Stll very confused with my water

[TNugent]

Recently moved to the country and am on a well. Had a sample done and the results are below. Been trying to read info and looking at Bruwater and just can't wrap my head around things. Thinking I may just be best off using RO water or something. Can my water be saved?

pH 7.2
Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) Est, ppm 464
Electrical Conductivity, mmho/cm 0.77
Cations / Anions, me/L 9.4 / 9.6

ppm
Sodium, Na 6
Potassium, K 5
Calcium, Ca 125
Magnesium, Mg 33
Total Hardness, CaCO3 450
Nitrate, NO3-N < 0.1 (SAFE)
Sulfate, SO4-S 23
Chloride, Cl 11
Carbonate, CO3 < 1
Bicarbonate, HCO3 479
Total Alkalinity, CaCO3 393
Total Phosphorus, P 0.04
Total Iron, Fe 2.71
"<" - Not Detected / Below Detection Limit

 

[mchrispen]

You have both very hard and very alkaline water. With that amount of calcium, you might investigate slaked lime treatment to treat the alkalinity. http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Alkalinity_reduction_with_slaked_lime . You will need to calculate the final water product characteristics.

Otherwise, you will need to dilute that alkalinity away with RO or DI water - and at 3:1 or 4:1 you might as well go with 100% RO system.

 

[PastorofMuppets]

you will most definitely need to dilute up to 50% or more with RO or distilled water.
bru'in water has inputs for dilutions.

 

[schematix]

Ouch. As others have mentioned, that's terrible water for brewing. You have options but all are either cost or labor intensive. You could do RO or just buy distilled.

 

[ajdelange]

There are things you can do here such as increase the calcium (you have only 6.2 mEq/L calcium but 7.8 mEq/L alkalinity) with the chloride and/or the sulfate and then boil or treat with lime to drop the alkalinity down to a more manageable level (1 mEq/L) but this would result in an increase in chloride (you do have wiggle room there) and/or sulfate where you also have lots if wiggle room if you like lots of sulfate in your beers. Your iron situation is also disastrous and you will have to get that down to 0.1 mg/L or less. There are things you can do there too (aerate and filter). Using these methods will allow you to brew a limited range of beers which, if those happen to be the kinds you like is fine but there is a fair amount of work involved in the lime treatment (or boiling) and the iron treatment. If carrying out either of those you will also need test kits to see how much you were able to reduce the alkalinity and iron levels. Iron can also be dealt with by the use of an iron reducing filter which does the aeration (or oxidation with pemanganate) and filtering automatically. Use of RO water will be much simpler both in terms of the time you will have to put in to water preparation and in terms of how much chemistry you need to understand.

 

[TNugent]

Thanks for the input and confirmation of what I thought I read, my water stinks! I know it will be a pain but I'm leaning towards buying water to brew with. I have no problem investing in an RO unit but I'm not a fan of all that waste water considering I'm on a well and a septic system. I know I could collect the waste water to water the garden or something but it might just be easier to buy 20 gallons of water at the store when I want to brew.

 

[PastorofMuppets]

unfortunate reality of well water.

You may not need to buy 100% of your brewing water.
Even if you could use 25% or more of your own water it would save you something.

 

[schematix]

If you're going to brew a lot it probably makes sense to just buy a small RO system. One drawback of RO is the flow rate. Unless you get a large system, you'll need to collect water for a day to get enough for a batch. This can be solved by adding a tank, or planning ahead. One additional consideration when you're on a well is your well's supply capacity. RO is actually very wasteful of water (typically throws away several gallons for every 1 it produces), so if you're supply isn't that capable, you may wish to just buy water.

 

[ajdelange]

Concentrate need not be a big concern with an RO system. It is true that the under-the-sink units sold at home improvement stores often have recoveries of less than 20% (at which 4 gal concentrate goes down the drain for each gallon of permeate) even if you prepare 10 gal for brewing that is only 40 gal wasted. If that is really a concern the system can be modified for higher recovery by increasing the feed water pressure and throttling the concentrate flow. Recoveries up to 50% can be achieved in this way. It is possible to go to even higher recoveries by feeding some of the concentrate back around into the feed (at the cost of somewhat lower rejection). The very low recoveries of the small allow them to operate with hard carbonaceous water. If you modify for higher recovery (or buy a system capable of it) you will have to soften the feed water.

 

[MaxStout]

Thanks for the input and confirmation of what I thought I read, my water stinks! I know it will be a pain but I'm leaning towards buying water to brew with. I have no problem investing in an RO unit but I'm not a fan of all that waste water considering I'm on a well and a septic system. I know I could collect the waste water to water the garden or something but it might just be easier to buy 20 gallons of water at the store when I want to brew.

If you're not too far from a Cub Foods, you can pick up RO water bulk for 39c/gallon. Might be a cheaper and less wasteful alternative to setting up an RO system. The downside is hauling jugs of water home for each brew day.

Edit: I bought 3 of those plastic 5-gallon water jugs and take them to the store. I don't exchange them, just fill them up at the dispenser. Easier than dealing with a bunch of 1-gallon containers.

 

[TNugent]

Concentrate need not be a big concern with an RO system. It is true that the under-the-sink units sold at home improvement stores often have recoveries of less than 20% (at which 4 gal concentrate goes down the drain for each gallon of permeate) even if you prepare 10 gal for brewing that is only 40 gal wasted. If that is really a concern the system can be modified for higher recovery by increasing the feed water pressure and throttling the concentrate flow. Recoveries up to 50% can be achieved in this way. It is possible to go to even higher recoveries by feeding some of the concentrate back around into the feed (at the cost of somewhat lower rejection). The very low recoveries of the small allow them to operate with hard carbonaceous water. If you modify for higher recovery (or buy a system capable of it) you will have to soften the feed water.

Interesting, I will definitely look into that. If I could get from 33-50% recovery I think I would invest in an RO unit but any lower than that I would probably just buy my water. I've got a family of 5 with 2 teenage boys who can't seem to figure out the meaning of a quick shower. It's not the RO use alone but with all the showers, dishes, laundry and everything else I begin to worry. Our septic is brand new but the well is older and was used to light duty with 2 eldery people (My Grandparents) who were the definition of conservation.