reverse osmosis water

Hi there, I have done a quick search but it yeilded no result so apologies if this is a popular question. I live in Essex and the water is very very hard and this affects my other love (apart from the wife and littleun) that is fishkeeping. Due to the very high TDS of my tapwater I have an RO machine plumbed in under the bath that I use to mix the salt water for my reef tank. I wonder if it is worth or possibe to use RO in beer brewing?

I have concerns though as I am sure that removing all traces of minerals and heavy metals will affect the viability and taste of the beer? Perhaps I could dilute my tap water with RO? The book I have suggests using bottled water, is this better and why?

this has come about as all my brews have had a chemically almost metallic tase to them, so maybe there is something else that is doing this other than the water

Any help greatly appreciated from you knowledgable folks

It depends on whether you are kit or AG brewing to an extent, you could use RO then burtonise the water using burtonising salts.

I live in Grays and our water is similar, after using a campden tablet to remove Chlorine I use CRS to take the CaCO3 out. I used to test the water's alkalinity then dose now I generally use

non for porters with maybe a pinch of salt

0.4ml per litre for darker coloured beers (OP and the like)

0.8ml per litre for pale malt beers

As you say removing all the minerals would hurt the yeast, but RO is not 100% efficent so try it with RO water only first then try it with a 4 RO to 1 tap water dilution and see how it goes.

Don't use pure RO water, your mash pH will be completely wrong.

As far as a lot of the minerals required by yeast for metabolism most are required at the microgram level and are supplied from the malt. You are much better measuring the alkalinity and then diluting this using your RO water to get to the desired alkalinity (30 for pale ales up to 100 for dark beers) . . . and then boost the calcium as required.

Going on what I know of Essex Water (Having grown up in Harlow) this will be around 1:10 dilution (1 Litre of Tap water and 9 of RO). So while that can be seen beneficial as far as alkalinity is concerned, it drives you calcium level way too low . . . so you have to supplement it with calcium (either sulphate and/or chloride). . . . . This is where Prolix method is so much more useful. You already have a lot of calcium in the liquor so why dilute it? Using acid treatment (Brupaks CRS) to reduce the alkalinity to where it needs to be, which leave the calcium levels where they need to be as well.

that is excellent and detailed information, I just need to go away and work out what the devil you are all talking about :lol:

I should add this weekend I plan to do a nettle beer but future brews will be non-kit brews.

Aleman said:

Don't use pure RO water, your mash pH will be completely wrong.

As far as a lot of the minerals required by yeast for metabolism most are required at the microgram level and are supplied from the malt. You are much better measuring the alkalinity and then diluting this using your RO water to get to the desired alkalinity (30 for pale ales up to 100 for dark beers) . . . and then boost the calcium as required.

Going on what I know of Essex Water (Having grown up in Harlow) this will be around 1:10 dilution (1 Litre of Tap water and 9 of RO). So while that can be seen beneficial as far as alkalinity is concerned, it drives you calcium level way too low . . . so you have to supplement it with calcium (either sulphate and/or chloride). . . . . This is where Prolix method is so much more useful. You already have a lot of calcium in the liquor so why dilute it? Using acid treatment (Brupaks CRS) to reduce the alkalinity to where it needs to be, which leave the calcium levels where they need to be as well.

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Actually AM most large Commercials now use all RO water & then adjust the water chemistry to suit the profile required, that's how they brew foreign beers here, It also ensures they have no trouble with certain contaminent's in the water table they are drawing from.


However Manutius for home use the best thing to do is to read up about water treatment, there is plenty of info on the web and in books, however you need to know the following (which you can get from your water suppliers drinking water quality report):
you need to know the levels of
Calcium
Magnesium
Sodium
Sulphate
Chloride
As MG/l or PPM
you will also need to find out the alkalinity as CaCO3, not usually on your water quality report a quick phonecall to their lab via customer services will usually get you that info.

You can then you the water calculator in the calculators section of the forum, to get the additions required to get your water right.

London/essex water should be good for porters and stouts, you will need CRS, epsom salts, gypsum, table salt and chalk to change your current water profile to brew other styles, but as an absolute minimum add 1/2 campden tablet per 5 gals of all the water you are going to add to your brew, to remove chlorine, therefore reducing the risk of TCP taste in the final brew.

Hope you get to where you want to be.

UP

that is brilliant advice, I am sure then it must have been the left over chlorine and chloramine in my tap water that left the mettallic chemical atse in my previous brews.

I shall look into those chemical additives and have a play with the calculator. many thanks

unclepumble said:

Actually AM most large Commercials now use all RO water & then adjust the water chemistry to suit the profile required, that's how they brew foreign beers here, It also ensures they have no trouble with certain contaminent's in the water table they are drawing from.

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This is one case where you do not want to blindly follow commercial practice . If you have a lab that can accurately measure your additions and dose the water in the right order then go for it, otherwise you are more than likely to end up doing more harm than good.

unclepumble said:

For home use the best thing to do is to read up about water treatment, there is plenty of info on the web and in books

Click to expand...

And it's either over complex, wrong and misleading :twisted:

unclepumble said:

You need to know the following (which you can get from your water suppliers drinking water quality report):
you need to know the levels of
Calcium
Magnesium
Sodium
Sulphate
Chloride
As MG/l or PPM
you will also need to find out the alkalinity as CaCO3, not usually on your water quality report a quick phone call to their lab via customer services will usually get you that info.

Click to expand...

Which is often out of date and from a single measurement in the last 12 months.

You can then you the water calculator in the calculators section of the forum, to get the additions required to get your water right.

unclepumble said:

you will need CRS, epsom salts, gypsum, table salt and chalk to change your current water profile to brew other styles

Click to expand...

The one thing you don't need is chalk . . . as your water is filtered through and stored in chalk beds. This is the big problem with your water, the chalk has dissolved and is sitting there as calcium and carbonate/bicarbonate ions. . . . the calcium is good . . . the carbonate is very bad (If brewing a pale ale/lager), and needs to be removed . . . the easiest way is to use an acid addition (Brupaks CRS is the easiest to get hold of and most flavour neutral ) . . . but to do this you need to measure the alkalinity level in the water you are going to use for brewing. Salifert do a aquarium test kit that allows you to do this fairly accurately (other test kits are available but the accuracy is somewhat questionable).

The other thing I would question is the requirement of table salt, I'm still trying to understand why there is the need to blindly throw sodium ions into the water? I know that traditionally London waters are high in sodium chloride, but there is no brewing reason why it needs to be added. Calcium sulphate and calcium chloride are both used to add calcium ions, which are essential in many brewing reactions, magnesium sulphate provides magnesium ions which are required by used as a trace nutrients. Often sufficient magnesium is provided by the malts so does not need to be supplemented. the choice between calcium sulphate and calcium chloride is made depending on which way the brewer wants to bias the flavours of the beer. For a hoppy beer you need to increase sulphate level, for a malty beer you need to increase the chloride level, the levels of fluoride and sulphate given in the water analysis report should be sufficient to guide you as to what your resulting beers taste like.

The brewing purposes water treatment is very simple, however many authors and web sources over complicate matters, and unless you actually have sound brewing techniques then water treatments are not going to make any difference to the finished beer. There are much more important factors that need to be mastered before doing anything more complicated than adding half a Camden tablet to the water before brewing. (At least as far as hard/hi alkalinity waters are concerned)