Please Help Me Understand My Water Report (ideal styles?)

Discussion in 'Homebrewing' started by BedetheVenerable, Jan 14, 2013.

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  1. BedetheVenerable

    BedetheVenerable Initiate (0) Sep 5, 2008 Missouri

    Just got my water report today, after sending a sample into a lab. I've listed below, what they sent me. I know this might be tedious, but for y'all who are experts at water and understand water modifation, etc, could you please let me know if, in general, there are styles that this water is or is not suited to? I'm just really getting into all-grain, but have always used bottled water. I got a chlorine (activated carbon) filter, and would like to start using our house water if at all possible. However, I'd like to start brewing without MESSING with my water chemistry a whole lot, as I don't feel confident in doing so yet. Any help would be much appreciated.

    PH 8.5
    TDS, ppm 318
    Conductivity .53

    Sodium 20 ppm
    Potassium 9 ppm
    Calcium 65 ppm
    Magnesium 27 ppm
    Total Hardness, CACO3 275 ppm
    Nitrate .2 ppm
    Sulfate 8 ppm
    Chloride 5 ppm
    Carbonate 23 ppm
    Bicarbonate 368 ppm
    Total Alkalinity 340 ppm
    Total Phosphorus .81 ppm
    Total Iron <.01



    FWIW, as a sidenote, I have the malts on hand for a Bitter and a Sweet Stout...will I need to use bottled spring water for either of these?
     
  2. GreenKrusty101

    GreenKrusty101 Initiate (0) Dec 4, 2008 Nevada

    Not an expert, but...with a ph of 8.5 you should be fine with anything really dark and containing some caramel. Nothing really screams bad water (to me) for a stout.

    Edit: I'd be more worried about chlorine and chloromines if this were from a municipal water supply
     
  3. psnydez86

    psnydez86 Initiate (0) Jan 4, 2012 Pennsylvania

    I'm definitely no expert and am just getting into water chemistry myself. I highly suggest using either EZwater software or Bru n' water software. I found the Bru n water spreadsheet easier to understand than ezwater so i used it. You can put in your water profile and pick what specific kind of beer you wanna make and the spreadsheet will give you some ranges of where you want each mineral to be at and what to add to your water to achieve that.
    https://sites.google.com/site/brunwater/ all the different minerals are intimidating and focusing on calcium, sulfate, and chloride are the most important ones as a very skilled homebrewer on this forum told me.
     
  4. hopfenunmaltz

    hopfenunmaltz Pooh-Bah (2,611) Jun 8, 2005 Michigan
    Pooh-Bah Society

    That water is hard, but that is not the problem, the high alkalinity is. The water may be ok for a stout. The sulfates are low for a bitter.

    Use Brunwatef or easy water to find how to treat or dilute the water for lighter beers.
     
  5. inchrisin

    inchrisin Pooh-Bah (2,013) Sep 25, 2008 Indiana
    Pooh-Bah

    Off the top of my head you should be set for English styles (Bitters and stouts). If you add some RO to the mix (1/3-1/2) you dhould be looking more like German/Vienna style--or something lighter for that matter.
     
  6. hopfenunmaltz

    hopfenunmaltz Pooh-Bah (2,611) Jun 8, 2005 Michigan
    Pooh-Bah Society

    That water is not so good for most bitters, as it could use more Ca and SO4, less alkalinity.
     
  7. BedetheVenerable

    BedetheVenerable Initiate (0) Sep 5, 2008 Missouri

    I'm (VERY) new at this, but is the reason it's not so good for bitters the fact that the bitterness won't come through as firm and crisp? Since I've never played with water before (as several people said this is the last thing to do in the brewing process) could I make halfway tasty bitters, and would my hopping just not come through as cleanly, or would the whole beer taste off? I certainly don't want to waste a whole batch if I can avoid it; I guess if necessary I'll just use bottled water for the bitter until I'm comfortable with water manipulation. I don't know what the levels of my bottled water are, but I've made a couple of decent bitters with it though the hops, (especially with lots of low-alpha finishing hops), have seemed just a bit rough...
     
  8. hopfenunmaltz

    hopfenunmaltz Pooh-Bah (2,611) Jun 8, 2005 Michigan
    Pooh-Bah Society

    Search for Daniels or Mosher pale ale profile.
     
  9. ditch

    ditch Initiate (0) Aug 3, 2009 Virginia

    Wow. Definitely stout or Porter water. Even diluting 50% with distiller water you Alkalinity is way up there. I would say if you want to make hoppy beers to just buy distilled/RO water and build a profile that is high in Calcium, Sulfates and even Chlorides. That level of Carbonate is going to kill your hops.
     
  10. hopdog09

    hopdog09 Initiate (0) Sep 6, 2012 Michigan

    not to be too picky, but total alkalinity can't be larger than total hardness since total hardness is made up from total alkalinity and non-carbanate hardness
     
  11. marquis

    marquis Pooh-Bah (2,301) Nov 20, 2005 England
    Pooh-Bah Society

    Needs some extra minerals for bitters but the alkalinity my well be reduced sufficiently simply by boiling.It's not unknown for brewers to simply add a tiny amount of mineral acid to counteract alkalinity.
     
  12. BedetheVenerable

    BedetheVenerable Initiate (0) Sep 5, 2008 Missouri

    Well, damn. I'm not sure then; those are exactly the numbers the lab sent me. Do you think there might have been a mistake and should I contact them?
     
  13. pweis909

    pweis909 Grand Pooh-Bah (3,176) Aug 13, 2005 Wisconsin
    Pooh-Bah Society

    This doesn't jibe with what I learned in aquatic geochemistry, albeit that was 20 years ago and I may be overlooking something (Crikey, I'm old!).

    My recollection: Total hardness is not "made from" total alkalinity (but I think I understand why you might say that). Most of the stuff that typically contributes to alkalinity also contributes to carbonate hardness, and then there is this non-carbonate component to hardness. However, a natural water could have some of its alkalinity derived from sodium carbonate minerals, which does not contribute to hardness. Additionally, some alkalinity may come from hydroxide minerals, which may or may not contribute to hardness.

    The convention of expressing alkalinity in units of CaCO3 equivalents and Hardness in units of CaCO3 equivalents adds to the confusion.
     
  14. jokelahoma

    jokelahoma Savant (1,138) May 9, 2004 Missouri

    Your chloride and sulfate are both pretty low, but that bicarb number is off the chart. You can brew darker beers with this (stouts or porters), but even then you'll probably want to add a bit of gypsum or calcium chloride to up the Cl and SO4. Not too much, though, or your Ca will get out of whack. Apparently Mother Nature has it in for brewers, otherwise we would be able to add individual minerals without having to do salts that combine two.

    In my opinion, for lighter colored beers (blonde ales, pilsners, etc.), you'll likely want to dilute your water with some distilled to get those bicarbonate numbers down into a more manageable range. Then you can add back the other stuff that you've also diluted.
     
  15. marquis

    marquis Pooh-Bah (2,301) Nov 20, 2005 England
    Pooh-Bah Society

    As in my earlier post , bicarbonate can be reduced by boiling. Good idea to bubble air through while doing it too.It's always a good idea to preboil brewing liquor anyway , it can get rid of chlorine too though not chloramine.
     
  16. VikeMan

    VikeMan Grand Pooh-Bah (3,043) Jul 12, 2009 Pennsylvania
    Pooh-Bah Society

    If I had your water, I would use distilled/RO water and build from there, using EZWater or Bru'nWater.

    It's not that difficult. It really isn't. If you read the basic water information at the Bru'nWater site and spend some time with one of the spreadsheets, you'll be fine. Building from distilled/RO, just get the mash pH right, get at least 50ppm calcium, and get a chloride/sulphate ratio where you want it, and you're most of the way there.

    In the meantime, you could try a stout, I guess. Or you could dilute your water with RO/distilled. But to figure out if the resulting profile is very good for a given grain bill, you'd really need (you guessed it) one of the spreadsheets.
     
  17. hopfenunmaltz

    hopfenunmaltz Pooh-Bah (2,611) Jun 8, 2005 Michigan
    Pooh-Bah Society

    That does not match the modern definitions that you can find in Palmer or Brunwater.
     
  18. premierpro

    premierpro Savant (1,060) Mar 21, 2009 Michigan

    On my report from Ward Labs my Total Alkalinity is 176 and myTotal Hardness is 85. I think I'll trust the Lab on this one.
     
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