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Hey guys, posted this on reddit but wanted to see if there were any responses here.. I am planning on brewing rayfound's MACC IPA and wanted to be sure I'm making the correct additions to distilled water.. The recipe has been scaled down for 5 gallons so the grain bill is this:
Grains:
2 Row - 9lbs 10 oz
Munich - 1lb 12 oz
Honey Malt - 10.5 oz
would I be correct in making the following additions?
0.50 (Gram/gal) Gypsum
0.75 (Gram/gal) Epsom salt
0.23 (Gram/gal Canning salt
0.15 (Gram/gal) Calcium Chloride
and 0.25 (mL/gal) Lactic acid
Thanks in advance!
Posted 34 days ago.
What's your target profile? Yellow bitter? Pale ale?
What are your mash and sparge volumes? I have Bru'n Water open and everything else in, but I need those (input on tab #3) to see if this balances.
Posted 34 days ago.
I have it set to Pale Ale profile.. I was thinking India Pale Ales should fall under that category, but I'm of course learning and really don't know if thats always the truth..
Mash Volume - 3.5 gallons
Sparge - 5 gallons
hopefully that ends up with a pre-boil with about 6-6.5 considering water loss in the grain.. I'm just kinda guessing this (is it obvious I don't have beersmith yet?)
Posted 34 days ago.
Edited 34 days ago by blur_yo_face
Pale ale is fine.
Everything looks good to me, except I'd personally bump that lactic acid up to .6 ml/gal - that gets you to a mash pH of 5.41. By my sheet, .25/gal gets you to 5.59, which is borderline for any beer, and too high (IMO) for a lighter colored beer like this.
Posted 34 days ago.
huh.. thats strange, maybe I am doing something wrong.. its estimating my mash pH to be right at 5.2, and adding more acid brings it down to 5.0.. maybe there's something I'm missing here..
Posted 34 days ago.
Hmm...
One thing was I was using 2.0 and 9 for the pale malt and Munich, respectively. I still get 5.53 now when using 25 ml/gallon.
Do you have "distilled water" selected, and the dilution percentage set to 100% on tab #2?
Also - I see the old javascript:nicTemp() bug on your links. Before you post, do a hard refresh (control +F5) to load the new version of the editor, which should not have that error. :)
Posted 34 days ago.
ah, thanks! I'll try to remember the F5 trick next time..
I have a lot of distilled water burning a hole in my pocket, so I plan to use only distilled water in this brew.. both mash and sparge.. did I plug that in correctly?
I recently bought an RO system, but its used and has dirty filters.. so I'm going to hold off on using it.. I am still trying to decide how I want to install it once its all cleaned, but that's a story for another time.. maybe I'll make a gear/equipment post when I get that figured out..
Posted 34 days ago.
I need to see tab #2 to know if you did the distilled part correctly.
Edit: hang on. Looks like you *did* do it right. I missed an input on tab 3! LOL
If anything, it's now too low on PH. If I drop the lactic to .1 ml/gal, I get a mash pH of 5.3 - as low as you want to be.
Posted 34 days ago.
Edited 34 days ago by homebrewdad
haha! just finished uploading tab #2 to imgur and everything.. I kinda figured everything on tab #1 and #2 are overridden by the dilution percentage going to 100%.. just wanted to be sure I'm doing it all correctly, hopefully I don't have to ask you too many questions after this time..
screw it, I want to see if I can do the (ctrl + F5) trick..
Posted 34 days ago.
Looks good!
You only have to do the control F5 trick once. What happens is that the site tells your browser to cache (save) the old script for future use, so as to load the page faster. It saves it for a good long time.
Control + F5 says "no thanks, give me everything fresh from the server". You get the new code, which then gets remembered - and works (like yours obviously now does).
I think you are golden re: recipe.
Posted 34 days ago.
There's no need for MgSO4 and/or NaCl. Get you Ca to at least 50g/l and balance your SO4 and Cl by the amounts of CaCl2 and CaSO4.
Posted 34 days ago.
that's essentially the response I got from reddit.. so I guess for most beers its all about calcium chloride and gypsum? then if needed, bring the alkalinity up using lactic acid? I already have plenty of both of those, and no MgSO4 or NaCl..
Posted 34 days ago.
That makes sense to me.
I personally tend to use calcium chloride, gypsum, and lactic acid in most of my beers - and nothing else. I have used Epsom salt and baking soda, but that's rare.
Of course, I have reasonably hard water; I'm not building up from distilled.
Posted 34 days ago.
OK, I've been writing the primer all day and putting away the sack of Munich 2.
Send me your file and I'll help you tweak the profile. You need to have your finished profile MATCH the desired water profile. The file linked above looks a ways off.
vinpaysdoc at gmail dot come
Posted 34 days ago.
Couple of things...
You are at about half of the Pale Ale profile's sulfate number. Honestly unless you have brewed with the Pale Ale profile before, be aware that some people do NOT like 300 ppm sulfate in any beer. I brew with it often - but only for competitions. I prefer the sulfate level for IPAs slightly closer to 200 ppm... for beers that go on my personal taps. I like a little magnesium in my hoppy beers - but not overly so - that profile, if you miss high, will produce a dry, minerally beer.
Also - make sure that your Munich is 10L. Munich is a tricky one as some vendors are much lighter. The 10L is much more acidic than the lighter Munich base malts. That lovibond number in BWS drives the calculated acidity... so just verify.
I would shoot for a mash pH around 5.4. It's a forgiving number if you miss either side, and it seems to help hop utilization in the boil kettle some.
Posted 34 days ago.
