# How Can I make Brine



## Deebee7 (May 3, 2012)

I’d like to experiment with a simple brine this winter. No fancy spray equipment. I have a 300 gallon tank I use for watering/feeding trees. I’d like to know how to make a concentrated tub of brine that could be reconstituted in 100 gallons of water. How long will I be able to store the salt water mix? I’m just going to use my 4 gal pack sprayer around entry ways, exits etc. Any precautions I need to take, does it freeze at all? It will likely rinse into grass edges some. Heavy granular salt is too abrasive and destroys the concrete where I’m going to use it. Thanks!


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## seville009 (Sep 9, 2002)

Many threads....here's one

https://www.plowsite.com/threads/brine-making.166004/


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## Mark Oomkes (Dec 10, 2000)

Deebee7 said:


> Heavy granular salt is too abrasive and destroys the concrete where I'm going to use it.


Salt does not destroy concrete.

Granular salt does not melt snow or ice.

Granular salt mixes with snow or ice and creates a brine, the same thing you are doing, you are just removing one step.

When reading those threads...ignore the guy who wants to boil his salt water.

You have at least a couple fallacies that you need to understand that you are wrong about.


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## Mark Oomkes (Dec 10, 2000)

But in all reality, all you need is salt, water, a tub, a big spoon to stir the sauce and a salinometer.


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## m_ice (Aug 12, 2012)

Mark Oomkes said:


> But in all reality, all you need is salt, water, a tub, a big spoon to stir the sauce and a salinometer.


And time if you plan on stirring by hand as agitation


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## cjames808 (Dec 18, 2015)

If you are relying on it. I’d buy a maker or already made brine/mix. Unless it’s a let’s try it out thing. 

We tried a double tote maker and a couple totes to store it. Couldn’t make it fast enough for the places we used it on. Electric pump was the best as it worked inside. Gas pump sucked got all rusty and had to leave the door open. 

Looking back I would buy a nice sprayer, two large 1000+ storage tanks and just order it.


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## notchy (Jan 10, 2017)

I was interested in trying this out for my own personal use at my home to use on my driveway and steps.

what is the correct mixture ratio for a small batch?

I was thinking of using a 5 gallon pale.

Would I put 2.25lbs of rock salt and add a gallon of water and mix with a paint mixer attached to my drill to stir it up?

After that could I store the liquid in another 5 gallon pale and cover it? Would I be able to use it in the future or does that batch mixed have to be used immediately?

I was planning to use a 3 gallon garden sprayer to spray my driveway


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## leigh (Jan 2, 2009)

notchy said:


> I was interested in trying this out for my own personal use at my home to use on my driveway and steps.
> 
> what is the correct mixture ratio for a small batch?
> 
> ...


 Roughly 2.5lb per *gallon* of water will produce a 23.3% solution
I would use a pail ,not a pale
Yes it would
Yes you could
No 
Why bother ? just throw the salt on the drive and let the snow make the brine,cut out the middleman !


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## notchy (Jan 10, 2017)

I did not mention that I patio pavers for steps and I can not throw salt directly on it. That is part of the reason for wanting to make the salt brine.



leigh said:


> Roughly 2.5lb per *gallon* of water will produce a 23.3% solution
> I would use a pail ,not a pale
> Yes it would
> Yes you could
> ...


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## BossPlow2010 (Sep 29, 2010)

notchy said:


> I did not mention that I patio pavers for steps and I can not throw salt directly on it. That is part of the reason for wanting to make the salt brine.


Are the patio pavers concrete,


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## Mark Oomkes (Dec 10, 2000)

notchy said:


> I did not mention that I patio pavers for steps and I can not throw salt directly on it. That is part of the reason for wanting to make the salt brine.


You do realize brine is the liquid state of salt???

And that when salt comes in contact with snow\ice, it becomes brine????????


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## LapeerLandscape (Dec 29, 2012)

If its such a small area that you only need 5 gallons at a time I think I would just use a shovel and or a broom.


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## leigh (Jan 2, 2009)

Mark Oomkes said:


> You do realize brine is the liquid state of salt???
> 
> And that when salt comes in contact with snow\ice, it becomes brine????????


 Easy on the advanced chemistry, can you dumb it down for us mortals?


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## Hydromaster (Jun 11, 2018)

Mark Oomkes said:


> You do realize brine is the liquid state of salt???
> 
> And that when salt comes in contact with snow\ice, it becomes brine????????


Water melts salt?

And here I've been heating it up to
2575.4° F


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## Mark Oomkes (Dec 10, 2000)

Hydromaster said:


> Water melts salt?


Sure???


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## leigh (Jan 2, 2009)

notchy said:


> I did not mention that I patio pavers for steps and I can not throw salt directly on it. That is part of the reason for wanting to make the salt brine.


 On a serious note here's a reference, take any info or comments on here with a grain of salt.https://thepaversavers.com/yes-you-can-use-rock-salt-or-ice-melt-on-concrete-pavers/


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## naturescaretaker (Dec 6, 2019)

Just go to YouTube and search salt brine makers and you will see hundreds of videos were people have made them out of IBC totes.


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## naturescaretaker (Dec 6, 2019)

Here's a picture of what we built before we sold our Washington operations. We could make 2400 gallons per hour with this set up out of each of the 3 locations. Between all 3 locations, we used 42,000 gallons per deployment on a pretreatment and double that on a post.

The change you don't see was waster supply. There's two 2,500 gallon tanks we pulled water from and then pushed them into 5,000 gallon storage tanks. Based on forecasted low temp, we would add a minimum amount of CaCi2 to keep it temperature compliant.

At the main office, we used a 12 tote set up with two pumps.


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