Brewing with softened water?

[Cliff]

I bypass mine.
The softening mineral through which your water is percolated is a Calcium Magnesium blend.
Magnesium can make your beer bitter. Really bitter.

I've switched out to Limestone but still I prefer to tap ahead of the filter / softener unit for water right from the ground. My natural well water is delicious, but it's acidic and hard.


I also unplug the unit for weeks at a time and run it for a few days in between to recharge the Zeolites in the De-ionizer stage. This introduces less salt into the potable water supply. Normally the damn thing wants to cycle every day. It's not necessary

[Junket]

I own a reverse osmosis system, and for the past few years, I have been building my brewing water from RO water, so I am experienced in addding salts.

I have moved to a home with a salt-based water softener. Will I be OK if I install the RO system AFTER the water softener? From the research I've done, this might actually make my RO membrane last a bit longer, because the Na won't clog it up as quickly as the Ca. Will the RO membrane successfully strip out the Na?

Or, would I be better off installing the RO system BEFORE the water softener?

[mabrungard]

I own a reverse osmosis system, and for the past few years, I have been building my brewing water from RO water, so I am experienced in addding salts.

I have moved to a home with a salt-based water softener. Will I be OK if I install the RO system AFTER the water softener? From the research I've done, this might actually make my RO membrane last a bit longer, because the Na won't clog it up as quickly as the Ca. Will the RO membrane successfully strip out the Na?

Or, would I be better off installing the RO system BEFORE the water softener?

Using the softened water will improve your system's membrane life. RO membranes do their poorest job in removing Na and other monovalent ions, but it will still substantially reduce their concentrations. You will still have very low Na concentrations in your product water. The RO water profile that is included in the Bru'n Water program is from the testing that I had performed on my RO water which is installed downstream of the water softener. Very low Na (I think its about 6 ppm).

Do it!

[ajdelange]

Because of similar discussion on another forum I went back and checked the specs on the membranes used in my RO system. NaCl rejection is listed as 96% minumum and 98.5% typical. This was a bit of a suprise but given the increasing use of RO for desalinization of sea and brackish water I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the manufacturers would do everything they could to improve rejection of Na and Cl. In this same regard I find it interesting that specific numbers are given on the glossy for NaCl while the whole rest of the ion spectrum is covered by a single TDS reduction number (also 98.5%).

[Junket]

Great info - thanks guys. Installed my RO unit and am collecting water to brew an IPA tomorrow. And will start saving up to purchase a larger water storage tank to hook up alongside my little 2.5 gallon tank. Saw some decent prices on ebay.