Astringent Ale Syndrome

[jt]

Ok, I've had some problems with astringent ales (as mentioned on the old forum)
I thought I was either
a) reciurculating badly
b) crushing too fast
c) splashing badly from the runnoff to the kettle
d) combinations of all the above

But I think I've fixed all those
The common thread is that the only affected beers have had Aussie Pale as the predominant malt (with <10% Vienna, wheat or caramalt per batch)
Beers with darker malts don't suffer at all. Beers with MO don't suffer either.

So I think that leaves me with wort ph

I had a quick look at promash along with the Wellington water specs and it looks like I could be making lots of various additions depending on the target water spec.

But before I rush off to the chemists- or invest in a ph meter, has anyone else in Welly suffered the same ?

I'd have bought some gypsum from Phil, but someone had just bought his last 4 packets

There was a suggestion from Stu about tartaric acid - Steve Nally uses 50gm per 1000 litres which would put me about 1.5gm for 30 litres

Does anyone have a rule of thumb for additions in Welly perhaps - or should I go the whole hog and test ?

[Greig McGill]

This is REALLY gash, and I'm not sure I'll recommend it, but it has worked for me, ymmv.

I had some similar issues, even with MO as my base malt. I too decided it was probably pH, and so, in the middle of a mash, and having nothing else to hand, I grabbed a large lemon from our tree, squeezed it into a glass, and dumped it, pips and all into the mash tun. A pH reading after 5 minutes showed stabilisation at around 5.6 (cooled) which I think is about right. The problems went away, so I've been doing this ever since (last 5 batches).

Voodoo, I know, but damn my beers have been tasty lately! :)

[jt]

What stage did you start measuring Greig - Like after an astringent batch or have you always measured - strips or meter ?

[Greig McGill]

I had some problems, so decided in advance to measure the pH about 10 minutes into the mash, just using standard get-them-from-your-local-P-lab litmus strips. After adding the lemon juice, I remeasured after about 10 more minutes.

[Sparky]

Haha....Nice idea...All Hell would let loose here if I start using Mrs S's gin lemons for my brewing.

My first brew adjusting sparge water ph almost ready to go into keg.

Unfortunately I didn't test the mash ph, however I'll do that next round.

[Kieran Haslett-Moore]

I love it , thats awesome.

[Fairlane]

Just as an aside, you can get gypsum from a gardening shop a lot cheaper (per kg)...

dh

[jt]

The peas would never forgive me if I gave their food to the beer !!

[Stu McKinlay]

I'm a teaspoon of CaSo4. Flat for a 20L batch, heaped for 40L batch.
Don't add anything to the mash for darker beers but do add it to the sparge water.
Never felt too hard... just a little too soft now and then.
I have a wee jar of tartaric that has never been opened.

[jt]

Thanks Stu - so that's for any base grain - one addition or split between mash and sparge ?

Interesting that J Palmer says treat the mash, not the water - but that's a generalisation I guess

I was 50/50 whether to treat both the mash and sparge water or just to brew dark beers and leave the additions out .. but I'd have to be brewing a beer I was happy with to do that and I'm not there yet either.

Cheers, jt

[Stu McKinlay]

My reasoning: the non-treated sparge will lower the acidity of the mash as you get through the sparge. This means a higher alkaline mash at the business-end of the mash, just when the astringent tannins are most likely to be extracted.

Scientists, feel free to knock my common sense logic. I know what Einstein thought of common sense.

[Richee]

Yes I agree with you Stu. As the sparge continues the mash pH increase (becomes more alkaline) and this is not good.

For me I have not treated the mash as pH gets down to 5.1 with little trouble and 4.99 on my darker beers. I have been toying with the logic of adjusting sparge pH though. Comments from George Fix's "principles of Brewing Science" that I would be interested in feedback on:

"Instead of using historical examples as a guide [water profiles], the best overall strategy is to first make sure the technical requirements of the mash are met (i.e. proper pH) and then adjust the mineral content by using the finished beer's flavours as a guide".

"Direct mash acidification is generally preferred to salt additions for the reduction of the mash pH."

On sparging ..."When the residual extract in the grains reaches 1.0 P then sparging is terminated. In modern practise, the focus has turned to the pH of the wort collected from the sparge because pH increases with the extraction of undesirbale astringents. A general rule is to terminate the sparge when the pH of the collected wort increases much beyond 0.1 pH units higher than the mash pH. In any case it should not exceed 5.5"

Here's my concern "if the sparge water has alkalinity in excess of 50 mg/L as CaCO3, then the pH will quickly approach the critical point". Our water is pH 8 (alkalinity 64 mg/L as CaCO3) so I think I have been extracting astringents due to higher than desirable pH. Fix then goes on to talk a bit about tempertaure being important.

John Palmer has spreadsheet somewhere on his website that includes a calc for adjusting the sparge water to a desired pH.

Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Rich

[jt]

Can I add to my confusion - similar beers with Cali Common yeast (W2112) turn out ok.
Any thoughts on that ?

Maybe I need to check my thermometers and my mash and sparge temps.