Question regarding water types?

[Andylatter85]

Ok I will try to condense but my question is this, When brewing do you guys use tap or bottled water? I tend to use bottled myself as I live in Ipswich terrible hard water! The reason I ask is because I'm worried that tap water could change the end product. Has anyone had any issues with tap water? Lets be honest using bottles to fill a bucket is a pain in the ar*e! it would be much more cost effective and faster to use the tap stuff.

Any advice welcome :)

 

[PD]

my tap water tastes ok to me out the tap, so I brew with it, apart from a camden tablet in the hlt I don't add anything else to the water.

 

[Andylatter85]

I'm probably paranoid so my next brew I will use tap water see how it goes :) Cheers

 

[nixhaz]

Hey, I use Ipswich water too. Foul stuff! Hard as nails :twisted:

I boil it for 15 mins, add a campden tablet and do the GW water treatment (2 tsp gypsum, 1tsp salt, 1/2 tsp epsom salts).

However, I just downloaded the water board's chemical analysis of the water and using an online calculater, it just says to add some CRS for lager, and CRS plus a tiny bit of gypsum, salt and epsom salts for bitter. The exact info is at work, but can send to you if you like tomorrow. I'm going to try this (plus a campden tablet for chlorine/chloramines) for my next brew. :pray:

 

[Andylatter85]

Haha you use this cr*p too I didn't know you were a Suffolk boy?! Yes you are correct it is bloody awful. Anyway thanks for the advice dude much appreciated and informative too!
I will give your concoction a blast!

Thank you nixhaz :thumb:

 

[nixhaz]

No worries mate..Let us know how it goes! (or rather, how it gew)
I'm an Essex girl btw!! :drunk:

 

[Andylatter85]

My apologies nixhaz, Yeah I will let you know :) I feel like a right prat now LOL

 

[nixhaz]

No need to apologize!
Cheers! :drink:

 

[anthonyUK]

In general hard water is great for brewing. The issue is the alkalinity if brewing AG as it 'buffers' the pH for mashing and for all brewing it's the chlorine/chloramine that is bad but these are easily removed with campden powder/tabs.

 

[Pinchy]

I didnt think our suffolk water was too bad! Bury St Edmunds for me! :thumb: Should i be looking at using bottled water for AG?

 

[Jeff Brewjubbly]

I don't treat the Swindon water at all and I think I'd only look into it if the beer ever tasted slightly out of order... but it tastes perfectly fine to me so I don't change anything that isn't broken.

 

[pjc]

My tap water in Maidenhead is very hard and alkaline. I used to brew without treating it and although dark beers turned out OK, my pale ales would be horribly bitter and not pleasant to drink at all. I started using CRS to correct the alkalinity and it has made a huge difference to the finished product.

 

[Andylatter85]

Our water is pretty bad I seems the closer to ipswich you get the worse it is lol, I have a filter jug and a filter kettle. I just used plain old Ipswich tap water for my creamy stout tonight so will see how it goes.

 

[Pinchy]

Yep lots of kettles die here in Suffolk haha! Saying that I've used tap water on a few kit brews and wine so it can't be too bad can it?

 

[BarnsleyBrewer]

My water is ground sourced and was always bad at brewing light beers because of high alkalinity, dark beers were never a problem....
Since gaining help and info on here and learning about water treatment using CRS I can now brew a cracking blonde ale....

BB

 

[Andylatter85]

My water is ground sourced and was always bad at brewing light beers because of high alkalinity, dark beers were never a problem....
Since gaining help and info on here and learning about water treatment using CRS I can now brew a cracking blonde ale....

BB

Sounds interesting stuff! I would love to brew a blonde ale :)

 

[Andylatter85]

I didnt think our suffolk water was too bad! Bury St Edmunds for me! :thumb: Should i be looking at using bottled water for AG?

I'm not joking I seriously have gone through 2 kettles this year LOL.. And that's using de-scaler.I use ASDA 1 gallon bottles because they come in handy as a demijohn, £1.10p each all you have to do is drill a 10mm hole in the top.

 

[Runwell-Steve]

I didnt think our suffolk water was too bad! Bury St Edmunds for me! :thumb: Should i be looking at using bottled water for AG?

OK, they don't make the best beer, but do you see Greene King using bottled beer, no, so I think your tap water will be fine. Just find out what's in it and treat it accordingly.

 

[mabrungard]

I didnt think our suffolk water was too bad! Bury St Edmunds for me! :thumb: Should i be looking at using bottled water for AG?

OK, they don't make the best beer, but do you see Greene King using bottled beer, no, so I think your tap water will be fine. Just find out what's in it and treat it accordingly.

I guarantee that GK does perform some sort of treatment to their water prior to brewing with it. One thing that is becoming very prevalent in breweries is RO or nanofiltration systems to reduce the overall mineralization in the water. Nanofiltration is used in most Anheuser Busch breweries and RO is used at Guinness' St James Gate brewery. I wouldn't be surprised if GK used it in their brewery, but its really dependent upon the incoming water quality. Maybe its not that bad.

But in virtually all breweries, some form of acidification is employed in order to produce acceptable mash pH conditions. Controlling the alkalinity of brewing water is the surest way to improve your beer taste and quality. Finding out what your tap water quality is the first step in learning what adjustments you might make for your water.

 

[nixhaz]

I didnt think our suffolk water was too bad! Bury St Edmunds for me! :thumb: Should i be looking at using bottled water for AG?

OK, they don't make the best beer, but do you see Greene King using bottled beer, no, so I think your tap water will be fine. Just find out what's in it and treat it accordingly.

No kidding, GK is pretty dull stuff. Did the brewery tour and from what I recall they use their own well water but then RO it, which seems like a complete waste of time! :)