mash chemistry

[tougas24]

hey,

I'm doing my first batch with water chemistry adjustements tommorrow. I played a little bit with the mash chemistry online spread sheet and i have few questions. Here's my saved record number so you can recall it to see: SZBKSR2

I'm using 188 g of chocolate 450° malt in that recipe. If i enter that qty, it gives me a 4,26 mash pH. Since i want to be between 5.3 and 5.6 mash pH, i need to add my chocolate malt after the 60 min mash, when recirculating. Is it normal that low amount of malt can drop that much my mash pH, or it's something else that making it wrong.

THX

 

[TheZel66]

what percent of the grist is the chocolate malt? Also, what's your starting PH of your strike water? If it's really that low, I would raise the pH of your strike water to balance it out.

 

[tougas24]

it starts with a water pH of 7.2. 5% of the grist is chocolate malt

 

[Nosybear]

Mostly, unless your water is really whacky, the mash pH will stabilize itself in the mid-5's without modifications. If you're worried about the chocolate malt, cold-steep it overnight and add the liquid to the boil, avoiding any potential pH or bitterness problems without concern about the water. And unless you're having problems with beers you can trace to the water chemistry (that is, you've eliminated all other causes for the problem - the effect of water chemistry is small relative to other factors in brewing), don't worry about it. Macro-breweries that have to make the exact same beers over and over might obsess about a few ppm of calcium but for most of us, other factors in our process and ingredients far overshadow the water chemistry.

 

[Kaiser]

the problem was that you did not specify the correct malt types for the specialty malts. I saved an updated record here http://www.brewersfriend.com/mash-chemi ... id=TD2K7N5

with those settings I get to a mash pH of 5.7. You may add some acid to get that closer to 5.5

Kai

 

[tougas24]

Maybe it changed when i played with other parameter and i did'nt notice. Now it make sense!

THX