Hard water issues

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
That water is very similar to the water in my city. It has been ion-exchange softened. It is NOT suitable for any brewing usage. The sodium and chloride are very high and the alkalinity is crazy high. The great thing about that water is that it is an excellent feedwater for a RO machine. The membrane should have a good long life since the Ca and Mg are so low.

There is not really a firm answer for 'best' RO system. The minimum you need is 3 stages: particulate filter, activated carbon filter, and RO membrane. Adding additional stages like an extra particulate filter or post-membrane activated carbon filter is unnecessary. I do recommend avoiding proprietary equipment like Whirlpool or GE since that might lock you into buying their replacement filters at higher cost. Since most of the equipment is fairly standard and all components tend to come from the same sources, the most important thing is the quality of the filters and membrane. Filmtec membranes are very reputable. Beyond that recommendation, look for a decent price. The other important consideration is how you will be storing your RO water. You can either keep it in an open tank and use a float valve to shut off the system when the tank is full. Or you can use a pressurized tank. In either case, you need a large tank capacity since RO output flow rates are low. If using an open tank, its capacity should be equal to the mash plus sparging water volume. If using a pressure tank, the tank volume has to be double the mash plus sparging volume since their is a big air bladder in there that reduces the tank's effective volume.
 
As long as you have a properly sized storage tank, you don't need a high output rate for brewing typical homebrew sized batches. 100 gpd is pretty high. The high flow rate for that system is why it needs 2 carbon filters. The DI resin stage is useless in brewing since you actually want SOME of the water's ionic content in your water.

A hundred dollars for that system seems too good to be true. Buyer beware. I do see 50 to 75 gpd systems from reputable sellers in the $100 to $150 range.
 
That's the exact one I bought about 1 1/2 years ago. It's been great for me, and I'm happy with it. I paid about $10 less, so the price must have gone up a bit since I bought mine.

I haven't needed to change any filters or anything, and I've used it for about 50 brewdays or so.
 
That unit is similar to the one I have. It should be fine. As Yooper mentions, you don't really need to change filters or membranes on a regular schedule. The only thing that matters is the quality of the finished water and a TDS meter is needed so that you can keep track of that parameter. I have one of those dual in-line TDS meters from HMI and it has proven useful. It pointed out when my membrane finally gave up the ghost with a climbing TDS reading. That was after a couple of years use.

Enjoy!
 
Back
Top