Waitforme Ashbeck has increased in alkalinity since that recommendation, no harm in Volvic with it to reduce Volvic’s hardness & alkalinity, but seems an expensive way to go.

    a month later

    So have I understood correctly? If I’m using Ashbeck in my Elizabeth, shall I still continue replacing the tank water filter as well, or is that not necessary anymore?

    a year later

    erkal Ashbeck at 46mg/L bicarbonate is fine, check the label.


      This is Ashbeck that I bought about a week ago

      I used to use Tesco’s Ashbeck as it was recommended on here and then someone mentioned Waitrose bottled water, so I thought I would give that a go and have been using it ever since. But, as you posted the picture of the Ashbeck minerals, I thought out of interest I would see what the difference was against Waitrose water. The result?…. Not a thing. Every mineral content is exactly the same. So, as I have been having to travel 13 miles to go to Waitrose and only a mile and a quarter to Tesco, I think I will be going back to Ashbeck.

        Both Tesco Ashbeck & Waitrose Essentials Lockhills are Cumbrian water from Armathwaite. At some point in the past it was softer/lower pH/lower alkalinity.

        It’s definitely a more recent thing, they weren’t always the same

        Lockhills same as Ashbeck I think

        I found this one from Sainsbury’s preferable to Ashbeck for espresso.

        Flair 58, Mahlkonig EK43, Kinu M47, 1zpresso ZP6.

          JimmyP - you have a Flair - so you should be good. I wouldn’t put that into the boiler of my coffee machine. It would be a white rock in no time. 😊

              Chase Spring is also very high in alkalinity, so tends to mute acidity and make coffee chewier in body, it’s pretty typical of hard UK tap water.

                IIRC they show the composition of it per 100ml when most others do it per litre so at first glance it looks low scale until you realise you need to multiply by 10 to compare!

                  Dusk I think that’s peculiar to Sainsburys?

                    MWJB To be fair I prefer Chase Spring to Ashbeck because it does tend to balance the acidity of the lighter roasts I enjoy for espresso, but I’m not sure it’s highly alkaline with ph7? And I’m also not sure one can regard uk hard tap water as uniform? Chase spring contains a small fraction of the minerals I have in my tap water at home.

                    Flair 58, Mahlkonig EK43, Kinu M47, 1zpresso ZP6.

                    • MWJB replied to this.

                        JimmyP - I use ZeroWater filter and remineralise with Potassium Bicarbonate at a concentration of 100mg/L. My machine still behaves and sounds like new - despite being over 4 years old.

                        If you had used Chase Springs on a dual boiler machine… the likelihood is that it wouldn’t be working by now.

                            MediumRoastSteam Ok, I’m surprised it makes that much of a difference, but for me it’s another reason to love the Flair.
                            I reckon it’s about eight months since I did any maintenance 😅👍

                            Flair 58, Mahlkonig EK43, Kinu M47, 1zpresso ZP6.

                                JimmyP ‘Alkalinity’, is what they used to call ‘Karbonate hardness’ (KH), or temporary hardness. It’s basically the bicarbonate value in mg/L multiplied by 0.8 to give the value as CaCO3 (this is the scale used widely in the water industry).

                                It’s not directly relatable to the pH (hydrogen ion).

                                I didn’t say UK tap water was uniform, ground water is very widely varied, but the areas of soft water tend to be in the West & (igneous rock) & more sparsely populated. Chase spring is roughly around the average at 140mg/L total hardness, 120mg/L alkalinity, many folk (like me) will have water this hard, or harder, coming out of their tap.