What do you use RO water for, besides brewing?

[Tom R]

I'm almost done installing my brewery's RO system (big thanks to Buckeye Hydro!), just need to tidy up a bit.

So I'm wondering what you guys who have plenty of RO water on hand use it for besides brewing and sanitizing?
I understand it's not tasty in coffee, or for drinking straight. Probably no tgood for ice cubes, either?
My wife's steam iron comes to mind, and car batteries.
What else?

 

[DBhomebrew]

I understand it's not tasty in coffee, or for drinking straight.

You can add minerals and dial it in just the way you like it. No worries about pH, this is water salts for flavor's sake.

 

[day_trippr]

RO is handy for rinsing off pH meters.
Other than brewing we don't use RO for much...

Cheers!

 

[MaxStout]

Mixing Starsan.
I find it good for drinking, but that's a matter of taste. But don't drink RODI water, as that tastes horrible.
I use it in my Keurig, coffee tastes fine, and I haven't had to de-scale it in the 5 or so years I've had it.

 

[Tom R]

You can add minerals and dial it in just the way you like it. No worries about pH, this is water salts for flavor's sake.

Hmm, I should find a Pelligrino clone recipe for my wife...

 

[DBhomebrew]

Hmm, I should find a Pelligrino clone recipe for my wife...

A quick Google search found this on a familiar site...

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/help-me-design-better-mineral-water.644788/

 

[day_trippr]

Forgot about the Star San mix thing. Yeah, RO is great for that too

Cheers!

 

[mac_1103]

Buy yourself an aquarium and some exotic fish.

 

[Tom R]

Buy yourself an aquarium and some exotic fish.

If I was going to have fish, I'd just pump some water out of the cove and farm salmon and halibut in my living room.

But I REALLY don't need yet another hobby!

 

[Moose_MI]

It’s not good for drinking?
I love it for the Keurig…i never have to clean it now and i’ve not had to replace it since i started using the RO in it. The money saved replacing keurig’s has paid for the RO system

Ice cubes for large molds for bourbon … yes, I like my bourbon chilled

Crystal light, which if Im not drinking beer or coffee, is about all I ever drink

Sanitizer.

Water for making yeast starters

 

[DBhomebrew]

It’s not good for drinking?

It's not that it's  bad, some think it's just rather flat and lifeless in flavor.

 

[day_trippr]

Water for making yeast starters

Like distilled, RO may not be ideal for that. The complete lack of minerals apparently can cause yeast cells to explode due to osmotic pressure imbalance...

Cheers!

 

[bellhp]

I've got an RODI setup that I used for my reef tank ... had an issue with a leaky bulkhead on the reef tank and I drained it and put it in storage .
I haven't used the RODI since ... my well water seems to make tasty beer and the only battery I own that I could put water in is a 6 volt unit in my 39 Buick ... most are sealed nowadays . So to answer the question ... not much .

 

[bvapor9]

Primary reason I installed it is for brewing base (Ward Lab tested mine - Ca:1 Mg:0 Na:3 Cl:2 SO4:0 HCO3:0), but other than that:
1. Use it for my Breville espresso machine - running 8 years strong with no problems...
2. StarSan mix.
3. Rinsing pH, TDS, thermometer during brew day.

 

[Buckeye_Hydro]

Cooking, drinking, coffee, tea...

 

[scrap iron]

Works great in the coffee maker and don't have to descale it very often or at all. Great for tea and ice. Making star-san and add a little gypsum to it for starters.
If it's too bland for some just add a pinch of calcium chloride or gypsum or both.

 

[hottpeper13]

I also use it for the tea I make for Kombucha.

 

[NeoBrew]

I have a 14 gallon pressure tank on my RO so I can get a whole brew day's worth of water out of it, but also have it hooked up to my ice maker and a faucet at the kitchen sink. We use it for virtually everything that will go into our bodies.

I don't know why people would shy away from it. It is a wonderful and neutral form of water. It is nearly pure H2O.

If you want to drink mineral water, by all means do so, but don't write off RO water as a great source of water for lots of things.

 

[DavidWood2115]

Like distilled, RO may not be ideal for that. The complete lack of minerals apparently can cause yeast cells to explode due to osmotic pressure imbalance...

Cheers!

RO is perfect for yeast starters made with DME. DME is just wort that has had (pure) water evaporated away. No need to add any additional salts; they are already in the DME.

Also, I second using RO for drinking, making coffee, and making ice cubes.

 

[Velnerj]

I don't have an RO system... But I was under the impression that drinking RO water (and distilled) can be bad for your health.

As the water completely lack any minerals it will absorb the minerals in your body until some equalibruim is achieved and then are flushed out of your body.

I suppose from time to time it's OK but steady diet could lead to some mineral deficiencies which can be dangerous. Am I right on this or is it a myth I've been told?

 

[matt_m]

All our drinking water, coffee making water, and ice makers in the fridge. Also have a DI stage for filling a jug of water to use in my CPAP machine.

 

[NeoBrew]

I don't have an RO system... But I was under the impression that drinking RO water (and distilled) can be bad for your health.

As the water completely lack any minerals it will absorb the minerals in your body until some equalibruim is achieved and then are flushed out of your body.

I suppose from time to time it's OK but steady diet could lead to some mineral deficiencies which can be dangerous. Am I right on this or is it a myth I've been told?

I don’t know the science/biology of this, but I have been drinking it as my primary source of water for over 25 years now. I’m still alive, my bones are intact and I have all my teeth.

 

[RyPA]

I use it for everything since buying the setup for brewing purposes - brewing beer, brewing coffee, drinking water, cooking pasta. Basically any water that gets ingested in my house is RO. Even my dog gets it for drinking water but lately I'm wondering if I should mix with tap water.

 

[Ki-ri-n]

Beer, starters, coffee, ice, water for the dogs (keeps the scaling down on the bowl) and my daughters turtle. It's all good.

 

[Rich1234]

There can be more than just good things in your water. You don't get to pick and choose what you remove. RO systems remove everything. The bad things as well as the good. You can get all the minerals you need from supplements and/or eating a quality diet.

I use RO water for everything that I consume. Beer, drinking water, coffee/tea, ice and probably a few I forgot.

 

[ITV]

I connected both my refrigerators to RO for drinking water and ice.

I also use RO water for my Miele coffee machine.

 

[VTX1300]

I use RO for almost everything. Brewing, starters with DME, fish and turtle aquariums, with minerals added back for their health and I use it in my CPAP.
For drinking water and coffee I don't care for straight RO so I add Himalayan Pink salt and Baking Soda to the water to add back some of the essential minerals and flavor and get the pH back closer to neutral. The dogs and pet rats also get this in their water bowl.

 

[Jag75]

Use it in our coffee bar, countertop ice maker and our cigar humidor

 

[YeastFeast]

Just mash/sparge water & mixing with StarSan.

 

[mac_1103]

As the water completely lack any minerals it will absorb the minerals in your body until some equalibruim is achieved and then are flushed out of your body.

Uh, no. Really. Just no. Your body is perfectly capable of retaining the minerals it needs. Now if your drinking water is your only source of essential minerals, you might have some issues since the mineral content of water from different sources is so variable. But if you eat a reasonably healthy diet your body probably isn't relying on drinking water for anything except water.

 

[TheCache]

As the water completely lack any minerals it will absorb the minerals in your body until some equalibruim is achieved and then are flushed out of your body.

I believe this is true, but it needs to be understood in context. Your body gets minerals from many sources; the food your eat, any supplements you take, the beer you drink, etc, etc. According to WHO (leaving further discussion of their value to the political threads), RO water can be problematic if that is the only water you drink and you are mineral deficient in your diet or for other health reasons. I also noticed that some companies who sell alternatives to RO systems used the WHO report to bash RO making it even hard to get an accurate picture. Maybe some of the RO folks on this site could weigh in.

I drink RO water at home and have for the last couple of decades. I don't have the science behind this, but my feeling is I do less damage drinking RO then drinking the trace amounts of chemicals and contaminants not removed by my local water utility. It's a trade off. In some cities this may not be true, but I used to live in a rural area and only had well water. It was not good for drinking without some treatment.

Also, adding trace minerals is easy. A jar is pretty inexpensive and last quite a while. I do this regularly. A couple shakes in a glass and I've got clean water with a good amount of clean minerals.

Do your homework, lots of info for and against out there. I'll go with all things in moderation and hope for the best.

 

[JAReeves]

A quick Google search found this on a familiar site...

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/help-me-design-better-mineral-water.644788/

I used the khymos site for my mineral water recipes. Two of my kegs are dedicated to sparkling mineral water, Pellegrino-style. That way I don't hear any complaints when one runs out .

EDIT: As @Deadalus mentions below, the wastewater is an issue. Because I live in (normally) sunny and dry SoCal, I direct all wastewater into a rain barrel in the yard and use it to water the yard, cooling water from making beer, also; it all ends up in the plants at some point.

 

[Deadalus]

I have been putting it in the clothes iron.

I also use it in the brine for making fermented vegetables.

If it isn't particularly necessary, and if you don't capture the waste water, it is a wasteful use of water. If on a well not that much of an issue I'd say. During the growing season, I direct the waste water to one of two water tanks to use for watering plants and the garden. I simply don't have a good way to store though in the winter.

 

[RyPA]

I have been putting it in the clothes iron.

I also use it in the brine for making fermented vegetables.

If it isn't particularly necessary, and if you don't capture the waste water, it is a wasteful use of water. If on a well not that much of an issue I'd say. During the growing season, I direct the waste water to one of two water tanks to use for watering plants and the garden. I simply don't have a good way to store though in the winter.

Isn't that contaminating veggies that you are going to eat? Or is it flowers?

 

[day_trippr]

Isn't that contaminating veggies

RO brine isn't exactly toxic - it's pretty much what one would be consuming if there was no RO system in sight
In the scheme of things I'd be more concerned about where the backwash from a water softener ends up but only because there's so much salt involved...

Cheers!

 

[JAReeves]

RO brine isn't exactly toxic - it's pretty much what one would be consuming if there was no RO system in sight
In the scheme of things I'd be more concerned about where the backwash from a water softener ends up but only because there's so much salt involved...

Cheers!

@Buckeye_Hydro or Bobby should correct me, but the chlorine/chloramine would be removed by the charcoal filter. The remaining metals & minerals would be removed by the RO system in the waste water. It’s this waste water that goes into the garden, perhaps a little more concentrated than straight hose water would be, but so far I haven’t seen adverse effects on my hops, grapes, tomatoes, etc.

 

[Deadalus]

Isn't that contaminating veggies that you are going to eat? Or is it flowers?

I've considered it but all it's doing is adding extra minerals to the soil, it's city water to begin with. I can multiply the numbers in the city water report by 4. My municipal water is no where near hard water and not dangerous. I already irrigate my garden. I collect rainwater too though so the maybe 60 gallons of waste water gets diluted by about 90-180 gallons of water when I water with rainwater. The plants don't take up all the removed atoms/molecules/minerals immediately, some will be attached to the soil through cation exchange. I only brew every 3 weeks or so and so it will rain and some of that material will be picked up and work its way into the water table and eventually back to the ocean or possibly precipitate underground or along the way somewhere.

I'd consider it a little more closely if the incoming water had specific issues.

 

[RyPA]

Good points and yes as long as your tap is decent then no issue. I was thinking along the lines of using RO to avoid potential chemical contamination, fluoride, etc. that you'd be still consuming those things, only through veggies instead of water.

 

[Bobby_M]

I don’t know the science/biology of this, but I have been drinking it as my primary source of water for over 25 years now. I’m still alive, my bones are intact and I have all my teeth.

If you were malnourished or on some very strict diet and only drinking RO, you could become mineral deficient. You get minerals from your diet as a whole, food and water.

I use RO for coffee, general drinking, making ice, feeds into my perpetual seltzer tap, the steamer function on the clothes dryer, the clothing iron, humidifiers, cooking that absorbs water like pasta and rice.

 

[shetc]

CPAP machine