This is turning into an RO thread that I'm not interested in at this time (as stated)
Costco has Poland Spring for $1 a gallon. I'll try that as a base without adding anything and see how it goes. I'm interested if there will be a difference compared to tap that I've been using forever
Do you need Campden tablets with bottled water?
They come wrapped up in a 6 pack which makes it easier to carry at least.
Johnny, please don't take this the wrong way, but it's time for you to learn about water.
If you're just using your basic water, you are almost certainly not making the best beer you can make. My son was doing extract brews, and he was using his local water. Switched to using RO/Bottled water and his beers took a leap forward.
As far as bottled/distilled/RO water, for all intents and purposes, they're going to operate the same for you. Once you get water that is essentially devoid of minerals, you need to build the water back up. In what way you do that depends on the recipe.
Here's what caused the water thing to click for me: dark malts produce a more acidic mash than light malts. This is why certain beers became associated with particular places: Stouts in England as the water was alkaline, and they needed the acidity of dark malts to bring mash pH down to where it needed to be. In other places with water that was not alkaline, the malt needed to be light so as not to bring the pH down too far. Think Pilsen.
Distilled or RO water is very similar. But you need to add salts and such to get it to where you need it to be. I don't know why you're concerned about adding salts or acid (lactic or phosphoric) to strike water; it's pretty much standard procedure.
A recent brew where I had 8.25 gallons of strike water had 1 gallon of my very alkaline tap water and 7.25 gallons of RO water. Due to the particular grain bill I had, I added 5gr of Calcium Chloride (CaCL2), 5 gr of Epsom Salts (MgSO4), 1 gr of Gypsum (CaSO4). Needed a ML of lactic acid, too, and I added 1.5 Campden tablets (crushed).
It's just standard that I build the water up--and I'd guess that's the case for 95 percent of all-grain brewers. If you think you're going to brew good beer just by using distilled water and not doing anything to it, well, IMO you're going too far in the other direction.
**********
You're adamant about not using RO water. Wondering why.
When I learned about water I used some distilled water from WalMart a couple times, then after examining the cost, bought an RO system from Buckeye Hydro. I hooked it up to the faucet on my utility sink, and I run the output into an Aquatainer. That's standard every brew day: I empty the aquatainer into the boil kettle, then set it to refilling.
RO systems do not need to be permanently mounted. I don't have a tank, and it's fairly basic. I don't know about what RO systems do with a lot of iron in the water, but I'm sure there's some way to deal with it. What kicked me over the top was this: i have that water available all the time, I don't have to schlep gallons of water from the store, and it's cheaper--by a lot. Enough to pay off the system. Mine's paid off, and that water is as cheap now as can be.
Anyway, perhaps some food for thought.
