58 replies to this topic

[djinkc]

Never had what I consider big issues with our water here.  Even gave Palmer a copy of our local water report and he said it was pretty good.  Of course this was during the KCBM annual competition.........    Still, why not try to make better beer?

 

Not even close to the meat of the subject.  I don't know if I can finish this book or not.

 

Kinda boring - almost dry.

[HVB]

I was excited for the book and even pre-ordered it. Sadly, I never even bothered to read it, it just sits on the shelf.

[Big Nake]

I was excited for the book and even pre-ordered it. Sadly, I never even bothered to read it, it just sits on the shelf.

Same. I have it and have read parts of it but not the dry/boring parts. I prefer to concentrate on "my" water, how to adjust it for what I need, etc. DJ, my guess is that you don't need direction on water but it's always nice to know what's in your water and what you can do with it for various styles.

[neddles]

It's a reference book, not a cover to cover reader. Much of it does not apply to the home brewer.

[positiveContact]

Same goes for yeast I think.

[HVB]

I got all my water knowledge from Ken!

Same goes for yeast I think.

Same for me at least.

[Poptop]

I was excited for the book and even pre-ordered it. Sadly, I never even bothered to read it, it just sits on the shelf.

me

[denny]

Never had what I consider big issues with our water here.  Even gave Palmer a copy of our local water report and he said it was pretty good.  Of course this was during the KCBM annual competition.........    Still, why not try to make better beer?

 

Not even close to the meat of the subject.  I don't know if I can finish this book or not.

 

Kinda boring - almost dry.

 

STOP BEFORE YOU HURT YOURSELF!!!!    That is one of the most boring books I've ever had the displeasure of trying to read.  It's not even really aimed at homebrewers.

[Poptop]

^^ that's funny

[Big Nake]

I find that most of these books have information that brewers will find helpful but then a very high percentage of things that you don't want to get into. The best thing that I got out of WATER was the section where the author said something like, "pH strips are for amateurs. If you want to make great beer, you NEED a meter". I don't necessarily AGREE with the statement but it did drive me to use a meter instead of strips and I do like the confidence it gives me for knowing the pH throughout the process.

[positiveContact]

I find that most of these books have information that brewers will find helpful but then a very high percentage of things that you don't want to get into. The best thing that I got out of WATER was the section where the author said something like, "pH strips are for amateurs. If you want to make great beer, you NEED a meter". I don't necessarily AGREE with the statement but it did drive me to use a meter instead of strips and I do like the confidence it gives me for knowing the pH throughout the process.

 

if you seem to be having pH problems I can see that.  if you aren't wellllllll, I guess it increases confidence.  you had some tough water to work with though and in your case I personally think it made a whole lot of sense!  my water seems good and even I keep consider getting one but never get to pulling the trigger

[Big Nake]

if you seem to be having pH problems I can see that.  if you aren't wellllllll, I guess it increases confidence.  you had some tough water to work with though and in your case I personally think it made a whole lot of sense!  my water seems good and even I keep consider getting one but never get to pulling the trigger

The thing is that you may not know that you're having pH problems until you get a meter. I was using what I consider to be the best strips (ColorpHast) which were about $20 per box. But I could never really trust matching the color of the strip with the key on the box and it just didn't seem overly reliable to me. It's not that my water is tough to work with as much as I prefer to trust my instruments and take as much variability out of the equation as possible. The Thermapen has made me comfortable knowing my mash temp and the Omega meter has me feeling comfortable with my pH readings. That only leaves about 9,132 other things to question.

[positiveContact]

The thing is that you may not know that you're having pH problems until you get a meter. I was using what I consider to be the best strips (ColorpHast) which were about $20 per box. But I could never really trust matching the color of the strip with the key on the box and it just didn't seem overly reliable to me. It's not that my water is tough to work with as much as I prefer to trust my instruments and take as much variability out of the equation as possible. The Thermapen has made me comfortable knowing my mash temp and the Omega meter has me feeling comfortable with my pH readings. That only leaves about 9,132 other things to question.

 

it's true I can't really know with a lot of confidence beyond there being a lack of indicators in terms of taste that I have a problem.  kind of looking to solve a problem that doesn't seem to be there.

[Big Nake]

it's true I can't really know with a lot of confidence beyond there being a lack of indicators in terms of taste that I have a problem.  kind of looking to solve a problem that doesn't seem to be there.

Further contributing to the issue was that I found some anomalies in BNW where it wouldn't calculate the pH correctly. It occurs to me that someone could use BNW and get it to work properly so that the actual mash pH was predicted accurately by BNW and then the strips could be used just to confirm that you're in the zip code. But I didn't really have that comfort with BNW so I felt that there was some play in the process that I wanted to tighten up. On top of all that, I had made many, many pale beers with some harshness so I actually did have that problem that needed to be solved.

[positiveContact]

Further contributing to the issue was that I found some anomalies in BNW where it wouldn't calculate the pH correctly. It occurs to me that someone could use BNW and get it to work properly so that the actual mash pH was predicted accurately by BNW and then the strips could be used just to confirm that you're in the zip code. But I didn't really have that comfort with BNW so I felt that there was some play in the process that I wanted to tighten up. On top of all that, I had made many, many pale beers with some harshness so I actually did have that problem that needed to be solved.

 

I can't remember the whole story but was your pH actually significantly off or was it something else?

[neddles]

I can't remember the whole story but was your pH actually significantly off or was it something else?

I'm pretty sure it was a corrupted copy of the spreadsheet.

[positiveContact]

I'm pretty sure it was a corrupted copy of the spreadsheet.

 

oh snap!

[neddles]

oh snap!

No snap. It was a real problem. I was helping him through it one night and for some reason it seemed fine until certain point where when you added more acid the pH would not drop. It just sat there. I think Ken talked to Martin about it and he was puzzled too. IDK if Ken ever tried deleting and downloading again or a newer revision. I've never seen anyone else on the net have that problem. 

 

ETA: I was referring to his BNW anomaly that he noted above.

Edited by neddles, 07 February 2017 - 01:24 PM.

[Big Nake]

It got to this point where I was making my various recipes and was using my meter and between taking notes and making a lot of similar recipes, I was able to get a good feel for how much acid to add to the strike water. So I was never really pressed to fix the BNW bug (if it was a bug) or troubleshoot it at all. But it was something that caused me a bit of discomfort with regard to feeling good about my approach. Once I got comfortable with my water, my additions, the acid adjustment and the meter, things got smoother.

[djinkc]

It got to this point where I was making my various recipes and was using my meter and between taking notes and making a lot of similar recipes, I was able to get a good feel for how much acid to add to the strike water. So I was never really pressed to fix the BNW bug (if it was a bug) or troubleshoot it at all. But it was something that caused me a bit of discomfort with regard to feeling good about my approach. Once I got comfortable with my water, my additions, the acid adjustment and the meter, things got smoother.

Isn't there a free BNW and a full blown paid version?

 

Anyway I need to plow through this book at least for the pertinent parts.  I don't do any water adjustments except Camden tablets.  I don't have any big problems I'm aware of but it would be nice to tweak stuff a little.

 

I found a short article Kai did

 

 https://www.braukais...st_vs_pH_meter 

 

I think I'll stick with strips.  It seem that half the posts about pH meters are problems - at least to me.