Spotless Water

[Horners]

Has anyone used these guys yet?

https://www.spotlesswater.co.uk

At under £1.50 for 33L seems good value? Just wondering how practical it is to turn up with a bunch of empty supermarket water bottles and fill up? Any suggestions for cheaper say ten litre vessels?

 

[Ghillie]

From their FAQ:

“Is the water drinkable?

The filling stations have not been approved or built to standards for human consumption.”



I’d assume you’re buying distilled water at that. So you would obviously need to build water profiles which you’ll be aware of?

Wouldn’t go anywhere near it in all honesty.

 

[Horners]

@Ghillie well thats a good point - hadnt spotted that or even thought to look.

I had planned to build profiles from scratch. I had figured that as all water will get vigourously boiled for an hour it would be fine?

 

[MrRock]

More discussion here:
https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/reverse-osmosis-water.81641/page-3

 

[Ghillie]

@Ghillie well thats a good point - hadnt spotted that or even thought to look.

I had planned to build profiles from scratch. I had figured that as all water will get vigourously boiled for an hour it would be fine?

Building profiles from scratch then you’ll be sound with having distilled/RO.

I’d personally not have any issues with the water itself. On the assumption that you’re not getting physical lumps of anything in it. Like I’m talking rodent droppings, urine, metal filings, oil, fuel, etc.

I’m happy with the “aye it’ll be sound after an hour long boil” - but for that I’d want to know the back story of the water’s life before it got to me. Don’t care how long I’m boiling water that’s had dead rats in it, I won’t be drinking it.

The “not for human consumption” is likely an **** covering exercise.

Is your tap water that bad?

 

[GerritT]

That's dead water. It's not just "suited for easy profile building", one HAS to add salts, minerals etc to get proper water.

I understand the uses, and I'd bathe in it if necessary, but nope, not brewing.

 

[DavidHatton]

I registered, and got £20 free credit, there is one a short journey away, not sure if i will trust it yet, but lager season is coming and might even filter it before use. any other suggestions, I normally use turkish bottled water as it's local, £1.30 for 5 litres.

 

[GerritT]

Keep us posted!

 

[Sadfield]

Isn't the issue, that it is too pure for drinking rather than contaminated with anything unpleasant? IIRC drinking pure water can dilute minerals in the body rather than replacing them as tap/spring water does. Should be fine for a base to brewing water given they list aquariums as one of the uses after mineral addition.

 

[the_quick]

That's the point, RO water is not good for consumption, because it is too pure. Perfect if you want to build your water profile from scratch. They claim that water is RO filtered and has 0 tds. If that is the case, it is perfect to use it as that.
They have lot's "coming soon" locations, one near me. They claim they have cooling and heating system in place and as well that water is monitored 24/7 - just wonder how long they will be able to keep that pricing.

 

[Clint]

Without reading the small print do you think Joe public would buy it to drink thinking it's like the stuff from the supermarket?

 

[GerritT]

Isn't the issue, that it is too pure for drinking rather than contaminated with anything unpleasant? IIRC drinking pure water can dilute minerals in the body rather than replacing them as tap/spring water does. Should be fine for a base to brewing water given they list aquariums as one of the uses after mineral addition.

Water is bad as it is. Drink 12 pints of water in one evening and you might end up dead, drink 12 pints of beer and it's called 'Friday'.
Or, as we in the east say, it's called 'being the designated driver'.

 

[Davegase]

Has anyone used these guys yet?

Spotless Water Home

At under £1.50 for 33L seems good value? Just wondering how practical it is to turn up with a bunch of empty supermarket water bottles and fill up? Any suggestions for cheaper say ten litre vessels?

If it's good enough for aquariums it must be good enough to brew with. Homebrewers often buy RO water from aquatic shops. Bearing in mind it is a blank canvas and will need to be modified to suit the type of beer you are making. It would be ideal for mixing up starsan sanitiser.

 

[stripeyjoe]

I just got 35l of water from them for a pilsner, gave the nozzle a good spay with starsan first!
I used my 25l Jerry can that I usually store StarSan in and put to use for no chill beers, also have a 10l water container for camping. The water comes out at a fair pace, filling anything under 10l would be a PITA.

Would be interesting to get a lab report to check there’s no weird chemicals in there…

 

[Ben034]

I registered, and got £20 free credit, there is one a short journey away, not sure if i will trust it yet, but lager season is coming and might even filter it before use. any other suggestions, I normally use turkish bottled water as it's local, £1.30 for 5 litres.

You can buy a reverse osmosis system for under £40. I only use it for lagers now (mix with my tap water). Easy to install into a hose tap with no work needed or you may have an existing washing machine type fitting that would work. Alternatively you can plumb in if needed.

 

[nickjdavis]

I use Spotless for all my brews and have done for about 9 months now. I've got an RO system and to be honest I've not used it since I got a Spotless account.

You don't have to worry about the water being sat there in the tanks for ages....the prime users of the Spotless system are window cleaners who fill up their systems tanks with huge regularity. Its quite common to get to the Spotless outlet and find a queue of folks waiting to use it. My local spotless outlet is 25 miles away from where I live....I can drive there, fill up 40L ( takes about 45 seconds) and drive back in a quarter of the time than it takes for my RO system to generate 25L of RO water.

40L will cost £1.60.....it would take 25-30 brews before I end up spending more on my Spotless water than it would on a basic RO system....throw in the time taken to generate RO water from a domestic system and for me its a no-brainer.

I never, however, use Spotless water as my sole brewing liquor.....it is always cut with my local tap water (which is pretty hard)....maybe 85/15 (spotless/tap) if brewing pale beers, 50/50 when brewing stouts....basically, whatever ratio is needed to keep the actual physical salt additions needed, to a bare minimum (there is no point taking stuff away only to re-add it again)...plus there are other beneficial nutrients (e.g Zinc and Copper) within tap water that would not get reintroduced by the "normal salt additions" that one would make.....so in my opinion it is beneficial to always use a little bit of tap water.

 

[Ben034]

I use Spotless for all my brews and have done for about 9 months now. I've got an RO system and to be honest I've not used it since I got a Spotless account.

You don't have to worry about the water being sat there in the tanks for ages....the prime users of the Spotless system are window cleaners who fill up their systems tanks with huge regularity. Its quite common to get to the Spotless outlet and find a queue of folks waiting to use it. My local spotless outlet is 25 miles away from where I live....I can drive there, fill up 40L ( takes about 45 seconds) and drive back in a quarter of the time than it takes for my RO system to generate 25L of RO water.

40L will cost £1.60.....it would take 25-30 brews before I end up spending more on my Spotless water than it would on a basic RO system....throw in the time taken to generate RO water from a domestic system and for me its a no-brainer.

I never, however, use Spotless water as my sole brewing liquor.....it is always cut with my local tap water (which is pretty hard)....maybe 85/15 (spotless/tap) if brewing pale beers, 50/50 when brewing stouts....basically, whatever ratio is needed to keep the actual physical salt additions needed, to a bare minimum (there is no point taking stuff away only to re-add it again)...plus there are other beneficial nutrients (e.g Zinc and Copper) within tap water that would not get reintroduced by the "normal salt additions" that one would make.....so in my opinion it is beneficial to always use a little bit of tap water.

I guess everyone has their own prefences - for me a 25 mile drive to get water and carry it up the stairs is not for me. I would prefer to just leave the RO unit on for a few hours whilst I do something else the night before a brew day. Sounds like a good way to get a large volume of water quickly if you need it though provided it's fine to brew with.

 

[nickjdavis]

I guess everyone has their own prefences - for me a 25 mile drive to get water and carry it up the stairs is not for me. I would prefer to just leave the RO unit on for a few hours whilst I do something else the night before a brew day. Sounds like a good way to get a large volume of water quickly if you need it though provided it's fine to brew with.

no I guess it is not for everyone but I'm in a position where I often need to drive down to the area where the Spotless system is for other reasons, so I can just combine the two needs....it is not a regular thing where I need to make a "water specific journey".

The Spotless stuff is absolutely fine to brew with.

 

[Broken Toe]

You've sold me. I have one 2 miles away and will give it a pop for my next brew. Like you @nickjdavis to will cut mine in before I try and go whole hog on it. Cheers @Horners for the heads up on this.

 

[Tess Tickle's Brewery]

Just got my first load of spotless water. Brewing this afternoon. £3.19 for 76 litres. Amazing value compared to the supermarket stuff.