Water
A water profile stores the mineral makeup of your brewing water as six ion concentrations in ppm: calcium, magnesium, sodium, sulfate, chloride, and bicarbonate. Save the numbers from your tap report or a target like Burton-on-Trent once, and any recipe can start from that source water when it works out salt additions. The screen lives at /profiles/water and has two halves: a list of every profile you can reach, and an editor that opens over it for reading or changing one.
Stock and your water
Every profile is one of three kinds, shown as a badge on its row.
Global profiles are templates homebre.ws maintains, covering common city and classic brewing waters. They are read-only at the source.
Custom profiles are ones you built from scratch. They are fully yours.
Edited profiles are global templates you changed. The first time you edit a global, homebre.ws copies it into your library and your changes land on that copy; the global it came from stays as it was. That copy carries the Edited badge and can be reset back to the original.
The actions on a profile:
- Edit
- open a profile and change any field. Editing a global forks it into your own Edited copy on save.
- Copy
- duplicate any profile into a fresh Custom one of your own.
- Reset to default
- on an Edited profile, discard your changes and revert to the global it came from.
- Delete
- remove one of your profiles. A swipe-to-confirm guards it.
- Default source profile
- a toggle in the editor that pre-fills this water as the source for new recipes. One profile holds it at a time.
Browsing water
The list at /profiles/water shows every profile you can reach, global and custom together.
Header. The title, a count chip reading N profiles, and a New profile button that opens a blank editor. A stat strip sits below it with four numbers: Profiles (the total), Avg hardness (ppm), the hardness Range across your profiles (ppm), and Custom (how many are yours).
Filter and search. A Search box filters by name and description. A Group control orders the list by Hardness, by Balance, or None for a flat list. A Type control narrows to Custom, Global, or None for both.
Table columns. On wider screens the profiles appear as a sortable table; on narrow screens it collapses into stacked per-profile cards, each with the swatch, name, the six ion readings, and the hardness and balance scales.
| Column | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Profile | A water swatch, the name, and its description. A Default badge marks your default source; a Custom, Global, or Edited badge marks the tier. |
| Ca²⁺ | Calcium, in ppm. |
| Mg²⁺ | Magnesium, in ppm. |
| Na⁺ | Sodium, in ppm. |
| SO₄²⁻ | Sulfate, in ppm. |
| Cl⁻ | Chloride, in ppm. |
| HCO₃⁻ | Bicarbonate, in ppm. |
| Hardness | Total hardness as ppm CaCO₃, with a band from very soft to very hard. |
| Balance | The sulfate-to-chloride ratio, with a label from round/malty to crisp/hoppy. |
Click a header to sort, click again to reverse. A footer line shows how many profiles are displayed out of the total.
- 1Filter to Custom or Global, or type in Search, to narrow the list.
- 2Click any row to open its editor.
- 3Toggle Default source profile so new recipes start from this water.
The editor
Clicking a profile opens an editor over the list. It is both the read view and the form: the spec is the set of values you can change.
Provenance. When you open a global profile, a line under the title reads “Editing a global profile — your changes are kept on your copy,” your cue that saving will fork it. Custom and edited profiles read “Six ion concentrations in ppm — hardness and balance are derived.”
Ion grid. The six ions sit in a grid, each as a labeled input in ppm, valid from 0 to 9999.
Derived readout. Below the ions, two figures recompute as you type, each with a band and a small scale:
- Total hardness in
ppmCaCO₃, banded very soft / soft / moderate / hard / very hard. - SO₄ : Cl balance, the sulfate-to-chloride ratio shown as
1.5 : 1, labeled round/malty, balanced, or crisp/hoppy. Water with almost no sulfate or chloride reads mineral-free.
Actions. The footer carries a water swatch and the hardness band, then Cancel and Save changes (or Create profile on a new one). An edited profile also offers Reset to default.
Water fields
You edit a profile in the same panel whether you’re creating one, changing your own, or forking a global. Every value is stored as it’s entered in ppm.
Identity.
| Field | What it does |
|---|---|
| Name | What the profile is called. Required. |
| Description | A short note on where the water comes from and what it's for. Optional, up to 500 characters. |
| Default source profile | A toggle that pre-fills this water as the source for new recipes. |
Ion concentrations. Six inputs, all in ppm.
| Ion | What it does |
|---|---|
| Calcium (Ca²⁺) | The main hardness ion. Lowers mash pH and helps the yeast and clarity. |
| Magnesium (Mg²⁺) | A minor hardness ion and yeast nutrient. A little goes a long way. |
| Sodium (Na⁺) | Rounds out malt character in small amounts; harsh in large ones. |
| Sulfate (SO₄²⁻) | Accentuates hop bitterness and a dry finish. The hoppy half of the balance ratio. |
| Chloride (Cl⁻) | Accentuates malt fullness and body. The malty half of the balance ratio. |
| Bicarbonate (HCO₃⁻) | Carries alkalinity, which raises mash pH and buffers dark, acidic grists. |
The editor derives total hardness from calcium and magnesium, and the SO₄ : Cl balance from sulfate and chloride. Both are read-only and update live.
- 1From the list, click New profile for a blank one, or open a Global profile to fork it.
- 2Name it, then enter the six ion values from your water report.
- 3Check the derived hardness and balance read the way you expect.
- 4Click Save changes. A forked global lands in your Custom list as Edited.