Anyone know anything about these? Cheaper solution than the osmio zero!
Bottled Water and Descalling Espresso Machine
JahLaza - that’s a distiller. A very different thing from the Osmio Zero.
It boils the water, the vapour is caught in a condenser. All the minerals are left behind, only water ends up on the other side.
The process is highly inefficient. It takes 5 hours to distil 3.5L of water.
You have to remineralise the water yourself as, it is, tastes of nothing (as distilled water should).
I only use a distiller because no one else in my household will drink from an Osmio Zero (they rather drink from the tap… go figure).
yeah very true, they’re both very different systems alright.5 hours a bit of a wait but I think if one was just using it for the espresso machine it would be an ok solution, add some bicarbonate back in
MediumRoastSteam no one else in my household will drink from an Osmio Zero (they rather drink from the tap… go figure).
Wow!
Did they drink the water from Osmio Zero before ? A couple of weeks, I would have thought any one to convert.
My daughter rolled her eyes when she heard I had spent £350+. She became a big fan on day 1. My wife was terribly disappointed and wasn’t happy I had spent a lot of money for a water filter. After a week, she said the best investment we ever made! 😂
LMSC I actually have one, bought it last may or something, apologies I may have been a bit misleading with the post! Yes I love it, has replaced the kettle, my girlfriend uses it all the time too. I started to notice the smell of chlorine from the tap water the day after I first started using it which I hadn’t noticed prior to that! I leave the remineralisation cartridge in place and don’t have to worry about the espresso machine water
LMSC No no, the osmio is here to stay! I was just inquisitive browsing there and thought that would be a reasonable option if just for feeding the espresso machine.If I was starting again, maybe I would consider something like that. there’s a fair price difference, but of course the osmio is a one stop for everything and the produce is there on demand as opposed to waiting 3 hours or whatever
- Edited
JahLaza Agree. It was an easy decision for us, despite the one-off outlay. What amazes me, hope folks don’t get me wrong, are the discussions / hesitations on the cost of filter replacements when we spend at least thousands on espresso kits. Even, IMO, a one-off investment for a unit like this is worth it compared to the hassles of scales; add the potential health benefits. 😊
I use a distiller. It’s the most consistent method as output isn’t affected by changes to the supply. It is inefficient though and you have to obviously distill a batch in advance.
LMSC Did they drink the water from Osmio Zero before ? A couple of weeks, I would have thought any one to convert.
No, they haven’t. I’d love to buy one, but I fear it would be only me drinking, and, knowing my wife, she won’t touch it either, and make a point that the tap water is just fine. 🤷
If I were to buy one, I’d maybe drink one or two litres a day from it. Problem is, as soon as I go back to the office, I’d drink even less from it. So yeah, it’s distiller for me, for the time being at least.
13 days later
I decided to test my water , both tap and Ashbeck with 20mg of Bicarbonate of Soda added per 5l.
The first pic below shows my tap water giving a reading of 5 drops per 20ml equating to 2.5 German Total hardness (44.8mg/l) and 2 drops per 20ml giving a German Carbonate hardness of 1 (17.8mg/l).
The second pic is Ashbeck with 20mg of Bicarbonate of Soda per 5l giving a reading of 7 drops per 20ml equating to German total hardness of 3.5 ( 62mg/l ) and 4 drops per 20ml giving of German Carbonate hardness of 2 ( 36.6mg/l )
I’m thinking that taste aside, I’d be better using my tap water ?
Anyone ?
@DavecUK , lol, I’m thinking I could use the fridge supplied filtered tap water, just a boggo standard filter for taste and odour.
But , on the scaling side of things then would you reckon my tap water is good enough ?
Flippin ekk as like!! Where do you live?
Out in the sticks in Angus
20mg Sodium bicarb to 5 litres will give you an extra 2.4mg/l alkalinity….not worth bothering.
It’s very difficult to accurately measure 10 or 20mg of anything, with ordinary scales of a 0.00 resolution you might be accurate to 0.1g (100mg).
Your test would indicate the label on the Ashbeck is significantly out of spec given you’ve only added 2.4mg/l alkalinity with the Sodium bicarb the Alkalinity should be about 27mg/l and hardness should be bout 42mg/l….so I have to ask, did you stop adding drops at the sign of first colour change or did you keep going until it was a “bright” colour? The accurate test would be the one where you stop at the first colour change.
What is the resolution of your test kit? It say 1drop = 1degree but are you supposed to use a 5ml, 10ml, 20ml sample etc?
If you made a mistake and added 200mg (0.20g) then you’d end up with about 50mg/l alkalinity with the ashbeck and at least 25mg/l with your tap water……..that’s if the tap water had no alkalinity to start with. So either way something has gone wrong somewhere……or the ashbeck you have is way out to start with.
Thanks @Rob1 , my mistake, it’s actually 200mg bicarbonate of soda I’m adding to the 5l of Ashbeck.
The test kit asks to use 10ml and 1 drop equals 1 degree of German hardness, but I used 20ml and just divided by 2.
According to my water report the alkalinity of my tap water should be approx 25mg HCO3/l
Does the above make more sense of my test results ?