Help Reading Water Reports

(That's water to the rest of us!) Beer is about 95% water, so if you want to discuss water treatment, filtering etc this is the place to do it!
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Jolum
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Jolum » Fri Jun 04, 2010 11:42 am

Hi Chris, am I right in that the other chemicals mentioned in my water report are pretty inconsequential compared with the total alkalinity? I've struggled with this ever since returning to brewing. My water report from Seven Trent was pretty useless:
Calcium = ??
Magnesium = ??
Sodium = 18.49
Sulphate = 53.5
Chloride = 20.93
So I followed your example and bought a kit and tested the total alkalinity of my water, it's around 68.5 mg\l. As it was so low I just add a teaspoon of Gypsum to the mash and another to the boil but (if I wanted to) I could reduce it to 30mg\l by adding 5.11 mg\l CRS for a pale ale. Ok I get that. So what about all the other things mentioned in say Graham's water treatment calculator? Just ignore them? That's the bit I've always struggled with. You make sense - when I look at one of those calculators I struggle to understand what it's telling me. Maybe it's just me :roll:
"Everybody has to believe in something, I believe I'll have another drink." - W.C. Fields

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Jolum
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Jolum » Fri Jun 04, 2010 12:54 pm

Cheers Chris, I for one make pretty good drinkable beer without trying very hard on the water treatment side. I just don't want to miss a trick, if I can make my good beer better then I'm all for giving it a go.

And no, I would never be so bold as to criticise Graham's calculator. It's as you say the calculator is all things to all men, though for me it's a little too much :D
"Everybody has to believe in something, I believe I'll have another drink." - W.C. Fields

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Horden Hillbilly
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Horden Hillbilly » Fri Jun 04, 2010 3:21 pm

Thanks for the detailed post Chris. In order to prevent this post from sliding down the board & being lost, I am going to make this a "sticky".

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Jolum
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Jolum » Thu Jun 10, 2010 10:34 am

Chris-x1 wrote:I should add in this litigious, spoon-fed society that acid is dangerous and should be handled with care.

If you don't know the appropriate precautions to take when handling strong acids you should research it on Google or another approriate search engine before buying any CRS.

Key words such as precautions whan handling acid precautions and personal protective equipment

In addition the Health and Safety Executive will offer advice http://www.hse.gov.uk/index.htm
Come on Chris we're all mature enough to know how to handle acid.
1. Low lit room.
2. Some friends you feel comfortable and relaxed with.
3. Pink Floyd on the CD player.
Oh and plenty of water

That is what you meant right? :lol:
"Everybody has to believe in something, I believe I'll have another drink." - W.C. Fields

hebbstar
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by hebbstar » Thu Jul 22, 2010 11:07 pm

Hi
Just after a bit of advice after doing 3 AG brews and getting what I think is low Brew House efficency, due to lower than expected OG and wondering if it's the water quality.

I'm in Chesterfield and the Severn Trent water report says...

Number of tests Min Avg MAX
Hardness Total as CaCo3 mg/l CaC03 4 107.000 131.000 146.000

Checked the forum to see if anyone has posted corrective action for ChesVegas which I can't find.
Do you think the H2O quality is a problem ?

I usually do a 90 min plus mash at the right temps using a coolbox.

I get my grain from a local brewery, Brampton Brewery, so I don't think grain quality is a problem, as they weight out from stock.

Any pointers ?

Cheers

theratroom

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by theratroom » Fri Jul 23, 2010 6:45 pm

Should I be adding gypsum to my water as a kit brewer I mostly do pale ale my water is soft to medium

theratroom

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by theratroom » Fri Jul 23, 2010 7:32 pm

Thanks Chris

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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Aleman » Sun Oct 03, 2010 6:59 pm

Chris-x1 wrote:If your water report does not include alkalinity or total alkalinity (same thing), don't bother asking anyone to decipher it on the forum. There is something you should know and do to help yourself first !!!



Before you do anything, you want to know the total alkalinity of your water expressed as CaCO3 Don't be supprised if this isn't on your water report.

CaCO3 is shorthand for Calcium Carbonate. To standardise alkalinity figures and calculations, brewers refer to alkalinity as an equivilent amount of CaCO3 present in 1L of water. It can be expressed in other ways but we want to know it expressed in terms of CaCO3 or calcium carbonate.

Expressing it as an equivilent amount of CaCO3 or in other words expressing it in terms of CaCO3 means interpreting alkalinity as if it were calcium carbonate that was entirely responsible for the total alkalinity of the water.

This standardises the way we deal with alkalinity and makes some simple calculations even easier.

It is written down on the page as: mg/l CaCO3, for example the alkalinity of my water is 205mg/l CaCO3


If it this figure is given in terms of HCO3 (expresed how much bicarbonate equivilent is present) then change/convert this to the equivilent amount of Calcium Carbonate by dividing it by 1.22, for eg an alkalinity of 1.22mg/l HCO3 = 1.22/1.22 = 1mg/l CaCO3


If you have a figure expressed as Meq/L then multiply the figure by 50 to give you alkalinity (or total alkalinity) expressed as CaCO3, for eg an alkalinity of 1meq/l = an alkalinity of 50mg/l CaCO3mg/l



The reason you want to know the alkalinity of your water is because it is this figure that helps you adjust or control the mash PH. Alkalinity is a buffer that resists shifts in ph with the addition of an acid, without a strong buffer (or high alkalinity) the mild acidic nature of the grains will allow the ph to fall naturally to roughly within the correct range, somewhere near(er)to 5.3. In otherwords, remove the strength of the buffer and you allow the mildly acidic pale malt to do its stuff.


Note: Water ph does not control the mash ph. Don't bother testing it. Total Hardness does not really help either so don't bother reading it, even if you see the letters CaCO3 after it, they are just there to try and catch out those people who can't read instructions :wink: .


Pale ales and bitters require a total alkalinity of 25-30mg/l CaCO3


Homebrewers mostly use CRS (carbonate reducing solution) or Murphys AMS (same thing) to control or reduce it. It's an acid that neutralises alkalinity or reduces the carbonates present (same thing as far as we are concerned).


You want your alkalinity (or total alkalinity) figure to be given in terms of CaCO3, this is because we know that 1ml of CRS neutralise 180mg of CaCO3 and therefore will lower the alkalinity. This means you can calculate how much CRS to add to reduce the alkalinity to your target figure of (say) 30mg/l.

For example: If there is 220 mg/l CaCO3 present in your tap water, and you only want 30 mg/l and you also know that 1ml of CRS will reduce the level CaCO3 level in 1 litre of water by 180mg then:

First take away 30 from 220 (the amount of CaCO3 we want to remain behind from the amount that is currently there)

220 - 30 = 190 (removing 190mg CaCO3 per litre you will leave behind 30mg/l)

to work out how many mls of CRS is required to do this, calculate or how many 180's there are in 190.

190/180 = 1.05 (I prefer not to round up as it's better to slightly under do it than over do it)

You now no that by adding 1.05mls of CRS to 1L water with a total akalinity of 220mg/l CaCO3 you will reduce the alkalinity to 30mg/l CaCO3

If you want to treat 10L of water you will add 10 x 1.05 = 10.5mls of CRS and if you want to treat 25L of water you add 25 x 1.05 = 26.25mls of CRS and so on.


If you don't know what the total akalinity of your tap water is and you can't find it on a water report, test it yourself, it will cost you about the same as 2-3 pints of beer from your local pub and about 10 minutes of your time reading through this thread

>>water testing and treatment thread<<

hint:

http://www.charterhouse-aquatics.co.uk/ ... -1967.html

Image

By testing it yourself, you will get better results than someone who relies on a figure from their water report (if you follow the instrucions in the video and the advice in the thread) because you will have a current, up to date accurate figure for the alkalinity of your tap water.

Some one who relies on a water report could have (is likely to have) and end of year average,or a figure that was taken several months ago and averages or out of date figures can be significantly different than the actual figure. Best case scenario, your ph will be off, worst case scenario, you strip the plating off your elements.

Buying a test kit will also give you the oppotunity to check you have added the correct amount of CRS by testing the water once it has been treated and you will be able to make sure that you actually do have the residual alkalinity (the alkalinity remaining) you want.

It will also tell you if your alkalinity varies from week to week or month to month which it can easily do.

If you are lucky enough to have an alkalinity of 80mg/l or less straight from the tap you can just leave it alone and brew as is once you have removed the chlorine. It may be a little high for pale ales and bitters but it isn't high enough to worry.

Whatever your alkalinity you will probably find you get best results by adding a tsp of gypsum to your mash and a tsp of gypsum to your boil. This boosts your calcium level which helps with all areas of brewing, from the mash to the boil and to fermentation and it will help with presentation of your beer (give it polish). Just because 1 tsp in each helps it doesn't follow that 5 tsps in each is better :wink:.

If your water reports tells you what your calcium level is, great. Aim to adjust it to at least 50mg/l or better still closer to 150mg/l.

Don't know how to do that ? Add a tsp of gypsum to the mash and 1 to the boil and you will be close enough.

>>Related Thread<<
Bump ;)

molehill

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by molehill » Thu Nov 15, 2012 6:38 pm

Where can I locate this video please?

#-o

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Horden Hillbilly
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Horden Hillbilly » Sat Nov 17, 2012 2:10 pm

molehill wrote:Where can I locate this video please?

#-o
Here.

...

molehill

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by molehill » Sun Nov 25, 2012 4:48 pm

Very good ..... Thank you =D>

Tebbs

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Tebbs » Thu Feb 07, 2013 7:17 pm

Hi, I'm a first time brewer and I've got a water report, just wanted to run some figures past everyone and see if I'm understanding properly!

Alkalinity(mgHCO3/l): 302
Calcium: 116
Hardness (Total) (mgCaCO3/l): 290
Chloride: 46
Sodium: 27.2
Sulphate: 50

I'm slightly confused by things I have read elsewhere online about Alkalinity and Hardness, but I think both of these areas are my problems- they seem too high. Couldn't find a figure on my report for Magnesium which is supposed to be the other important factor. Everything else seems to be within acceptable levels.

Any advice/thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

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Eric
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Eric » Thu Feb 07, 2013 9:14 pm

Knowing your water's alkalinity is the starting point, matching that to the style of your proposed beer will get you going in the right direction. In this case it appears you will have to reduce that alkalinty for virtually every style of beer.
Permanent hardness will provide essential minerals needed for brewing, but they might not be in the most ideal form for your purposes, but this is a subject you can explore after mastering control of alkalinity.
At the top of the page, find and click on Image where you will find another link to Graham's Water Treatment Calculator
If you then enter those figures I think you'll find, with suitable use of CRS, an interesting water profile.

Of course, those figures you gave might not represent the water you get from your tap every day, just what it was when that test sample was taken. Consider getting a Salifert Kit that might allow you to measure your water's actual alkalinity.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

barry44

Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by barry44 » Wed Dec 04, 2013 4:26 pm

Hi all.

I requested a water report from Scottish Water and have received the following information:

Expressed as Calcium Mg/l 5.5
Expressed as Calcium Carbonate Mg/l 13.7
Expressed as Calcium Millimoles 0.1
Expressed as French 1.4
Expressed as English 1.0
Expressed as German 0.8

They also attached a water report which gave me a Hydrogen Ion (pH) of 8 and also gave me values for the following which i have input into bru n water:

Sodium 4mg/l
Iron 16.21 ug/l or 0.016 mg/l
Sulfate 8.24 mg/l
Chloride 5.75 mg/l
Nitrate <1 mg/l
Nitrite <0.01 mg/l
Fluoride 0.04mg/l

I did not get values for Bicarbonate, Magnesium or Potassium, is this normal? I am in Glasgow so my water is soft.

With regard to entering my information in Bru n Water, i note that there are 2no values containing calcium, being calcium and calcium carbonate. Do i enter the calium value in the calcium cell and the calcium carbonate value within the carbonate cell or do i leave both empty and add the calcium carbonate value to the reported total alkilinity value?

help!!

Dave S
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Re: Help Reading Water Reports

Post by Dave S » Wed Dec 04, 2013 4:56 pm

barry44 wrote:Hi all.

I requested a water report from Scottish Water and have received the following information:

Expressed as Calcium Mg/l 5.5
Expressed as Calcium Carbonate Mg/l 13.7
Expressed as Calcium Millimoles 0.1
Expressed as French 1.4
Expressed as English 1.0
Expressed as German 0.8

They also attached a water report which gave me a Hydrogen Ion (pH) of 8 and also gave me values for the following which i have input into bru n water:

Sodium 4mg/l
Iron 16.21 ug/l or 0.016 mg/l
Sulfate 8.24 mg/l
Chloride 5.75 mg/l
Nitrate <1 mg/l
Nitrite <0.01 mg/l
Fluoride 0.04mg/l

I did not get values for Bicarbonate, Magnesium or Potassium, is this normal? I am in Glasgow so my water is soft.

With regard to entering my information in Bru n Water, i note that there are 2no values containing calcium, being calcium and calcium carbonate. Do i enter the calium value in the calcium cell and the calcium carbonate value within the carbonate cell or do i leave both empty and add the calcium carbonate value to the reported total alkilinity value?

help!!
Blimey, your water's almost distilled! you're working with an almost blank canvas. I only see one cell for calcium on the Water Report Input page. The value for CO3 is your alkalinity - Calcium. Set the HCO3 cell to zero.
Best wishes

Dave

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