Waterproof Digital pH Meter

[packerduf]

Hey Packerduf you mean something like this?........

Exactly! I've seen this before, somewhere. I wasn't sure of it's validity so I dismissed it. But, if you trust it, then I trust it. I'll give it a go. Thanks for posting the info.

[MadBrewer]

Screwy, let me ask you this...what is the recipe you have in mind for this. Post the recipe, your strike and sparge water amounts and I'll punch in the amounts of salts you have listed above and I'll be able to show you how that profile you listed may or may not be the best route to take. I can run the numbers through EZ water calculator. As I said, adding those salts blind is like not using a recipe calculator to see where you are at with things. In a sense you are simply hoping to land in the optimum ph range instead of making sure you are in the ball park. Adding the Chalk to the brewing water itself is useless, it is not soluble in plain water. It will not dissolve or absorb into the water. It is soluble slightly only in lower ph such as that of the mash. But again, only slightly, it's a water addition you do not need to work with. Calcium Chloride and Gypsum are your friends. Along with some food grade acid such as Lactic to acidify the mash further if needed.

If you are hell bent on using a "profile" for this IPA. Turn to page 165 in the Water book read over about making or adjusting brewing water for an American Pale. At the top of pg 166 in the Water book they give a starting point for a Pale Ale profile. The profile they give on pg 166 is pretty much what Sierra Nevada uses for Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. Now that is a profile I can trust and would recommend, even as a starting point. To give you reference it is something similar to this off the top of my head, and think about how this compares to what you posted:

Ca (Calcium): 70ppm
Mg (Magnesium): 15ppm
Na (Salt): 35ppm
Cl (Chloride): I think it was around 50ppm
So4 (Sulfate): 110ppm
Alkalinity around 25.

They also acidify all the brewing water at once to a ph of 5.5. Of course they are not starting with RO water but you get the idea. Over all it's a fairly mild water profile and think of what that does for Sierra Nevada Pale ale. I mention this for reference because it's something you can relate to, something you have tasted. After all, isnt' that a great tasting beer and pretty much the standard of the style.

[ScrewyBrewer]

Ok, thanks for helping me figure this out. The recipe is super simple 1 pound of CaraPils and 11 pounds of US 2 Row. I planned to modify 10 gallons of water to make the math easier to understand. The confusing part to me is how to adjust the water properties of distilled water using only Gypsum, Epsom Salt, Chalk and Salt. How do I correlate those additions to what you've posted from the book. I guess I can try to read the book again but so far reading it has only raised more questions than providing the answers I was hoping for.

So far all I have to go on are the examples below, which to me are easy enough to understand.....

One tsp. Gypsum (calcium sulfate) = approximately 100 ppm. in 10 gallons.
One tsp. Salt (sodium chloride) = approximately 140 ppm. in 10 gallons.
One tsp. Powdered Chalk (calcium carbonate) = approximately 150 ppm. in 10 gallons.
One tsp. Epsom Salts (magnesium sulfate) = approximately 130 ppm. in 10 gallons.

But how on earth does someone convert those quantities into the examples below?

Ca (Calcium): 70ppm
Mg (Magnesium): 15ppm
Na (Salt): 35ppm
Cl (Chloride): I think it was around 50ppm
So4 (Sulfate): 110ppm
Alkalinity around 25.

[MadBrewer]

Well thats where the water calculators come into play. The thing that is confusing me Screwy is how you are refering to certain ppm values. You cant really have 100 ppm Calcium Carbonate. Adding calcium carbonate...chalk will give you increased calcium but also brings carbonates to the water. The same goes for Gypsum you wont have 100 ppm Gypsum you have calcium sulfate that brings calcium and sulfate. I think instead of your profile for 100 ppm calcium carbonate you simply mean Calcium. I ran the tsp additions you listed for 10 gals of water and come up with a different profile. Ill post some more stuff later.

[MadBrewer]

Ok Screwy, now that I'm home this is a lot easier to do than on my phone but anyway. If I add the tsp amounts of the minerals you listed before into 10 gals of water the profile I come up with from EZ water Calculator is below. As I said, when we add Gysum (calcium sulfate) you will bring up the Calcium ppm as well as Sulfate ppm. If you add Salt you are adding sodium ppm and contributing some Chloride ppm. When you add Chalk (Calcium Carbonate) you are again adding to the calcium ppm and carbonate which will add alkalinity to your water. EZ water even calculates your mash ph, and for your recipe and what you plan to add it's still on the higher side of things. I'm not a fan of treating all the water at once, I understand it may be easier to do that for manual calculations but not for water software. Anyway, the profile I come up with from the amounts list previously actually isn't all too bad, the thing that through me off at first was how you referenced the correlation between the amounts you were going to add and their ppm. Like I said, you can't measure your profile in terms of 350ppm Gypsum, 100ppm Salt and 100ppm Chalk. When you say 350ppm Gypsum I think 350ppm SULFATE from the Gypsum which is a lot and that's why I asked what was your Calcium ppm, what was your Chloride ppm...etc. The salts you first lilsted are the salts you will be adding, but all together, the profile they makeup looks like this:

Ca: 126ppm
Mg: 0ppm
Na: 16ppm
Cl: 24ppm
So4: 204ppm

Alkalinity:52
RA: -38
ph: 5.5

[Brewbirds]

I found this article about the pH the other day when looking at the meters.

I've had some batches that didn't have a good hot break but I don't get what the author is calling "flakes".
Most of my hot breaks with a good rolling boil are just foam.

http://beerandwinejournal.com/proper-boil-ph/

Thought you guys might be interested.

[MadBrewer]

That's a good read Brewbirds. There is also an incredible article here from a guy that experiments to find all these things. http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Ho ... ts_brewing

If you are an all grain brewer, bottom line is you need to take ph seriously for the best possible beer. We might play around with our brewing water, have water profiles and add salts to make adjustments...when really all we are doing is trying to manipulate the mash ph. The water is not the goal, it's just how we get to the right ph for the step we are at.

Mash ph is were it starts, getting that in the optimum range, everything else kinda falls suite. Mash ph, sparge ph, Boil ph, proper fermentation ph, onto the finished beer ph all starts with getting the mash ph in the right range. It's actually quite simple and very rewarding.

There are several things affected by ph being off. Extracting tannins in the sparge, picking up harsh bitterness in the boil or lack of hop utilization. Hot break, good cold break. Finished beer clarity, astringency, flavor stability, good head and retention...the list goes on an on.

[ScrewyBrewer]

Thanks all for your thoughtful and considerate answers and information. I really appreciate learning and sharing information with my fellow Borg brewing buddies.

Today I received an Amazon package that contained the Hanna HI 98120 digital pH tester and calibration buffers I ordered last week. As an Amazon PRIME member I saved a few dollars on the cost of the items and got free shipping too. I've found PRIME to be a bargain because of that and the free streaming movies that members also get access to.

Anyhow the meter is waterproof, has a replaceable electrode, includes a digital thermometer and measures both pH and oxidation-reduction potential. Most of all it seems pretty easy to use having only 2 buttons that are used to read, calibrate and setup the tester. It took me less than 10 minutes to confirm the battery was fully charged, temperature readings were set to F instead of C and program the electrode calibration. From what I can see the 4.1, 7.1 and 10.1 buffer solutions I ordered go into individual cups, the tester gets set to calibrate and after a little dunking in the buffers the tester is ready to use.

This morning I found another great way used to express brewing water properties, this one really stuck in my mind, it was easy for me to understand. The idea equates RO water to a very quiet room with absolutely no noise. Just as an increase in noise level would cause a disturbance in a quiet room a small amount of salts would make a large pH change in RO water. Because RO water has no buffering its pH value is real easy to change, which is not necessarily what we brewers want. When all is said and done all we want to do it set the pH of the mash to 5.2 and keep it there for the entire mash. This equates to a very noisy room full of talking people listening to loud music, a small sound would go unnoticed. We want our brewing water properties to be sufficiently buffered so they can hit our 5.2 pH value but also resist any changes to that value.

Next up is a trip out to my LHBS to reacquaint myself and pick up some much needed brewing salts like gypsum, calcium chloride, powdered chalk and any other goodies they may have.

[bucknut]

Thanks all for your thoughtful and considerate answers and information. I really appreciate learning and sharing information with my fellow Borg brewing buddies.

Today I received an Amazon package that contained the Hanna HI 98120 digital pH tester and calibration buffers I ordered last week. As an Amazon PRIME member I saved a few dollars on the cost of the items and got free shipping too. I've found PRIME to be a bargain because of that and the free streaming movies that members also get access to.

Anyhow the meter is waterproof, has a replaceable electrode, includes a digital thermometer and measures both pH and oxidation-reduction potential. Most of all it seems pretty easy to use having only 2 buttons that are used to read, calibrate and setup the tester. It took me less than 10 minutes to confirm the battery was fully charged, temperature readings were set to F instead of C and program the electrode calibration. From what I can see the 4.1, 7.1 and 10.1 buffer solutions I ordered go into individual cups, the tester gets set to calibrate and after a little dunking in the buffers the tester is ready to use.

This morning I found another great way used to express brewing water properties, this one really stuck in my mind, it was easy for me to understand. The idea equates RO water to a very quiet room with absolutely no noise. Just as an increase in noise level would cause a disturbance in a quiet room a small amount of salts would make a large pH change in RO water. Because RO water has no buffering its pH value is real easy to change, which is not necessarily what we brewers want. When all is said and done all we want to do it set the pH of the mash to 5.2 and keep it there for the entire mash. This equates to a very noisy room full of talking people listening to loud music, a small sound would go unnoticed. We want our brewing water properties to be sufficiently buffered so they can hit our 5.2 pH value but also resist any changes to that value.

Next up is a trip out to my LHBS to reacquaint myself and pick up some much needed brewing salts like gypsum, calcium chloride, powdered chalk and any other goodies they may have.

Keep us updated on the ph meter and how it works out for you. I looked at it on Amazon but didn't see any reviews so I'm very curious to see how this one works out. Also a Amazon prime member and your really can't beat it, super fast free shipping.

[MadBrewer]

That's great you like your meter, but really any ph meter will do the job...we just need to read ph. But a couple things to remember are:

1) The meter needs to be calibrated regularly...like before ever use to make sure its accurate.

2) When reading the ph of a mash sample, pull a sample after several minutes once the mash starts. You need just enough to take a reading, let it cool to 68* in the freezer for a brief minute or two. The reading of a cooled sample will read .3 points higher than the actual mash. If you are shooting for 5.2 in the mash, your cooled sample needs to read 5.5

3) Keep in mind that the water profile you put together will change the character of beers and recipes you have made for all these years. So if you have recipes you really like, when you brew them with RO and adding salts back in, they will become different beers. This is why at first I recommended maybe just doing your regular brew session as usual and see what you get ph wise. See if you are really even off the mark at all. In a sense you will be starting all over as your beers from this point forward will be different.

Also if you are going to pick up water salts, pick up some Lactic or Phosphoric acid so that you can acidify the mash if needed. Even starting with RO water there will be times you need to acidify the mash. You might also need to pick up salts the brew store doesn't carry like Sodium Bicarbonate (Baking Soda) and Magnesium Sulftate (Epsom Salt) as well as plain Sodium Chloride (Talble Salt). Just make sure to get non iodinized salt, otherwise you will poison your yeast.

Good luck, be sure to post about the progress.

[ScrewyBrewer]

I finally found time to calibrate and take actual pH readings of 3 types of drinking water using the Hanna HI 98120 digital pH tester. I appreciate a good challenge every now and again but using it for the very first time couldn't have been any easier. The instrument itself runs a very intuitive calibration routine that's simple to follow. The meter is shipped dry so I soaked it in room temperature buffering solution for about 20 minutes before calibrating it. Once turned on I pressed the "Mode' button and held it until the 'OFF' display changed to 'CAL', the calibration mode.

When the display runs the 7.01 calibration I put the probe end into the 7.01 buffer until the 'USE' display changed to 'REC' or recording mode. There's a little clock icon in the upper left corner of the display that goes away once the tester reading has stabilized. Next the display ran the 4.01 calibration and I repeated the steps above to complete the calibration. The tester was now ready to use on my water samples, in between each sampling I rinsed the probe in distilled water and blotted it dry before taking the next sample. In each case the meter sensed the change in pH then recorded the reading once it had stabilized. It's a real good idea to take the time to let the pH meter stabilize the reading before moving on, waiting at least a minute or two the meter's accuracy appears to be better.

I easily found out several things about the water where I live and the distilled water I bought. The distilled water was nearly neutral, the tap water a bit alkaline and the same tap water run through the charcoal filter nearly a point softer. Interesting I thought to myself as I took second and third samples of them and the 4.01, 7.01, 10.01 buffer solutions and distilled water and recorded their values. I have to mention when storing the pH tester you don't need to overfill the probe reservoir with too much buffer solution like I did. The reservoir is inside the tester's waterproof cap and tends to squirt excess solution pretty far when you snap the cap on the tester.

pH 7.45 - Unfiltered tap water
pH 5.95 - Filtered through a Brita charcoal filter
pH 6.92 - Distilled water from the food store

I ended up buying Campden tablets made from sodium metabisulfate instead of potassium metabisulfate so I'll be returning them soon, why I should have taken my shopping list with me before I got there. I bought some gypsum, calcium chloride, calcium carbonate, potassium bicarbonate, baking soda, Epsom salt and non-iodized salt too. So for now I think I'm pretty much good once I determine what and how much to add to the distilled water.

I'd reached my daily limit of beer intake for the day or I would have poured a sample for a pH reading too. I'm all over Lagunitas beer this month, in fact I have their 'Little Sumptin IPA' and 'Pale Ale' on hand to take pH readings of all week. I've been playing around with different water calculators out there too, trying to find one that's not too advanced for what I can wrap my head around yet. Tonight I'm playing around with a simple Residual Alkalinity or RA calculator I found at Franklin Brew and it's easy to use. I like it because it seems like it will calculate the basic values needed to know about my brewing water.

In fact all I have to input is the recipe's SRM color value and the dilution rate of distilled water, which in my case is 0 since that and RO water are all I plan to ever brew with. Next there are 6 fields where gypsum, Epsom salt, non-iodized salt, baking soda, calcium chloride and chalk is added in grams per gallon. Clicking calculate displays the salt, mineral and alkalinity value in ppm. I locked myself in a room for 2 days until I finally understood what I needed to learn about water chemistry before ever even tinkering with a pH tester. I even have the Lewis DOT Structures for HCO3 -2 that I drew to prove it. I even learned things about the periodic table of elements like atomic weight and valences, I never knew existed before. Now if someone were to ask me to calculate the calcium content of my water as CaCO3 ppm I would be able to do it using a calculator and a pencil with a good eraser.

[MadBrewer]

That does look like a nice easy calculator to use. One thing is missing though...it's not helping you calculate your mash ph. You can make all those adjustments to your water only to find the mash ph is not where you want it. Dont' forget acid such as Lactic or phosphoric is going to be a big contributor to your mash ph as well. Salts are mainly the flavor additions for a beer, sure they can help lower or raise your mash ph/alkalinity but the main factors of the brewing salts are "seasonings".

I still highly recommend checking out EZ water 3.0. It will do the same thing as the calculator you posted, but it also has calculations for what your acid additions will do and it calculates mash ph. I found it to be very accurate when used correctly. I've had great success with it.

[ScrewyBrewer]

Yep both Lactic and Phosphoric acids are on my shopping list too, hopefully I'll be able to get them at my LHBS for this weekend's brewing. In a perfect world, one that I plan to inhabit in a few months, I'll be able to make up a few tiny sample mashes to help figure out the pH values of the grains when mixed with my RO water. I do understand the need to lower pH values when using RO or DI water though, because both RO and DI water have low alkalinity, or buffering properties, that help resist pH changes made by malt, acid and salt additions.

Keep in mind the owner of the company that makes the RIMS BIAB system I want to buy recommended adding 5.2 Stabilizer to the water because BIAB water mash thickness is much thinner than when batch or fly sparging. I believe the 5.2 Stabilizer is a gimmick. I don't believe it can magically lock any water into a 5.2 pH value irregardless of type of grains being mashed or water profile used. So began my quest to figure out where to begin modifying my brewing water properties. Rather than blindly buying someone's blend of mono phosphates and di basic phosphates I want to learn how to make my own recipe, after all isn't that what brewers are known to do.

[ScrewyBrewer]

Today's the big day, 12 pounds of grain a slew of Centennial and Cascade hops and all the water profile additions are in hand. I'll be brewing my Clock Strukker IPA today using distilled [DI] water and additions calculated with EZ Water Calculator and confirmed with Residual Alkalinity Calculator. I still use good old qBrew for calculating my recipes, its easy to use and like a favorite pair of shoes hard to part with.

Step 1:
After calculating my mash and sparge water volumes I entered them in section B:Volume using 100% distilled water.


Step 2:
Next I entered my grain information in pounds and calculated SRM


Step3: Said I needed to lower my water's pH

Step 4a:
Here I added my gypsum, calcium chloride, Epson salt and lactic acid amounts.


Step 5:
Admired the calculated water profile, all the values turned green and the chloride to sulfate ratio indicated a 'bitter' beer which is what I want instead of a very bitter or malty beer.



Going back to Step 3, I was happy to see that the pH values fell well within the optimum range for mashing, things are looking up! Just to play it safe I double checked the calculations using Residual Alkalinity Calculator and found that they all matched up there and it provided me with the residual alkalinity as CaCO3 value too.


So I'm pretty excited to be brewing again finally and putting my new found water profile skills to the test. Wish me luck!

[MadBrewer]

Now that looks more like it Screwy. That profile looks fine. Nice and simple. Its good not to get hung up on exact profiles just keep things within range and thats what matters. Only thing I would have done different would be smipping the epsom salt and adiding more Gypsum for the Calcium. But this looks good.

So what was the estimated ph. Remember EZ water guves you the room temp cooled same ph estimation which is 3 points higher. I usually shoot dor about 5.5-5-6 on the water calculator so I end up with 5.2-5.3 in the mash.

Good luck kedp us posted.