying to get my head around it!