Water calculator: Scaling potential and Remineralisation

Rob1

A lot of people are going to be using various water filtration methods. Traditional RO, RO DI, Countertop RO, Distillers and Zero water filters etc. The Osmio is already on the market and Skuma should soon follow allowing users to remineralise water to a specific spec using concentrates.

This Spreadsheet is basically an interactive version of Jim Schulman’s famed ‘insanely long water FAQ’ that allows you to assess the scaling potential of the water you are currently using after testing it with a GH/KH drop kit or checking a detailed water quality report. For care of service boilers there is a page designed to help in scheduling flushing based on how quickly minerals will build up. Finally, there is a remineralisation calculator page that can be used to calculate the precise quantities of the most common additives to be used to remineralise highly pure RO or distilled water.

Water Calculator

Note: You’ll need to save/download/make a copy to your own google drive to edit the file.

LMSC

Rob1

Welcome to the forum and fantastic to have you here Rob! We were wondering how do we drag you here! I was chatting with Dave the other day and we were confident that you will come on board.

You are precisely one of those coffee-cum-water experts that this forum needs. 😁

Thanks for the calculator, btw!

Rob1

To be honest I thought I was already here but I had to sign up so I guess I’m a member of another coffetime forum.

DavecUK

Rob1 To be honest I thought I was already here but I had to sign up so I guess I’m a member of another coffetime forum.

You were, unfortunately Tapatalk doesn’t let me export the data or users, so we all had to reregister here. Once Ver&^%scrote took over the other forum, I did a bit of research and realised I did want to be associated with them or the other 2 corporates that own 90% of forums. They just want to monetise the crap out of them and don’t care about community or the users.

So, I thought I would fix that……and be as non-commercial as it’s possible to be after seeing CFUK sold down the river by 2 previous owners..

As for the water FAQ, I may make a documentation section, i think there is a blog function, so I will see if that can do it. As we have various other documents that have been posted (as links of course). Although our donations have given us update space. I won’t use it, because we would quickly fill their resources.

As always though , good to see you Rob.

n8spresso

Thank you so much @Rob1, and perfect timing I was going to spend my evening researching water as I live in a soft water area and want to know what’s best for my new dual boiler machine.

According to my water authority the values for my supply are:

Alkalinity as CaCO3 is 14.9mg/l
Hardness Total as CaCO3 is 24mg/l
pH is 7.48

According to your spreadsheet this gives a LI value of -1.29 at 130°C so I don’t have to be too concerned about scaling, but what about corrosion at this level? Would you recommend mixing my tap water with a higher alkalinity bottled water?

Rob1

@n8spresso Yes, absolutely. Or add enough sodium bicarb or potassium bicarb to lift alkalinity to about 40mg/l. Would probably be quite difficult to do that to a litre so you might want to make a concentrate that you can use up quite quickly unless you use some distilled water to make it.

Duc959

Can someone help me extra the values needed for the spreadsheet from my local water report?

https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/-/media/ScottishWater/Water-Quality/Data/56/202109/Water-202010-Picketlaw-Last-12-Months.pdf

n8spresso

@Duc959 It looks like Scottish Water publish their hardness data in a separate report https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/-/media/ScottishWater/Document-Hub/Key-Publications/Water-Quality/230320WaterHardnessData2019.pdf

Duc959

@n8spresso did you use a test kit to get the other parameters as I can only seem to get the hardness from the 2 pdfs?

n8spresso

Duc959

No test kit, they’re the values straight from United Utilities — unfortunately I can’t link directly to the report due to how their site works but it’s quite comprehensive.

Duc959

n8spresso I called scottish water, lets see if they get back to me.

Rob1

A GH/KH drop kit is all you need. Like this one. You may be able to find it cheaper elsewhere or buy a similar alternative. They’re designed to be used with 5ml of water but you can increase the accuracy (decrease range between each drop) by increasing the sample size to 20ml or even more if you want to be more accurate, you just need to divide the table by the multiplier you use for a larger sample of water. E.g. 20ml = divide each given value for one drop by 4 to get the value of 1 drop in 20ml.

MediumRoastSteam

For those interested in seeing a distiller in operation, here it is. I just modded @DavecUK ’s ex-distiller, still going strong, with the elephant trunk mod.I drilled a 13mm bore hole at the front and attached a silicone hose to the condenser, so the water goes straight into a 2 litre glass bottle.

PortafilterProcrastinator

MediumRoastSteam

It is good to see a distiller in action, they don’t get much airtime compared to the ROs it seems.

How often do you have to do this?

Do you know roughly how much it costs per litre?

MediumRoastSteam

PortafilterProcrastinator roughly.

So, it takes in approx. 3.5L of water. THere’s no water wastage, only all the minerals are left behind.

Those 3.5L last me approx. 2 weeks. The Elizabeth does not waste water like E61s or levers. THe biggest wastage is when I backflush once fortnightly. I drink 2 espresso per day.

Cost wise, it’s very ineffective, specially with electricity prices going up and up. It’s takes approx. 6 hours to process those 3.5L. It draws 2.1A, so instant consumption is approx. 485W.

Using BG standard tariff, approx. 21p/KWh it works out at approx**. 17.5p per litre**. This excludes remineralisation, but some sodium bicarbonate will last you a lifetime and costs like £1.

Hope that helps.

Inspector

Hi, i would like to give Potassium bicarb a go rather than sodium bicarb to see if there is a taste difference in espresso.

i am feeding machine with Osmio water with mineral cartridge in and i add sodium bicarb (cant remember how many grs but it should be about 0.16) to bring tds up to 100. I just measure tds rather than measuring sodium bicarb weight.

So what i am asking, is this ok to buy? Thanks.

Petre

Inspector why do you use the mineral cartridge when you could just add GH that you can measure?

Rob1

Food grade Potassium Bicarb so should be fine, yes.

Inspector

Rob1 Thank you Rob.

In theory there should be some taste difference isnt it?

Rob1

Not sure. As you’re adding to a tds target then probably.

Inspector

Petre I don’t know. Pure laziness, to replace it with blank cartridge when filling coffee machine tank. I read osmio’s mineral cartridge can stay in and it wouldn’t harm so I was just leaving it there. Would that be better/tastier if I fill it with pure ro, then add potassium bicarb concentrate to bring TDS around 70-100? I think I can only try and see isn’t it.