# Water Chem Help



## Andy_27 (11/5/17)

Hi guys,
I've got a water report from the council (attached) and plugged the profile into Beersmith and Brewers Friend trying to figure out additions... It looks like my water is fairly low in everything, but also favours the malty profile as Beersmith says 'Extremely Malty' with a Sulfate : Chloride ratio of 0.6. If I plug in a 3g Gypsum addition, it changes to 'Bitter' with a ratio of 3.5. Also the residual alkalinity goes down to -5 ppm. Is that ok and am I working it correctly?

Also, if I add 2g Epsom Salts and 2g Chalk, all the dots turn blue (Beersmith water calc) and the Alkalinity changes to 50ppm, residual alkalinity 3ppm, Effective hardness 48 ppm and Sulfate:Chloride is now 5. I think the blue dots means good levels?

Thanks! 

View attachment AW_EmbeddedResultsSummaryReport.pdf


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## klangers (11/5/17)

Your water is great for brewing. It's far easier to add salts than to subtract (unless you have a reverse osmosis system).

Beersmith is probably oversimplifying this a bit. I can't help you with how to use that as it's not the tool that I use. The ratio _is_ "extremely malty" at 0.6, but the absolute values of both sulfates (~5ppm) and chorides (~15ppm) are very low. Until you get to 20-50ppm, that ratio isn't really valid IMO.

I always start working out my additions by getting my calcium levels sorted. 15ppm for calcium is too low for all grain brewing, so you need to get this up to at least 50ppm. If you use calcium sulphate (gypsum), you can get your calcium AND sulphates up. A few grams of gypsum should be all you need for most styles, unless you're like me and enjoy the chemistry of it all. Depending on what you're brewing, you can also add some calcium chloride to adjust the balance (chloride:sulphate) back again if you need to, whilst having enough calcium. Some epsom salts (magnesium sulphate) can't hurt either.

Don't worry about chalk - it won't dissolve easily anyway and is a pain in the arse.

EDIT: Advice is specific to OP


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## Andy_27 (11/5/17)

Thanks Klangers, thats a big help!


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