Using BRITA Purity Finest with poor quality tap water

Water analysis, treatment, and mineral recipes for optimum taste and equipment health.
isido993
Posts: 24
Joined: 3 years ago

#1: Post by isido993 »

My tap water quality seems to be quite poor so I'm trying to figure out if I can safely plumb in my espresso machine via a BRITA Purity Finest filter and would much appreciate somebody with better knowledge on water sharing their opinion on this.
Here is my tap water analysis: https://www.aguasdevalencia.es/Sites/1/ ... litica.pdf

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homeburrero
Team HB
Posts: 4863
Joined: 13 years ago

#2: Post by homeburrero »

That water is really hard (45 French degrees, equal to 25 German degrees or 450 mg/L CaCO3 equivalent.) That filter will help with that if you replace it at the proper interval. Note that the C-150 Finest will treat about 1100 liters at 10 °dH , so at your 25 °dH it would only treat about 440 liters before the softening resin is exhausted.

The really bad news is that your water contains 99 mg/L chloride ion, and these filters will not reduce that. Chloride is a corrosion concern and the only practical way to reduce that is with a reverse osmosis (RO) system. La Marzocco, for example, recommends using RO with a remineralization cartridge if your water has more than 30 mg/L of chloride ion.
Pat
nínádiishʼnahgo gohwééh náshdlį́į́h

isido993 (original poster)
Posts: 24
Joined: 3 years ago

#3: Post by isido993 (original poster) replying to homeburrero »

Thank you for the reply Pat!
I just threw away my RO system because it was full of bacteria (sanitising it wasn't helping much, the bacteria was usually back in around a month after sanitising), I'm currently using TWW + distilled, I'll just stick with that for now.

John49
Posts: 322
Joined: 9 years ago

#4: Post by John49 »

Agree distilled with some additions works for me, as well. I prefer simple solutions.