Water Treatment For Pale Ale

[hazard]

I've just started AG, now want to take the next step and think about water treatment (yes, i did try the search function!).

I understand that hard water is good for pale ale - eg Burton Ales from North West england. On other hand, dark beers are best made with soft water eg London Porter or Dublin stout.

So if I want to make the best pale ale I can, what if anything is required to get Melbourne Water to the right level of hardness? Is Melbourne Water hard or soft?

Wort hogs are having a pale ale competition in August at Diamond Creek, and since I live just around the corner I might as well throw in a bottle - I am planning a TTL-clone this weekend and would like to make it as good as I can (even if that means thrashing it twice a day). Thanks.

 

[brendo]

here's a good article to take a look at as a primer.

View attachment Key_Concepts_in_Water_Treatment.pdf

There is also some good info in John Palmer's "How to brew" (www.howtobrew.com)

Cheers,

Brendo

 

[razz]

That's the best primer I've read on water treatment yet brendo, specific to Melbourne which helps a lot. Thanks

 

[brendo]

That's the best primer I've read on water treatment yet brendo, specific to Melbourne which helps a lot. Thanks

No worries Razz!!

Tony Wheeler from Melb Brewers wrote it.

I am just starting to play with this aspect myself and have certainly found it helpful so far

Cheers,

Brendo

 

[hazard]

here's a good article to take a look at as a primer.
Brendo

Thanks Brendo, read this on the train home from work - brilliant, just what I wanted to know. Except for one question ... Where do I get calcium chloride? I'll need this on the weekend now that I know about this!

Hazard

 

[Swinging Beef]

Im with you, hazard, I just read it on the train too.
http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/default.asp?CID=11
Sells all the water conditioning bits.

 

[Jye]

If you start using the nomograph from How to Brew then it may be worth checking out this application I put together.

http://nomograph.babbrewers.com

 

[Hutch]

Thanks Brendo, read this on the train home from work - brilliant, just what I wanted to know. Except for one question ... Where do I get calcium chloride? I'll need this on the weekend now that I know about this!

Hazard

I think G&G stock it as well.

 

[hazard]

I brewed up an all grain on the weekend, after carefully reading the Tony Wheeler document. Since I batch sparge, this is what I did:
- mash in with 12 L of water - added 25 ml of calcium chloride solution
- sparged with 10L of water - added 10 ml calcium chloride solution
- second sparge with 10 L of water - added 10ml of calcium chloride solution

Is this right to add a bit of solution to each batch? The manual says to add 1 to 2 ml per Litre of mash but was not clear what to do for batch sparge.

Anyway - this appeared to get me in the right place. I usually get 75% efficeincy 9with no treatment, and my recipes are based on this. On Saturday I got way over target OG - 1056 against 1049 - working backwards, it appears that I got 85% efficiency rather than 75% !!! So water treatment has given great results (unless LHBS weighed out my grains incorrectly).

Anyone in Melbourne - I urge you to read this and take note, on a sample of one it works for me, it woulkd be good to hear if others can get same benefit.

Hazard

 

[scott_penno]

The PDF is a great read. Maybe a little off topic, but I've generally brewed pale ales where the majority of the grain bill has been pale malt with no darker malts at all. Efficiency has generally been around 70%-75%. The last two beers I've brewed have had around 100g of roast malt in a 23L batch and on both occassions my efficiency has hit 85% which has left me scratching my head. The only change to the entire process is the grain bill. I have never treated my water at all and have never measured the mash ph.

So, my question is, is the increased acidity that the roast malt has contributed likely to have been the cause of my increased efficiency?

sap.

 

[Stuster]

Hazard, there's no real need to add extra chemicals to the sparge. Unless you have very hard water, the mash is going to buffer the pH and it should stay around the same. It won't harm anything though. You can also just add it to the kettle after the sparge but again, I really don't see the need.

sappas, getting the right pH for the mash certainly can change efficiency. It might be other factors though like crush, but if that's the only difference then it's probably the pH. Maybe try adding a little gypsum to your next pale ale with only pale grains, something like 2g or half a teaspoon, and see what happens.

 

[HoppingMad]

Great document.

Have been tinkering with some Coopers Clones and had heard that Calcium Chloride is handy to get our Melbourne water a little harder like theirs.
Haven't graduated to using it yet but now I have this will be able to leap in with a bit more knowledge.

Cheers Brendo,

Hopper.

 

[fraser_john]

Palmer recommends adding salts to the kettle after sparge to maintain the ion ppm counts. i.e. if you added salts to get calcium to 80 ppm in the mash and then sparge, then salts need to be added to the kettle to keep it at 80 ppm.

This was on one of the podcasts about water on the Brewing Network.

John

 

[Stuster]

I did listen to that show fj, in fact all the water-ganza. I think he's right to some extent, though I think it's possibly overkill. The balance between sulphates and chlorides will remain the same, so as long as the calcium levels are more or less ok then there's no real advantage to adding extra to the boil. Really no need to bother with it in the sparge, as they said on that program. Anyway, maybe I should add some to the boil and see what the difference is before advising others not to.

Hopping Mad, a coopers clone is going to be fairly pale in colour, so adding some salts to the soft Melbourne water is definitely a good idea. Calcium chloride and/or a touch of calcium sulphate (gypsum). That document is a very good starting point for water additions. The Palmer info on How to Brew is good too.

 

[fraser_john]

I have never added to kettle, but with my most recent brew I did. I use rainwater, so perhaps the difference lies there, but I think that brew is one of the best balanced, best mouthfeel beers I have made in a long time.

Based on this, I am planning to brew an ESB this weekend and intend to do the same, balance up my mash using the nomograph & palmers spreadsheet, then take those additions and apply the same ratios to the kettle.

If the second one turns out well, then I am going to be a convert to carefully managing my water additions.

John

 

[hazard]

I made my second bew with calcium chloride addition on the weekend (black sheep ale clone, recipe care of Dr Smurto). As with the first brew (see my earlier post on this thread) I achieved 85% efficiency.

I have always achieved 75% efficiency with many partials and one AG before I used any water treatment. After 2 in a row at 85% I am willing to say that its no fluke, and that water treatment is providing consistent improvement in extraction rates.

TTL I brewed 5 weeks ago is still conditioning in the bottle, as others have noted recently, the cold weather is slowing down carbonation, so I haven't been able to do the taste test yet. Should be good in a few more weeks.

So my thanks to Tony Wheeler for this wonderful advice. Again, I would encourage any Melbourne brewers to read this and follow it faithfully.

hazard