Inline Water Filtration

How many of you are using inline water filters to extract chlorine and chloramine from your tap water?

I'm looking to go all grain in the coming weeks, and the thought of buying spring water or bottled water for those batches seems silly.

Any particular brands/models/types you suggest?

I'm looking at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VQHRCC/ref=ord_cart_shr?ie=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER. Any thoughts?

I appreciate any info/suggestions you'd be willing to give!

Cool find, I was actually thinking about building one of these:

http://***********/stories/projects-and-equipment/article/indices/20-build-it-yourself/402-build-your-own-water-filter-projects


Looks like the RV filter is rated at 2000 gallons for $20, I pay $0.89 / gallon of spring water....while the BYO version is significantly less expensive in the long run, this one still a lot cheaper than buying bottled water.

+1 for both options. I have been looking at an in-line option for filtering. (setting the top half of my brita filter on a bucket and letting the faucet trickle into it was a real spill hazard.)

I have always just let the water settle for a day or two to remove chlorine (I don't have chloramine in the water).

Do you think that filtering will remove minerals necessary for good mashing along with the chlorine?

While I'm far from an expert, I don't think I'm going to have a problem with removing the minerals w/ a filtration system. Tons of people use water filtration on their taps to negate the need for letting it settle or buying RO water.

My city water SUPPOSEDLY doesn't contain chloramine, but I like to work on the safe side, anyway.

I'll be acquiring some basic pH balancers from a forum member w/ my new, used mash tun. I think dialing in things on the pH balance will be more important to achieving a level of consistency that is acceptable to me.

I used that same filter before going inline, it works fine for chlorine removal and won't "strip" minerals from the water.

wildwest450 said:

I used that same filter before going inline, it works fine for chlorine removal and won't "strip" minerals from the water.

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Great to know!

I ordered it yesterday, w/ a 10' drinking water safe hose for under $30.

I'll be happy to move away from buying jugs of water.

This is a great find. Just received mine. It comes with a short length of drinking hose, and if you buy an additional drinking hose, you can set the filter up on your counter and push the water up into your kettle, much like the BYO build.

I use an undersink type active charcoal filter for all my water. My water is already super soft and requires mineral to be added anyway.

The filter itself should come with info about what it will take out. You don't normally have to worry about your filter taking out necessary minerals.

RobbyBeers said:

This is a great find. Just received mine. It comes with a short length of drinking hose, and if you buy an additional drinking hose, you can set the filter up on your counter and push the water up into your kettle, much like the BYO build.

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I received mine today. I think with both hoses, it'll work out just great for me, and rated at 2,000 gallons, I should be able to get pretty ample use out of it.

Just in time for my Saturday brew day!

I bought a Watts charcoal filter designed to be used for ice machines. got some adapters and ball valves and modified it so I could hook my garden hose up to it (my water source in the garage) honestly i havent noticed a huge flavor difference, but i wanted to do it so i did

First, i dont know where the whole scare on the internet that everybody water has chloramine but, most water systems do not use chloramine, it is more expensive than chlorine and only useful when using surface water sources (generally ground water is WAY cheaper and preferred because it is more constant). The primary reason to use chloramine is it wont react with organic compounds (nearly unheard of in ground water) to form these nasty cancer causing compounds (Chlorine does)

Now about what i use, I have one of these mounted on my stand. I feel safer using it, and it is easy. Plus, i can use the same setup, with a different filter cartridge to filter beer when necessary (i only do this when necessary, but it is nice to have the option)

http://www.amazon.com/Clear-Sediment-Valve-Filter-Housing/dp/B0025D4B1Y

Edit: There are a few other reasons, for chloramine use, but preventing disinfection byproducts is the big one.

Heavy chlorine use in my city's water, so a filter is necessary.

This site has some good prices on filter housings and cartridges:

http://www.buckeyefieldsupply.com/aboutus.asp

I installed this 10" x 2.5" housing:
BFS-307 Blue 10-inch housing, 3/8 inch - $14.25

with this cartridge:
BFS-219 Carbon block cartridge - The Sweetener, 10 inch - $9.50

My tap water is generally pretty good, but you never know when you may encounter elevated chlorine levels due to water main repairs and such. I figure it can't do any harm to filter all brewing water. It's really no effort and the filters are relatively inexpensive.

LordUlrich said:

The only reason to use chloramine is it wont react with organic compounds (nearly unheard of in ground water) to form these nasty cancer causing compounds (Chlorine does)

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There are other reasons it is used. One is that it is more stable and has much lower dissipation than chlorine, so it is used in many water systems that have very long runs. If they were to use chlorine, the concentrations near the treatment points would have to be unacceptably high in order to maintain standards at the end of the line. Chlorine is way more common, but there are plenty of water supplies that use chloramine.

I use campden tablets to knock the chlorine/ chloramine out. much easier than dealing with a filter.

sjlammer said:

I use campden tablets to knock the chlorine/ chloramine out. much easier than dealing with a filter.

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I also deal with a pretty rural water system with a very long run, and it probably isn't a bad idea to filter out some sediment, as well.

Otherwise, I'd probably be going that route, as well.

I was under the impression that charcoal & sediment filters do little to remove chloramine from water. Am I mistaken?

Brewing Clamper said:

I was under the impression that charcoal & sediment filters do little to remove chloramine from water. Am I mistaken?

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This is my understanding as well, but there seems to be some controversy on the subject. I don't have to deal with chloramines, but I would still like to know the truth.

Most filters remove some, but not all of the chlorine/chloramine. How much gets removed depends on the individual filter and how slow you run the water through it. I don't know of any reasonably priced filters that claim to eliminate chlorine/chloramine. The water where I brew is very close to a treatment point in the system, so it's high enough in chlorine to be undrinkable IMO. My filter gets enough of it out to make it good for drinking, but I still treat with campden tablets to remove the rest before using it to brew.

JuanMoore said:

There are other reasons it is used. One is that it is more stable and has much lower dissipation than chlorine, so it is used in many water systems that have very long runs. If they were to use chlorine, the concentrations near the treatment points would have to be unacceptably high in order to maintain standards at the end of the line. Chlorine is way more common, but there are plenty of water supplies that use chloramine.

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Admittedly I did over simplify a bit (at least in my area, and by my training chlorine is generally better and we do have lots of long water projects with long detention times). I read all these chloramine comments on the internet and it sounds like everyone things it is a conspiracy.
I guess my point is really, they don't use chloramine without reason, if they can avoid it. Water suppliers aren't adding chloramine just because they can. Also in most cases if you have chlorine you wont have chloramine.

Ok, so I just talked to my local water specialist. Regular Activated Carbon filters will not remove any significant amount of chloramine from your water. You need RO, Distillation or Catalyzed Carbon Filters. make sure your fiter is NSF approved.

Brewing Clamper said:

Ok, so I just talked to my local water specialist. Regular Activated Carbon filters will not remove any significant amount of chloramine from your water. You need RO, Distillation or Catalyzed Carbon Filters. make sure your fiter is NSF approved.

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That's also my understanding. Chlorine is easy to remove but chloamine is much harder to strip out. Simply heating water (like you do when you mash/sparge) will remove most if not all of the chlorine. A decent charcoal filter will also remove chlorine. But Chloramine is a tough SOB. To filter out Chloramine the flow rates have to be absurdly slow.

But it's my opinion that chloramine is not as reactive with the phenols in brewing and can be present in the water and not effect the beer. It's free chlorine that we need to avoid and in most cases I believe it's coming from the use of bleach as a sanitizer.

Individual results may vary :fro:

So can this filter be attached to a food safe hose coming from my outside spigot...my rig is in my carport so I use the outside water source...

LordUlrich said:

I read all these chloramine comments on the internet and it sounds like everyone things it is a conspiracy.

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The conspiracy does not concern chloramine; it's flouride that they are slowly poisoning you with. Flouride is a mind control drug and it appears to be working quite well on a large portion of the population.

Brewing Clamper said:

Ok, so I just talked to my local water specialist. Regular Activated Carbon filters will not remove any significant amount of chloramine from your water. You need RO, Distillation or Catalyzed Carbon Filters. make sure your fiter is NSF approved.

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I've never seen an NSF certification on any of the water filters I have purchased. Perhaps that's because they are not designed to be eaten. There is a chance that the filters did have the certification and I may have simply overlooked it. I figured that if it was intended for filtering domestic water that it would be safe to use. In any case, I'm not overly concerned.

sjlammer said:

I use campden tablets to knock the chlorine/ chloramine out. much easier than dealing with a filter.

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How's that? I just turn on my water for brewing and it's filtered. Screw on new cartridge every 3-4 years and repeat.

dedhedjed said:

So can this filter be attached to a food safe hose coming from my outside spigot...my rig is in my carport so I use the outside water source...

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I have a buddy who does it that way. He has an RV hose and a filter. He makes good beer so it must be working.

dedhedjed said:

So can this filter be attached to a food safe hose coming from my outside spigot...my rig is in my carport so I use the outside water source...

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Yeah. That's the idea. It comes with a 12" hose to run off the outside faucet into the filter, and I ordered another 10' rv hose to run off the filter.

No more buying jugs of water!

for the difference i micron size would something like this be practical, or is that overkill for brewing?

http://www.amazon.com/Camco-40651-Ceramic-Water-Filter/dp/B000BUU5VI/ref=tag_dpp_lp_edpp_ttl_ex