Initial Water Temperature being added to Brew Pot, does it matter?

[Sippin37]

So I normally do 2.5-3 gallon partial boils and then top off to 5 gallons in the primary but I have heard from several people that doing a full 5 gallon boil makes a HUGE difference. I am using an aluminum 7.5 gallon pot so there is plenty of room to do a full boil. Unfortunately I am still using the gas range on my oven but it seems to get up to a full boil with the lid mostly covering the top.

My one concern is that I add tap water on the coldest setting (thinking this is the cleanest form of water) and about 10-15 minutes after turning on the gas burner a lot of condensation forms on the side of the pot and trickles down into the burner and then scorches my oven top. I'm in Chicago only about 3 miles from Lake Michigan so our tap water is really cold year round. Is it okay to turn the tap water to a warmer temp when filling my brew pot to 5 gallons to try avoiding the condensation on the side of the pot? Or even adding the hottest possible tap water to the brew pot initially? I had always thought this would make the water not as clean, but since I was going to be bringing to a boil eventually, does it matter?

Thanks for any input, just thought I'd see if anyone had some words of advice before I ruin a 5 gallon batch!

 

[Snicks]

Well it would only be as clean as your hot water tank... maybe the water will have a little more iron than normal.

I actually use hop tap water all the time when I'm getting my second round batch sparge water ready, but only since I got a new tank earlier this year. When I drained the old one there was probably a foot and a half of rusty sludge on the bottom of it, probably not too good for brewing but I'm not really sure.

 

[DSmith]

You want unsoftened water if you have one of those. That would mean to avoid all hot water sides of facuets. If the water pipes are exposed in the basement, it's easy to determine if any of the faucets in the house have unsoftened cold water.

 

[Sippin37]

Ok great, thanks for the information guys. You reassured exactly what I was thinking on the subject.