Water Part Deux

So after the low mash efficiency last few beers AND my perception (note 1) of low mash efficiency in my last beer, I started looking at water more.

After looking at my options, I found a page on Braukaiser, and ended up purchasing an aquarium test kit that tests GH, KH, pH, NO2, and NO3.  The NO2 and NO3 are unnecessary for brewing, and I had 0 ppm for both of those anyway.  Using the spreadsheet and my 180ppm measurements for both GH and KH, I found Ca = 51 ppm and Mg = 13 ppm.

That’s not too different from my old measurements:

Ca: old 54, new 51

Mg: old 13, new 13

The two interesting differences are alkalinity and pH.

Alkalinity: old 123, new 180

pH:  Old 8.1, new 7.5.

The total alkalinity is a concern – that’s the ability of the water to buffer changes in acidity.  And my pH is lower than expected.  So I may not have had the wort in the proper pH range.  This could be why I’ve had efficiency problems.

2016-10-09-15-19-26

No nitrites or nitrates. 7.5 pH, 180 ppm of both Ca and Mg.

That being typed, I need a good pH meter.  That’s really the only point that I came to after all this.


Note 1: I initially thought that I had really poor efficiency, and there is a problem somewhere in my measurements… particularly not taking a pre-boil gravity.  I have the first running and the second running and the OG, and I determined a potential amount of sugar in the two runnings and it may be okay.  The real problem was that I had far too much strike water and didn’t make any adjustments.  I DID figure out that if I use Denny Conn’s method, I can safely assume his assumption that 10 pounds of grain absorbs 1 gallon of strike water, because mine is a hair over that.

On to the next beer!