Moving to tank water

[Crofty]

Hi Guys,

I'm moving soon and the water at my new location will be from rainwater tanks.

Being fairly new and not yet having gotten to the water chemistry business as yet... it's probably a year off at least, was contemplating in a broad sense how this would affect my beers at a time when I'm only just starting to get some consistency going.

I suspect the mineral content will be lower, so I'd need to start adding some of that in and then adjust to taste for future recipes and batches.

Does anyone else working off tank water have a good starting point addition for this? (say x grams of gypsum per xl of water or something along those lines etc...)

I'm slightly feeling a little overwhelmed reading some of the water chem stuff that's out there.

Appreciate any assistance or guidance you can provide

Crofty

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Just brew as you narmally would and see what/if you can taste differently. I brewed all my AG with tank water and no added salts..except an ESB with gypsum, and you could pick the different.

Tank watet is great as it gives you a great zero baseline to start from.

My only advice is to put on the biggest filter you can ( 24" x 4" ). You want the biggest to get decent flow without having to change often, at around 1-2.5 micron

 

[Dan2]

I've been using tank water from day 1 of my AG brewing. Also using salt additions from day 1.
I filter the water into the brewery so (as said above) you have a zero baseline.
The pH is 6. Not that it really matters, as the grain quickly changes that, but it means you don't need to worry about acidifying the sparge water.

I don't have a generic profile whereby I add x, y, z of gypsum, chalk, calcium chloride etc. I tailor the salts to suit each brew.
Since you have a while before you will be moving, spend some time reading over the brewersfriend website. Other people have found the brunwater website very useful too.
Also grab as many podcasts as you can find on water, and just keep listening until it clicks.
It may seem daunting at first, but once it clicks you'll find it all pretty easy.

For every brew, I punch the grist and water details into both brewersfriend water calc page, and EZwater spreadsheet.
First aiming at getting the pH in the right range, then fine tuning additions to suit flavour.
And I always take pH readings with my meter to verify the results.

 

[brewtas]

How do the pH readings match up with the spreadsheet?

 

[Dan2]

How do the pH readings match up with the spreadsheet?

Varies.
Some are spot on, some can be 0.2-0.3 out.
The important thing is to keep records and adjust up or down when re-brewing one that was out.

 

[Dave70]

Only problem I've run into was when using water from our secondary 5000L tank after intermittent rain.
Some of the tannins must have been extracted from the leaves sitting moist in the gutter then washed into tank. You could literally see the stain in the water holding it up to light, though you couldn't really taste it.
Was only making as alt that time so I figured the gypsum addition, plus malt, plus hops, plus boiling it for an hour would see off any astringency.
And indeed it did.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Tanks get stirred up after rain, so prob best to wait a week to let it settle.

 

[Crofty]

Tanks get stirred up after rain, so prob best to wait a week to let it settle.

Even with a filter inline... Or should be fine if I filter?

 

[Nibbo]

I use tank water at home. We have an inline filter @ 25mic after the pump and every things good. We don't get any extra turbulence from the tanks being stirred from rainfall. I've never worried that the water supply is not good enough to brew from. After working in the water industry for years, I'd be more worried from dirty water from the mains water coming through rather than our tank water.
That being said, other peoples systems/catchments may get more muck in their tanks than us so it may need to be treated differently.
I can't help you with the chemistry side of things as I don't add any additives to the water for brewing. I'll play with it one day, I'm sure.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

If its goid enough to drink its good enough to brew with. You cant filter out the tannins.

 

[Crofty]

You cant filter out the tannins.

good point.

 

[Trevandjo]

Probably a stupid question but will rainwater be totally free of minerals? If not could someone recommend a water test kit to buy?

Cheers, Trev

 

[spog]

Probably a stupid question but will rainwater be totally free of minerals? If not could someone recommend a water test kit to buy?
Cheers, Trev

Traces of all sorts will be in tank water,from dust ,leaves,bird shit and so on but in small amounts that won't bother your brewing.
Boil it first if you are concerned about the above concerns.
If you live close to the ocean you will of coucs get salt.
Near a smelter or mine...etc
I have brewed with rainwater unfiltered straight into the pot with no problems.
Cheers....spog...

 

[rockeye84]

Ive done about 30-35 batches and never filtered my rain water, its always been crystal tho. Other than to get rid of sediment & floaters etc, why would one filter their rain water?

 

[rockeye84]

Probably a stupid question but will rainwater be totally free of minerals? If not could someone recommend a water test kit to buy?

Cheers, Trev

If there is a kit I would like to know about it also. I asked my local shire to come test my tank water for mineral content.. $240.. bit steep!! Didn't bother. I'm just going to keep on assuming mineral content as zero.

 

[Crofty]

If there is a kit I would like to know about it also. I asked my local shire to come test my tank water for mineral content.. $240.. bit steep!! Didn't bother. I'm just going to keep on assuming mineral content as zero.

+1 anyone point us in the right direction?

 

[MartinOC]

I'm about to move to bore + tank. I'll get an analysis done on the bore water (for various reasons), but the tank, I'll assume as zero minerals.

 

[vic45]

I had a couple of different samples done a while ago at Ecowise in Geelong and they cost $70 each. Pretty reasonable I thought .

For anyone in Victoria thinking of bore water have a look at this - http://vvg.org.au/

 

[Crofty]

Thoughts on just taking a ph reading of the water... Will that be enough or is there something else to consider?

There's a bulk buy on ph meters going at the moment.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

For fucks sake....Just use your tank water to brew with.

Give up the "I am a wanker brewer....I need more chalk...."