cutting the finished product

[terryt]

hello everyone - I am preparing to do my first run, hopefully this weekend, and I have a question. I am planning to end up with a few large containers of some unknown strength. I have read in a few places that you use water to dilute the product. Is it ok to use ordinary tap water ?

[terryt]

Sorry I forgot to give you a few details. I have a batch of sugar and yeast brewing up right now.

[Uncle Remus]

Depends on the quality of your tap water, If in doubt use bottled water for dilution.

[stillman]

Better check the "parts per million" in your tap water. I had a guy at my house and the bottled water was worse than the tap water. He had a little hand held probe to check ppm. I have a big 5liter carbon filter that sits on a regular bottled water decanter. Cuts the ppm by half. Greenway is the Brand. Check it out anyway. The PPM is or should be marked on the bottled water.

Good Luck

[ponyboy]

ppm of what?

[Watershed]

I use my tap water but only boiled - we have some of the hardest water in the country, thankfully it's temporary hardness. If you don't boil it to get the salts out you get crystals dropping out of solution.

[stillman]

The guy that came with the ppm probe was actually trying to sell under the counter installed water distillers($3000). I didn't buy one but kept him here for about 3 hours answering questions. Bottled water can usually and legally have anywhere from 240ppm to 500ppm. Nestle(owned by Coka Cola) is one of the worst. 480ppm. "Pure life" my ass.

Boiling actually increases the ppm. Boiling should be for killing bacteria. The salt level increases as the water evaporates. Therefore concentrating the solution. My tap water was at 350ppm. after a run through the Greenway filter it was about 160ppm. Ok for me.

Bye The Way, there is no law saying that a company can't just put tap water into a bottle and sell it. "Bottled water" is just that "Bottled water". WHere they get it and all the hype is just marketing.

[TEC]

Stillman,

You must be refering to TDS (Total Disolved Solids). I have a RO/DI unit I use for aquarium water with an output of 7ppm after the RO unit and 3 ppm after the DI.

[golden pond]

hello everyone - I am preparing to do my first run, hopefully this weekend, and I have a question. I am planning to end up with a few large containers of some unknown strength. I have read in a few places that you use water to dilute the product. Is it ok to use ordinary tap water ?

Your best water is going to be from a natural source such as a well or spring and I know everyone on here don't live around such like some of us do. I'd say the best source is bottled spring water sold in stores, not distilled water. Also look on the label for "Natural Spring Water" not spring water thats been filtered or treated. Tap water for me to use to cut with would be a big NO,NO in my liquor even though it taste good to drink from the tap.

[Watershed]

Boiling actually increases the ppm. Boiling should be for killing bacteria. The salt level increases as the water evaporates. Therefore concentrating the solution.

Depends entirely on the type of hardness - boiling our water which is rich in calcium hydrogen carbonate causes the minerals to precipitate out as the carbonate - it's why kettles fur up. Other salts and other metal ions cause so called permanent hardness which isn't removed by boiling. Soap round these parts doesn't so much lather as turn to scum.

[stillman]

Stillman,

You must be refering to TDS (Total Disolved Solids). I have a RO/DI unit I use for aquarium water with an output of 7ppm after the RO unit and 3 ppm after the DI.

I guess that's what you would call it. My distillery friend said to only use reverse osmosis water. I don't have a system like that so I use the filtered stuff.


Watershed Wrote:

Depends entirely on the type of hardness - boiling our water which is rich in calcium hydrogen carbonate causes the minerals to precipitate out as the carbonate - it's why kettles fur up. Other salts and other metal ions cause so called permanent hardness which isn't removed by boiling. Soap round these parts doesn't so much lather as turn to scum.


I had the guy here long enough to boil some water and check it. The PPM went up after boiling. That's about all I know. And we have hard water here as well. Only the kitchen tap water doesn't go through the softener. Not supposed to drink the the softened water anyway.

Have a good day.

[Tater]

I allway heard that ya should use same water as used to make wash or mash with. To temper with
.

[The Chemist]

You can usually get RO water at fish stores. The kind with aquariums, not the kind you eat!

[Watershed]

If I'm that bothered about the cutting water I just buy a bottle of water and use that - I'm only cutting a couple of litres at a time.

[Thorin]

my tap water is so hard it can actually be mistaken for strong spirits if you do the 'shake and see how fast it clears'-test...

and the quality is very good for drinking, tastes as 'imsdal', a very known bottled water here, wich is about the cleanest water u can get in the store....

[AfricaUnite]

Do you guys not have Water Depot's where you are? for less than $3 you get 19L of beautiful double reverse osmosis water. I wouldnt use anything else to cut with myself. Its all personal preferance though.