Water
Water makes up most of your beer and is a
very critical ingredient. When you start, most tap
water will make drinkable beer, if you know a few
basics.
#1, get a water report. Many labs provide reports for
brewing, Ward Labs is one we have used for years. Go
get one right now, we will wait here until you get
back as we really can't talk much before you do
that..... waiting.......
OK, now that you know what is in your Dihydrogen
Monoxide (H20) besides the H and the double 0, we can
talk...
Most tap water can make decent beer. The great beer
styles of the world came about due to the location of
the people making the beer and growing the
ingredients. They optimized what they made according
to what they had. We have a modern advantage that we
now have water profiles, and can add things or dilute
to match any location around the world. The
combination of malts with the water is what changes
the whole game. Water does not know what dark or
light, or stout or pilsner is. All it knows is that
there are combinations of minerals and chemicals and
acids and bases that buffer and react in a big soup
called beer. Softer water is generally an advantage
for lighter beers, harder water for darker beers. If
you used tap water in Tampa Bay to try and make a
classic Bavarian Pils, you might not get world-class
perfect results, but I assure you that you'd still
make good beer. Just as if you wanted to make a big
IPA that really had incredible hop flavor, you might
wonder why you cannot hit the mark. It's all water
chemistry. The good news, you don't need to learn much
about the water to get started making great beers that
your friends will enjoy and that can win medals. Many
competitions are won with tap water and extract kits
with less than perfect processes.... so keep reading.
I will keep it simple using my local water as an
example. Our water is good for beers that are amber or
darker due to the water coming from an aquifer that is
mainly limestone and having a harder than normal
balance. Why is the color a factor? Well, the darker
grains used for darker beer contribute to acidify the
mash, and add balance. Your mash should have a PH of
around 5.2 generally, and without going to much into
that, it's all about that interaction of the grain and
water to get a resulting PH in your kettle that works
well.
The big two problem causers are Chlorine, and
Chloramine. If your water has either one, you need to
remove them, period. I don't know how many times I
have had to tell even some of the smartest beginners,
and even homebrew shops, that Chloramines will ruin
your beer and relegate it to the "tastes like
homebrew" category. Chlorine and chloramine can
contribute to the formation of chlorophenols and give
your beer a plastic or "band-aid" flavor. Even a
slight bit of this is obvious to many people, and is a
big problem with homebrewing as people either do not
learn enough about their water before starting, or
they do not listen when people try to tell them to
treat their water.
Local homebrew shops can be a big root cause of the
problem as they are the contact for new brewers, and
some of them refuse to listen, learn, and embrace the
proper water handling processes. These are the people,
that for a few bucks, can sell you what you need to
make better beer, and even include it in their
"starter kits" but many times fail to do this. They
could make a few bucks and improve your beer, but
fail. Not all shops are like this, but it's a shame
that we can't get them all to hit the most important
basic things, especially when you ask them to do this
and try to teach them about water. Frustrating.
Chlorine is simple, it will evaporate or volatilize if
the water is left uncovered a few days, or if a simple
filter is used. Simple filters can be a RV filter from
Wal-Mart for $15, or most any at the local Home Depot,
just read the package. Faster flow = more $$, it's
that simple. Chlorine can also be removed almost
instantly by a small addition of Potassium
Metabisulphite (Campden Tablets). More on this when we
deal with Chloramines.
If you have Chloramines, and your water system
administrator will tell you that, you need to be a bit
more careful. What is a chloramine and why is it
harder to deal with? Chloramines are a combination of
chlorine and ammonia, bonded together, and the purpose
is so that the sanitation properties of the compound
will travel all the way from the water treatment plant
to your tap and remain effective the entire time,
where basic chlorine will dissipate and become
ineffective. How do we get rid of the chloramine
compound??? Simple, mostly the same as chlorine except
the chloramine will not dissipate on its own. Filter
systems would have to be really good to assure that
they remove chloramines as it needs a chemical
reaction (read lots of carbon and more $$). To remove
chloramine with a filter system you need long contact
times with carbon to break down the compound. If you
have no way of knowing what the flow rate across the
carbon needs to be, and have a way of properly
regulating it consistently, and determining that in
fact you are removing the chloramines, then just treat
your water as if it has chloramines intact. Better to
be safe as it costs very little to do the right thing.
So, you can buy a great filter, but when I know there
are chloramines I simply also treat with potassium
metabisulphite (Campden Tablets). All it takes is 1/4
of a standard Campden tablet for each 5 gallons as a
single tablet will treat 20 gallons.
DO NOT FOLLOW DIRECTIONS USED FOR WINEMAKING, THAT IS
TOO MUCH!!!
You are facilitating the breaking of a bond, not
killing yeast as the wine folks are doing. Big
difference, and while a bit of extra potassium
metabisulphite is not harmful, it can carry through
the process and affect your yeast and maybe the taste
of the beer. Keep it simple and do not overthink this,
just do it.
OK, so now you know enough to be dangerous the the
next homebrew club meeting or bottle share.
For my process I first filter the water through a
particulate filter and then twin carbon block filters.
This result is pretty good brewing water but the water
here is still a bit "hard." I also have a reverse
osmosis (R.O.) filter to produce water to dilute the
local water. The RO water is close to distilled (only
H2 and only O) with 11ppm. This allows me to break
down the local water to match any other world location
with sometimes some additional minerals and such. Once
you learn water profiling there are many tools out
there to help you shape your water.

Water:
The Book