Water

[Biffy]

What is better...spring water or? No springs near me. I filled a pail with tap water, let is sit a few days covered.

Peace
B

[still_stirrin]

What is better...spring water or? No springs near me. I filled a pail with tap water, let is sit a few days covered.

Peace
B

Is the “tap water” chlorinated? Fluoridated? Does it come from a well? If so, do you have the water analysis?

It seems like you’re unprepared for this hobby. You need to “dig deeper” to get ready.
ss

[Homebrewer11777]

fluoridated is an issue?
I've been treating my water for brewing beer for years including filtration, treat with campden to knock down the occasional chlorine local water authority uses and building up with minerals to target profiles (my tap is very soft) but never heard about doing anything about fluoridation.

For OP the trick for letting your water sit out a few days to off gas chlorine may work if your water is treated with chlorine but don't think it will do anything if it is treated with chloramine. Campden tablet... 1 tablet for 20 gallons will take care of either chloramine or chlorine and works just about instantly.

For proofing I'm using distilled water from the grocery store. I have a big jar of it with my used oak fingers and seems to work nicely.

Gonna go look at the brewing forums about fluoride.

[Salt Must Flow]

If you're using well water or city water, you could just get a 2 or 3 filter canisters. One canister with a sediment filter and the other/others with a carbon block filter. The sediment filter removes fine particulates and the carbon filter/filters removes odors, flavors, color and chemicals. It will make good water. I would probably use a 'water filter flow restrictor' so it will slow the water flow through the filter and give it more contact time with the carbon filter/filters.

[Salt Must Flow]

You could just buy one or more of those disposable, inline carbon filters. Once it stops working well, just throw it away and replace it.

[MooseMan]

I use RO for proofing and to add to low wines for neutrals.

For ferments I just use tap water as it comes.
We have very good water where I live, but it's still treated so I used to add Campdens when I was really into beer brewing.

Then I did 2 back to back experiments.
I made 2 identical lagers from kits, one with the water straight from the tap and the other, 1/2 Campden crushed and stirred into 6gal the day before brewing.
They both fermented identically. A month in a corny under gas and 4 people could not tell the difference in taste, 3 months later I opened 2 bottles that I'd put aside and we still couldn't pick one from the other.

I did similar with a THIPA but grain brewed.
Again all identical but mash temps strayed a couple of degrees at the end of the second one, not enough to make anything happen though.

We drank this young, just 2 weeks old so the hop flavour was massive. My 3 guinea pigs/mates could not tell the difference, but I "Thought" I could taste a tiny hint of metallic edge in the one made with straight tap water.
Probably just because I knew which one was which.

[Homebrewer11777]

Local microbrewery owner advised me that his testing shows our water gets treated with chlorine at least some of the time. Mainly in summer. I'm not sensitive enough to tell if it is in there or not from the taste/smell so I always treat with both an inline RV filter and campden. If I had difficult water I'd go with RO for sure but the water tastes good and is soft enough to need mineral additions for just about any brewing project. Good article here https://www.brunwater.com/water-knowledge (see chapter 4.1) on the issue as it relates to beer brewing. Interesting comment in there regarding chlorophenols being seen as acceptable in some scotch whiskys...

[Salt Must Flow]

RO (Reverse Osmosis) filters water down to 0-5 TDS (total dissolved solids). That means the water is nearly as pure as distilled water which is 0 TDS. That means that RO units remove nearly everything from the water including minerals.

Carbon filtered water removes the nasty chemicals that everyone's concerned about. It removes color/discoloration, odors and bad flavors from the water. It just makes pleasant water. Carbon filters really don't affect the TDS much at all because it doesn't remove minerals or other dissolved solids.

My well water doesn't taste good, contains a lot of iron and doesn't smell good either. Filtering the water makes it pleasant.

I've been inside a city water reservoir before and it was horrible! My eyes and lungs burned for days afterwards. I wouldn't ever drink that shit and certainly wouldn't expose any fermentation to that shit either. People have terrible problems trying to keep an aquarium using city water too. After switching to filtered water, aquariums flourish. Filtration is a no brainer.

[Bee]

You better find out how hard your water is and it's residual hardness. This affects pH, which determines the efficacy of conversion enzymes. And, if your water is too hard and the pH doesn't get low enough in the fermentation, it will cause verdigris to form on your copper and it will leach into your distillate. (AKA "Blue Boogers" and blue distillate)

[Demy]

I think it also depends on what the water we are talking about will be used for....(mash, dilution of distillates etc...)