Using marble as a buffer

Production methods from starch to sugars.

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Badmotivator
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Using marble as a buffer

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Nerdybrewer just reminded me to watch the pH of my panela rum when using dunder. Good advice, of course. I have used oyster shell grit on occasion, but I dislike it, especially when it ends up in my garbage disposal. A couple of large shells would be nice, but I don't have any handy. But I got to thinking about something like a "sacrificial anode", but for pH. I searched on HD for "marble" and "buffer" and found only this bit:
cob wrote:
rad14701 wrote:ANY fresh water or sea water shells will work... :idea:
actually any calcium carbonate will do.

the shells are one source, pharmaceutical and food grade CC are made from marble, some antacids are made with CC.
I happen to have a large block of marble, so I cut off some pieces to try. I wanted pieces which are a) high surface area to weight ratio, b) not so thin as to be easily breakable and c) large enough to be really easy to find and remove. I think my ideal is a rod or bar long enough that it barely fits into my 8 gal fermenter buckets.

I will be testing marble as a buffer as soon as I get a low-pH mash going, such as panela + dunder. Any guesses on how well it will work, both in terms of its buffering and also ease of use and reusability?
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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> I think my ideal is a rod or bar long enough that it barely fits into my 8 gal fermenter buckets.


Or you could suspend smaller chunks in a vessel like this "hop bomb" ...

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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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hmmmm.....interesting. I'll be watching.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Badmotivator's Buffer Bars? :)

Just for fun I threw one into one of the 1st gen panela ferments but not the other. Time will tell.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I hope you weighed it first so that you can work out how much gets used.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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NZChris wrote:I hope you weighed it first so that you can work out how much gets used.
Naturally. :) 722 g
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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greggn wrote:> I think my ideal is a rod or bar long enough that it barely fits into my 8 gal fermenter buckets.


Or you could suspend smaller chunks in a vessel like this "hop bomb" ...

Image
When I was little around seventy years ago, before the days of teabags, my mother had something very like this; a tea infuser. I think you can still get them where you buy teapots and such,
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I think marble may even be competitive, price-wise, with oyster shell. Consider that you usually throw away the shell grit after the ferment, while the marble is reusable many many times...

If you search Amazon (or tile stores?) you can get a couple of 3"X6" white marble tile samples for 5 or 6 bucks. A tile store might sell you one big tile and cut it a couple of times for you.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Monumental masons might have offcuts for those who can't pick up shells off a beach.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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NZChris wrote:Monumental masons might have offcuts for those who can't pick up shells off a beach.
or don't have an oyster bar near by :)
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I really don't think uncrushed solid marble is going to work be nice if it did but it seems pretty damn durable hence its use for monuments bath houses and statues for the last few thousand years. If you don't have shells there's gypsum. chalk limestone, hydrated lime, slack lime, plaster, egg shells, calcium carbonate bicarb, drywall and a ton of other sources. I use milk of lime normally myself as calcium is not highly soluble so having it in suspension will drop pH more and much faster.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

Post by jb-texshine »

As a last resort pet stores sell shells,some VERY large,for aquarium decor and hermit crabs. They also sell dead coral. Been thinking bout buying a big conch shell and seeing how many times I can reuse it before it crumbles. I used a half dozen freshwater clam shell halves my 6 yr old gathered at the lake in a batch of uj that went 6 generations. When I recovered them they literally turned to mush in my hand.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Poultry farmer suppliers sell crushed shells, what we used to call shell grit.
Should be a lot cheaper than anything from the aquarium man.
If the hens are lacking (calcium ?) the eggshells can be soft.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I drill holes in whole oyster shells and thread stainless steel wire through them. When they get down, they either drop off the wire or can be snapped off with little effort and replaced.
It gives me a large loop that is very easy to fish out (even with a ton of corn covering it). I added a few clam shells but they didn't last very long.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

Post by Yummyrum »

I'm not so sure marble wouldn't work .
It is a very common Highschool science prac to drop small pebble size pieces of marble into a test tube of dilute hydrochloric acid Even a 0.1 mols/ liter will produce quite a lot of CO2 . There is definely a reaction although the marble does not decompose very quickly .
I think it would work Badmo.... certainly on sugar washes .
Last edited by Yummyrum on Tue Dec 13, 2016 5:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I just rinsed and gently dried off the Buffer Bar and weighed it. 7.5g, or about 1%, is lost already. :) Some of that surely represents dissolution and acid neutralizing, some is powder that falls off the bar.

Marble is granular, and tiny grains can be unlocked from their matrix and are mechanically freed. I noticed this in some clear test jars I'm looking at: effervescence and a tiny amount of very fine powder falling to the bottom.


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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I love this place!
So many people thinking outside the box.

Curious to see where this goes.
The first thing that pops into my mind as an alternate source of calcium might be those thingies they sell for budgies at the pet store, hangs on the inside of the cage. Kinda looks like a solid shell or something. No idea what it is, but that's the first thing that popped into my mind from the first picture.

Edit:just did a search and it's called "cuttlebone" a source of calcium. :thumbup:
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I was reminded today of that really cool cast-iron "lucky fish" that are given to remote SE Asian villagers to put in their cooking pots, which provides enough dietary iron to reduce anemia.
http://www.bbc.com/news/health-32749629" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

What shape would be appropriate for home distillers? A small marble statue of Popcorn Sutton flipping you the bird? A statue of a revenoor you can drown over and over again?
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Found these at my local supermarket-
oyster.JPG
Way too big to eat but for 50 cents each ...

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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Yikes! I say throw those monsters away and cut up that table instead. :)


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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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What I like about your marble idea, is that you can calculate the surface area before you put it in. There is no way I'm going to attempt to calculate the surface area of the tropical giant clam I put in my last rum ferment.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Badmotivator wrote:Yikes! I say throw those monsters away and cut up that table instead. :)


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HAHA I thought that you would notice the table

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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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What would be a good simple conclusive test of the buffering capability of a marble rod using a couple of fermenter buckets and some acid blend?

I have in mind two identical buckets, one "treated", another control. Fill both with equal amounts of water. Dose each one with sufficient acid blend to register in my pH strips, to about 5.0 pH. Wait a day, take measurement. Add sufficient acid blend to register 4.0 on the control, then add identical amount to marble bucket. Wait a day, take measurement. Add sufficient acid blend to register 3.0 on control, then add identical amount to marble bucket. Wait a day, take measurement.

The measurements on the treated bucket should tell a pretty good story about what will happen to a fermenting bucket whose pH wants to crash, right?
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I don't believe it acts as a buffer at any pH we need. Too much surface area of CaCO3 is capable of pushing a slow, or dead, ferment over pH 7 if you let it.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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I have some readings on my two panela buckets. I acidified them a bit on day 2, bringing them both down to 4.5 or 5, to help the yeast a bit and to inhibit infection. It's about three days later, the panela is halfway fermented. The unmarked bucket reads pH 4, 1.045, the marbleized bucket reads pH 5, 1.042.

I don't trust the precision or the conclusive power of these numbers, but view them as supportive of the idea that marble is helpful. More data on these buckets and more tests to follow...
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Badmotivator wrote:...The unmarked bucket reads pH 4, 1.045, the marbleized bucket reads pH 5, 1.042.
And the race is on!
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Untreated panela ferment: pH 4, 1.020
Marble bar panela ferment: pH 5, 1.020
Marble bar weighs 700g, so it has lost 3%. When I rinse it, a small amount of superfine powdery bits of marble are also rinsed and rubbed away. When I rack this wash I will try to see if there is much CaCO3 powder at the bottom of the fermenters.

We had a super-cold house for a week due to power outage, so these dumb buckets are going sloooowly.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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When my panela ferments finished, the bar weighed 696.6g, so it had lost 25.5g, or 3.5%. There was no detectable grit in the trub of the marble bucket.

I now have two buckets I'm trying to turn into an active dunder. Both were inoculated with sourdough starter, yogurt, and emmentaler cheese. I am going to put a marble bar in one of them and watch the pH and activity of the two buckets.

Edit: initial pH is 4 on both.
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Re: Using marble as a buffer

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Badmotivator wrote:I now have two buckets I'm trying to turn into an active dunder. Both were inoculated with sourdough starter, yogurt, and emmentaler cheese. I am going to put a marble bar in one of them and watch the pH and activity of the two buckets.
Keep a close eye on the pH. If it goes over 7, you will probably throw it out. My understanding of muck holes is that they are dosed with marl, which would indicate that the commercial operators are testing and controlling pH. I'd love to know what they aim for, but nobody's telling.
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