These meters (TDS and pH) come with calibration solutions and they have good reviews overall and the sell at $20 for the pair. I have them, but they are too new for me to give you experience based comments. However, I have tried the pH meter and it took under a minute to stabilize. If you search for "VIVOSUN pH and TDS Meter" on youtube, you will see a number of hits for reviews. if you buy one, follow the storage instructions here: www.coleparmer.com/tech-article/ph-electrode-care www.amazon.com/VIVOSUN-0-05ph-Accuracy-Readout-Temperature/dp/B06XKMH86J
Thanks for the recommendations. I'll do some digging and probably end up with one soon. I see a lot of cheap ones out there but I dont necessarily trust that they'll last for a long time, and many of the more visible/accomplished homebrewers out there seem to use $100+ pH kits, which has made me avoid it for a while. However seeing a lot of comments on this video vouching for performance on these less expensive systems is making me shift my opinion.
I'm definitely gonna grab one of these cheap pH meters before I look at any expensive ones. I work at a power station and we have pH instruments that cost a HELL of a lot of money. Will definitely take it into work and see how it stands up to an expensive one after seeing a comment from a professional brewer satins his £10 eBay pH meter was just as good as his ones that cost over £100... Oh and he said the cheap one has lasted longer 😳
Another great video! Maris Otter is my go-to base malt for any style that doesn't require tons of pilsner malt. For cutting down on ph levels I have heard of some people cutting their tap water with a gallon or so of distilled water. Never tried it myself but thought it would be worth mentioning. Love your willingness to always reach a little further and try something different.
Love my porters a little drier actually. Water profiles are fun to get right. I've found my local water really sucks for lagers, so with those I have to do the RO water direction as well. Good work!
Another great video mate nicely done. Nice to see the ones that don't turn out so well make it to the channel. We all make mistakes! Have you ever tried making a California Common? I made one recently and was pleasantly surprised how delicious it was. Have a try and post up the video for it, as it would be great to hear your experience. It also uses northern brewer hops so you would probably not have to buy more if you have leftovers from the porter. I went with a recipe based of the Anchor Steam Beer in case you're curious...
Thanks for watching! Cal commons are fun, and I have yet to put one on the channel but I definitely should. Anchor steam is a great beer (it is THE Cal Common!). Probably will get one on the channel sometime next year.
I built a portable RO system for around $150. All the parts are accessible on Amazon. I put it in a case I picked up at Harbor Freight. I put an in-line TDS monitor on it. I referenced www.hbrewo.com/ for the build. I’ve used it for a few brews now and it works very well. Water is still coming out at 0ppm and at Ph7. I fill up a few 5 gallon containers before brew day.
Good stuff! A lot of my beers have improved significantly by building my own water from RO or Distilled. I actually use a 60/40 blend of distilled and my filtered tap water when I brew on my big system. Then I use 100% distilled when I use my induction small batch BIAB set up. Cheers!
I'm not sure if I want to do full on RO/distilled water for everything yet, because I really love the way some of my European beers and hoppy beers have come out because of the water, but its probably worth doing for my stouts and porters. Cheers!
@@TheApartmentBrewer I looked at the cost of sending my water off for analysis and it was about the same price to buy a four stage RO unit. If you know your water profile, and you know that it does not change, you can dilute your tap water with distilled or RO water and then adjust that water to match your desired profile. For me, it's cheaper just to use RO and adjust, assuming that the RO has zero of all ions.
@@johnauld1268 I wish I could install an RO unit, but as a renter right now my landlord would not be super happy with that. For now my approach will be using distilled water t build profiles for roasty beers and keeping my base tap water to build profiles for everything else (which frankly works great), but its great to know that the RO system isnt too expensive!
I ordered my RO unit with washing machine connectors. To use it, I put the unit on the kitchen sink, unscrew the washing machine hose and hook up the RO using the fittings below. www.swelluk.com/d-and-d-ro-garden-tap-connector/~ That's not as good a proper plumbing, but it works for me. But if you have water that's good anyway, it makes sense to keep it simple.
I was just curious why you want to stay away from 5.2 stabilizer? I used it in my last brew. I put half a tablespoon in my mash and it locked in perfectly at 5.2. I brewed a hefeweizen and I'm pretty pleased with it.
Mostly because it isn't really good for every water profile out there. My water starts out with relatively high sodium and adding 5.2 stabilizer will increase that count a lot more, which will make the beer taste awful
Man that sucks it didn’t come out like you wanted, it definitely happens, I know hahaha. Looks good and at least you didn’t have to dump it. I’ve had to do that twice it sucks. Another great video man👍🏻👍🏻 🍺 cheers
YES! I need to get funky on this channel. Thanks for the view/comment guys! Really enjoy your live streams (although I always have to watch them later in the week)
Glad you decided to go the RO route, now you can use God's Gift to Dark Beers: Baking Soda! What program do you use to calculate your water chemistry? I use Bru'n Water, and have found both Beer Smith and Brewer's Friend to be somewhat inaccurate with regards to ph at least. At least your recipe looks pretty good, I do love what brown malt adds to a porter/brown ale.
I have shied away from using baking soda since my sodium counts are a lot higher than most people's already, but if I start using distilled it makes sense to use it. I use beersmith, and sometimes bru'n water too if something in my city water changes.
@@TheApartmentBrewer It seems like Beer Smith typically gets you the right calculations, but have you A/B tested it against the Bru'n Water ph? There have been several times (mostly on Brewer's Friend) that my acid additions are waaay out of the norm. But I agree that it's probably a water issue and you'll get better carbonate results from being able to use baking soda.
Haven't done anything like that but that's a good idea. Id be interested to see the difference. I know the two programs calculate hardness slightly differently
I actually brewed a fantastic altbier earlier this year. My water helps create really great European styles since they largely dont use roasted malts (usually a carafa variation is the darkest malt and it provides almost no roast) and because the high sodium/low sulfate content I have rounds out the mouthfeel and flavors really well.
Hey brotha, you said you treated both your mash and sparge water with the same profile. So you just treated each of those separately or did you make one big batch and separate some of it to heat up for your sparge water? I am going to try my hand at the sparge step to up the efficiency on my BIAB system. Beer smith seams to suggest to treat each water step separately. Hope this was clear enough to understand, thanks man!
Typically my process is to treat everything in one large batch and let off some water for sparge before I mash in, which I keep at sparge temps on the side. You'll definitely see efficiency increases by incorporating this step!
What would you say has given you the biggest increase in beer quality? Brewed a few batches, and nothing has been too bad, but nothing amazing. Is the water chemistry important? Quick chilling? Maintaining pH? Curious for your 2 cents
Probably a toss up between when I decided I would start pitching enough healthy yeast (making starters) and starting to customize my brewing water. At those points I noticed my beer got way better and different styles started to actually taste different from each other. I do think getting into water chemistry had a larger quality impact though. It is 97% of the beer after all!
On a home brew scale, baking soda (Sodium bicarbonate) is great for increasing ph. The baking soda will add some sodium to your beer but will be a small contribution. On ph meters, spend the money and get one with a changeable head. Ph meter heads don’t last forever. For them to last longer, you don’t want to stick them in hot wort. You want to cool the wort sample to room temp and then take a reading.
I wish i could use baking soda, but the problem I have is that my sodium count is already very high (65 ppm). Just adding the 2g in this recipe pumped up to 78 ppm for not that much HCO3 contribution. I've heard some suggestions for pickling lime, and for potassium bicarbonate which may be a bit more flexible for my tap water. But I think I'm just gonna do distilled water for my stouts and porters and build from there. Thanks for the insight on the pH meter heads, I really dont want to end up having to buy cheap pH meters only to have to replace them frequently
@@TheApartmentBrewer Sorry, I forgot how high your sodium level was already. I have never used potassium bicarbonate, but pickling lime is strong for anything under a 10 gallon batch. It takes nothing to slug the PH to high and then you have to push it back down with acid again. I would just use distilled or RO and use salts to shape the water to your needs. Good Luck and cheers.
for me it's the opposite. I use my city water for dark beers. 60/40 city/RO for amber and 100 Ro for light. Works out well :). Good luck with the water side of things (btw, if you go PH go mw102, I bought 2 before I bough this one. Went from 30$ one to 80 to this, buy once, cry once)
@@TheApartmentBrewer yes, but more than that, can't even trust the result from "calibrated" cheaper models. I think you are doing it right with going with strips till you can afford a real one.
@@TheApartmentBrewer I have mine as a 3 gallon batch BIAB because thats the most all grain I can do with my current set up. Cant wait to be able to do a full 5 gallons and keg it.
Good question: the alcohol present in fermented wort will actually skew refractometer readings significantly. Plain old hydrometer is just more accurate
@@slugger777 I can understand that, but it doesnt need temperature correction so it makes for a very quick and easy way to be sure of my gravity mid mash or mid boil, and does offer additional precision during those steps.
@@TheApartmentBrewer I guess I just have other priorities in my brewing setup at the moment then. But yeah I can see that it would make your life easier during brewing and mashing. Thanks for the info.
@@TheApartmentBrewer Magnesium adds a tartness to beer (taste it) and isnt really needed about 3-4ppm. sulphates will also enhance bitter/roasty/acrid/acidic .
These meters (TDS and pH) come with calibration solutions and they have good reviews overall and the sell at $20 for the pair. I have them, but they are too new for me to give you experience based comments. However, I have tried the pH meter and it took under a minute to stabilize. If you search for "VIVOSUN pH and TDS Meter" on youtube, you will see a number of hits for reviews. if you buy one, follow the storage instructions here: www.coleparmer.com/tech-article/ph-electrode-care
www.amazon.com/VIVOSUN-0-05ph-Accuracy-Readout-Temperature/dp/B06XKMH86J
Thanks for the recommendations. I'll do some digging and probably end up with one soon. I see a lot of cheap ones out there but I dont necessarily trust that they'll last for a long time, and many of the more visible/accomplished homebrewers out there seem to use $100+ pH kits, which has made me avoid it for a while. However seeing a lot of comments on this video vouching for performance on these less expensive systems is making me shift my opinion.
I'm definitely gonna grab one of these cheap pH meters before I look at any expensive ones. I work at a power station and we have pH instruments that cost a HELL of a lot of money. Will definitely take it into work and see how it stands up to an expensive one after seeing a comment from a professional brewer satins his £10 eBay pH meter was just as good as his ones that cost over £100... Oh and he said the cheap one has lasted longer 😳
I got a cheap one. It crapped out after one use and calibration
Another well made video! I've had some issues with ph tang (I suspect) with some of my darker brews. Good advice, looks delicious 😋 🍻
Another great video! Maris Otter is my go-to base malt for any style that doesn't require tons of pilsner malt. For cutting down on ph levels I have heard of some people cutting their tap water with a gallon or so of distilled water. Never tried it myself but thought it would be worth mentioning. Love your willingness to always reach a little further and try something different.
Cheers to a drinkable beer 🍺.
Really enjoying watching your brews and all the information you provide as you go along.
Thanks! Glad you're enjoying the channel!
Love my porters a little drier actually. Water profiles are fun to get right. I've found my local water really sucks for lagers, so with those I have to do the RO water direction as well. Good work!
When you do get the perfect water its amazing what a different it makes in the beer! Thanks!
Another great video mate nicely done. Nice to see the ones that don't turn out so well make it to the channel. We all make mistakes! Have you ever tried making a California Common? I made one recently and was pleasantly surprised how delicious it was. Have a try and post up the video for it, as it would be great to hear your experience. It also uses northern brewer hops so you would probably not have to buy more if you have leftovers from the porter. I went with a recipe based of the Anchor Steam Beer in case you're curious...
Thanks for watching! Cal commons are fun, and I have yet to put one on the channel but I definitely should. Anchor steam is a great beer (it is THE Cal Common!). Probably will get one on the channel sometime next year.
I built a portable RO system for around $150. All the parts are accessible on Amazon. I put it in a case I picked up at Harbor Freight. I put an in-line TDS monitor on it. I referenced www.hbrewo.com/ for the build. I’ve used it for a few brews now and it works very well. Water is still coming out at 0ppm and at Ph7. I fill up a few 5 gallon containers before brew day.
Try using potassium bicarbonate rather than chalk. It will dissolve far easier and yeast love potassium.
Interesting idea and I can't say I've heard of using that before. I'll have to check it out
@@TheApartmentBrewer Pickling lime works great and dissolves easily
Good stuff! A lot of my beers have improved significantly by building my own water from RO or Distilled. I actually use a 60/40 blend of distilled and my filtered tap water when I brew on my big system. Then I use 100% distilled when I use my induction small batch BIAB set up. Cheers!
I'm not sure if I want to do full on RO/distilled water for everything yet, because I really love the way some of my European beers and hoppy beers have come out because of the water, but its probably worth doing for my stouts and porters. Cheers!
@@TheApartmentBrewer I looked at the cost of sending my water off for analysis and it was about the same price to buy a four stage RO unit. If you know your water profile, and you know that it does not change, you can dilute your tap water with distilled or RO water and then adjust that water to match your desired profile. For me, it's cheaper just to use RO and adjust, assuming that the RO has zero of all ions.
@@johnauld1268 I wish I could install an RO unit, but as a renter right now my landlord would not be super happy with that. For now my approach will be using distilled water t build profiles for roasty beers and keeping my base tap water to build profiles for everything else (which frankly works great), but its great to know that the RO system isnt too expensive!
I ordered my RO unit with washing machine connectors. To use it, I put the unit on the kitchen sink, unscrew the washing machine hose and hook up the RO using the fittings below.
www.swelluk.com/d-and-d-ro-garden-tap-connector/~
That's not as good a proper plumbing, but it works for me. But if you have water that's good anyway, it makes sense to keep it simple.
I was just curious why you want to stay away from 5.2 stabilizer? I used it in my last brew. I put half a tablespoon in my mash and it locked in perfectly at 5.2. I brewed a hefeweizen and I'm pretty pleased with it.
Mostly because it isn't really good for every water profile out there. My water starts out with relatively high sodium and adding 5.2 stabilizer will increase that count a lot more, which will make the beer taste awful
I'm new to all this, but I'm wondering why you didn't just use distilled water for this brew?
Man that sucks it didn’t come out like you wanted, it definitely happens, I know hahaha. Looks good and at least you didn’t have to dump it. I’ve had to do that twice it sucks.
Another great video man👍🏻👍🏻
🍺 cheers
Yeah, I am happy I didn't dump it. But it just makes me want to perfect this damn beer style now haha
TheApartmentBrewer yep, I feel the same way when something doesn’t come out as expected
Do a dark saison!
Crazy that you said this. (Watch you guys every sunday by the way. Love all the info!) I'm brewing a black saison this weekend 🍻
Genus Brewing thats a good idea, I should try that..
YES! I need to get funky on this channel. Thanks for the view/comment guys! Really enjoy your live streams (although I always have to watch them later in the week)
Glad you decided to go the RO route, now you can use God's Gift to Dark Beers: Baking Soda! What program do you use to calculate your water chemistry? I use Bru'n Water, and have found both Beer Smith and Brewer's Friend to be somewhat inaccurate with regards to ph at least. At least your recipe looks pretty good, I do love what brown malt adds to a porter/brown ale.
I have shied away from using baking soda since my sodium counts are a lot higher than most people's already, but if I start using distilled it makes sense to use it. I use beersmith, and sometimes bru'n water too if something in my city water changes.
@@TheApartmentBrewer It seems like Beer Smith typically gets you the right calculations, but have you A/B tested it against the Bru'n Water ph? There have been several times (mostly on Brewer's Friend) that my acid additions are waaay out of the norm. But I agree that it's probably a water issue and you'll get better carbonate results from being able to use baking soda.
Haven't done anything like that but that's a good idea. Id be interested to see the difference. I know the two programs calculate hardness slightly differently
Do you have a good Alt Bier recipe? Thats a nice darkish beer, well not quite the darkness of a porter though!
I actually brewed a fantastic altbier earlier this year. My water helps create really great European styles since they largely dont use roasted malts (usually a carafa variation is the darkest malt and it provides almost no roast) and because the high sodium/low sulfate content I have rounds out the mouthfeel and flavors really well.
I often go for a run during mash, its starting to become a bit of a habit!
Hey brotha, you said you treated both your mash and sparge water with the same profile. So you just treated each of those separately or did you make one big batch and separate some of it to heat up for your sparge water?
I am going to try my hand at the sparge step to up the efficiency on my BIAB system. Beer smith seams to suggest to treat each water step separately. Hope this was clear enough to understand, thanks man!
Typically my process is to treat everything in one large batch and let off some water for sparge before I mash in, which I keep at sparge temps on the side. You'll definitely see efficiency increases by incorporating this step!
TheApartmentBrewer Awesome! Thanks for your ongoing help. Take care!
What would you say has given you the biggest increase in beer quality? Brewed a few batches, and nothing has been too bad, but nothing amazing. Is the water chemistry important? Quick chilling? Maintaining pH? Curious for your 2 cents
Probably a toss up between when I decided I would start pitching enough healthy yeast (making starters) and starting to customize my brewing water. At those points I noticed my beer got way better and different styles started to actually taste different from each other. I do think getting into water chemistry had a larger quality impact though. It is 97% of the beer after all!
On a home brew scale, baking soda (Sodium bicarbonate) is great for increasing ph. The baking soda will add some sodium to your beer but will be a small contribution. On ph meters, spend the money and get one with a changeable head. Ph meter heads don’t last forever. For them to last longer, you don’t want to stick them in hot wort. You want to cool the wort sample to room temp and then take a reading.
I wish i could use baking soda, but the problem I have is that my sodium count is already very high (65 ppm). Just adding the 2g in this recipe pumped up to 78 ppm for not that much HCO3 contribution. I've heard some suggestions for pickling lime, and for potassium bicarbonate which may be a bit more flexible for my tap water. But I think I'm just gonna do distilled water for my stouts and porters and build from there. Thanks for the insight on the pH meter heads, I really dont want to end up having to buy cheap pH meters only to have to replace them frequently
@@TheApartmentBrewer Sorry, I forgot how high your sodium level was already. I have never used potassium bicarbonate, but pickling lime is strong for anything under a 10 gallon batch. It takes nothing to slug the PH to high and then you have to push it back down with acid again. I would just use distilled or RO and use salts to shape the water to your needs. Good Luck and cheers.
I love a good classic Porter, but its got to have some sweet element to the flavor!
Agreed!
for me it's the opposite. I use my city water for dark beers. 60/40 city/RO for amber and 100 Ro for light. Works out well :). Good luck with the water side of things (btw, if you go PH go mw102, I bought 2 before I bough this one. Went from 30$ one to 80 to this, buy once, cry once)
That's what has been keeping me from buying cheaper pH meters - longevity!
@@TheApartmentBrewer yes, but more than that, can't even trust the result from "calibrated" cheaper models. I think you are doing it right with going with strips till you can afford a real one.
Really crazy to see this channel now a days
Hey, bud! Where are you based?
Love me a porter. I have a recipie for a Peanut Butter Porter that everyone loves and wants me to make all the time
Nice! I think a candy bar style porter/stout is something I'll make eventually. Cheers!
@@TheApartmentBrewer I have mine as a 3 gallon batch BIAB because thats the most all grain I can do with my current set up. Cant wait to be able to do a full 5 gallons and keg it.
Why do you still use the hydrometer when taking FG if you have a refractometer?
Good question: the alcohol present in fermented wort will actually skew refractometer readings significantly. Plain old hydrometer is just more accurate
@@TheApartmentBrewer interesting, that makes me want to get a refractometer less.
@@slugger777 I can understand that, but it doesnt need temperature correction so it makes for a very quick and easy way to be sure of my gravity mid mash or mid boil, and does offer additional precision during those steps.
@@TheApartmentBrewer I guess I just have other priorities in my brewing setup at the moment then. But yeah I can see that it would make your life easier during brewing and mashing. Thanks for the info.
Bin the Epsom off and go with calcium chloride for darker beers .
Depends on the starting water profile. I start with 100 ppm Cl already in the water, so adding more chloride makes it overwhelmingly malty
@@TheApartmentBrewer Magnesium adds a tartness to beer (taste it) and isnt really needed about 3-4ppm. sulphates will also enhance bitter/roasty/acrid/acidic .
Was the yeast just rehydrated in water?
Yep, just sterile water
My tap water is great for making dark beers..... maybe I could fill up about 10 gallons and deliver it to you
Cheers Steve
Haha that would help things quite a bit, you have an excellent porter recipe yourself! Cheers jesse!
Chalk really doesn't dissolve well
Also, a nice dry stout is quite refreshing with its low ABV at 4% and dryness. Not all stouts are chewy ;)
Very true! A well made one can be great in warm weather
Get an RO filter and pH meter.