[Phil_M]

RO, treated with minerals based on what Bru'n water profile I choose.

[homoeccentricus]

Since that one day when I almost brewed with demineralized water with lavender flavor, I stick to low-mineral spring water. I follow Bru'nwater recommendations to the mg.

[HoosierBrew]

Using electrolysis, I separate water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen.  After running the hydrogen and oxygen into a container, it is ignited with a spark, thus recombining the hydrogen and oxygen into ultra pure water.  Of course this is in lieu of the heavy water that I normally brew with

But sometimes I get lazy and don't worry about it, sit back, relax, have a homebrew and use RO/DI or my soft tap water

That's pretty funny. Nice work.

[pete b]

I use my softened tap water which doesn't test high for sodium and gypsum in varying doses and baking soda for dark beer. I only use brun water for a style I haven't brewed yet and don't bother filling out the spreadsheet each time. You don't want to know how I measure . To me its a ballpark thing and I make good beer that way. Others get way into it and enjoy that aspect of it and make good beer too. That's a nice thing about home brewing, you can do it your own way. My opinion though is that getting the minerals and ph in the right range improves beer but right now its fetishized by a lot of home brewers. I think the fact that its talked about so much and seen as something that needs to be done and people are getting milligram scales and adjusting boil ph and post fermentation ph etc. Is making for a strong placebo effect. If you fill out a spreadsheet, measure four salts to the milligram, calibrate a ph meter, check ph, freak out because its off a little, measure acid, measure ph again etc. Then you will really, really want to taste the difference. And you will, whether its there or not. And that's fine.
If this forum had a motto it would not be dwrhahb, it would be ysbwmayph. (You Should Be Worrying More About Your PH)

[Phil_M]

Pete, I kinda have a similar approach, though I do put in a little more effort.

My tap water sucks. RO fixes that, but some minerals are needed. I do fill out a full Bru'n water spreadsheet for each beer, and measure out the mineral additions as precisely as I can. I usually target a pH of 5.4, nice and middle of the road.

And that's when I stop worrying about it. Since I've learned who to use Bru'n water properly, I haven't even bothered measuring my mash pH. Maybe my pH isn't perfect, but it's yet to produce a bad beer.

I certainly haven't had the issues I did before I started using RO water and Martin's spreadsheet. Some of those beers were really bad.

[euge]

My long-time practice has been a simple estimated dilution. The local water is meh in any case except for dark beers.

I used Martin's spreadsheet for the first time yesterday. It's far better than J. Palmer's spreadsheet, which worked ok. Thanks Martin!

Mainly because I'm detecting some defects in the very pale ales and lagers that I pretty much brew exclusively now. Everyone else loves the free beer, of course. But I should be producing a better product.

To be true, it may all be in my head. What happened to that wide-eyed neophyte homebrewer to whom it all tastes great and there's no such thing as a lousy beer...?

[HoosierBrew]

I agree with you Phil, and with Pete to a good extent. I control my pH because I remember the beers I made prior to doing that. Some were luckily pretty good, others despite my best efforts not so good. I use Brunwater to get in the range I want and do measure the salts and acids accurately to get there. But there's a point where I let it go. I don't own a pH meter - some weeks I'm on the edge of buying one, others I just don't think I need it. I've used colorphast strips for years whenever I get the urge to verify Brunwater's prediction, and it's pretty much always close enough to target for my liking. I do agree there's probably a placebo effect when you get down to expecting a result from a few ppm this or that, or 5.3pH vs 5.4, etc . But the awesome thing about brewing is that there's room for the whole spectrum of this stuff.

[Phil_M]

I plan on getting a good pH meter eventually. I've got an el cheapo $15 meter that I never use anymore.

Honestly, if I had $100 to spend on instrumentation, I'd buy either a thermapen or a digital refractometer long before I bought a pH meter. Themapen would do double-duty for bbq as well.

In the meantime, what I'd doing works. Why worry about it?

[HoosierBrew]

I plan on getting a good pH meter eventually. I've got an el cheapo $15 meter that I never use anymore.

Honestly, if I had $100 to spend on instrumentation, I'd buy either a thermapen or a digital refractometer long before I bought a pH meter. Themapen would do double-duty for bbq as well.

In the meantime, what I'd doing works. Why worry about it?

Yeah, I'd love to have a digital refractometer, too. And I'll likely get a pH meter this year, but the nagging con for doing so is that the meter owners here who measure their pH between 5.2-5.6 (even if it's off target) usually let it ride and sometimes adjust downstream.  I can do that with what I have now. I realize that colorphast aren't meter caliber accuracy, but they're definitely ballpark, much like cheap fermometers are surprisingly accurate. We'll see.

[hopfenundmalz]

RO. The local water has >600ppm TDS, and half of that is alkalinity. If I only brewed really big dark stouts, I would be set.

[Weavz]

I have better results using water straight from my well instead of softened tap water. But I wonder whether I should get a water profile done. There is a water lab in my town.

[leejoreilly]

Straight tap water with a campden tab, plus whatever adjustments BrunWater calls for.

[Lazy Ant Brewing]

I use unfiltered tap water with Campden tablet for chlorine and adjust salts with Bru'n Water.

[erockrph]

I have a fairly soft well, so I don't need to use RO to be able to build a water profile that suits the beers I brew. I simply start with tap water and adjust with salts/acids/baking soda to reach the ion profile and mash pH I'm shooting for.