I'm thinking of brewing with tap water. Terrible idea?

I've come across a few post that people complain about off taste and the first thing people ask if it was brewed with tap.

It's the only thing I use an I produce pretty solid beer. IMO it's what gives your beer character. Many breweries use local water, which is why it is hard to clone many of them.

Where is does your tap water come from? Well or municipal? The short answer is that if your water tastes good then it is probably fine to brew with. If it is chlorinated municipal, then you will want to run it through a carbon filter to remove the chlorine or treat it with a campden tablet. I bought an under the sink carbon filter for our kitchen sink that filters the cold water supply and use our city tap water almost exclusively. Its like $40 at hardware stores and the filter lasts about 6 months.

Depends on what your tap water tastes like. If it's good water, then it's fine.

My local tap water is not so good, thus I always brew with bottled spring water that I like.

If you do brew with tap water I recommend boiling it all before adding any ingredients, use a filter system and or use campden tablets. That will help drive of some of the chlorine and other chemicals.

I have only ever used tap water, and my beers turn out just fine as well. Only thing i've ever added was some gypsum here and there. Never actually had a report done on my water either.

I've brewed with both tap and bottled spring water and I honestly can't tell the difference. It's up to preference and style of beer, really.

Once you boil tap water the chlorine is removed. If your tap water is very hard or very soft it may make a difference in flavor, but should not contribute to off flavors either. Off flavors often arise from poor sanitation practices or contaminated ingredients, so check your stock carefully and maintain scrupoulously clean utemsils when working with your brews. Even a poor home brew will always taste better than a commercial swill water to me. Theres really no such thing as a bad batch of home brew, you can get an infected batch, but a straight up" bad" batch will still be drinkable if you ask me. Just sayin...

Wheelchair Bob

I was unable to tell the difference between filtered and regular tap too. I started brewing with tap water out of necessity when my filter clogged. My water is city water and has a distinct chlorine odor straight out of the tap. As I said it is undetectable - by me - in the finished beer. Also, I THINK our water is hard.

I would guess it depends on what is in your tap water. If there is a lot of chlorine you might have trouble. I have used only tap water, through a Brita filter with great results.

Municipal chlorinated tap water here in Baltimore county. But it'll get boiled for 60 minutes. Thinking about boiling it prior to even mashing with it.

I've exclusively brewed with tap water with great results, but our tap water tastes great (apparently Louisville pioneered water filtration or something).

Early on my beers weren't as good as they are now, but that's because I was fermenting at room temp (around 75*) and now I can control it to keep it in the 60's. That was the single best improvement I've seen in my brewing so far.

Going to make some calls and try to find out if my area uses chloramine or chlorine. Apparently chloramine can't be boiled off. Baltimore county/city if anyone may know.

The simple answer to this is to just brew a batch with all tap water and see what you think. You can get water reports and analysis and read and measure and keep going with that and still have crap beer. If you have water that comes out of your tap that works, awesome!!

I brew with all tap water for all styles. It works, it's easy, and it's REALLY cheap.

The municipal water here in the teeming metropolis of Marengo is supplied by two rather deep wells. It is clorinated, but there is no detectable odor. I have brewed with tap water since my first brew; I do not plan to switch to anything else. I figure that, since I drink our city water, I can brew with it.

glenn514

I normally drink tap water and had no problem buying gallons of spring water when I was only doing 2.5 gallon batches but I have moved up in the world of brewing and am doing it more and 5 gallons at a time. I'll get a filter soon but I'm going to do Cream of Three Crops with tap water today. It's a very light brew so if the water is bad it will definitely show.

pcollins said:

The simple answer to this is to just brew a batch with all tap water and see what you think.

Click to expand...

I'll second this. For an inexpensive, fast turnaround experimental batch you may want to try Biermuncher's Centennial Blonde: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/centennial-blonde-simple-4-all-grain-5-10-gall-42841/

There's an extract version near bottom of first page.

Ooops, nevermind - looks like you're going with Cream of 3 Crops - another great choice!

My tap water is little better than liquid limestone and truly tastes awful--yet I brew everything with it. I use it straight from the source with no softener and use a carbon filter to remove chlorine. If I am brewing a style from a region calling for softer water I may dilute with RO water--one beer was 50% RO. Usually this is not needed. I treat my mash and sparge water with lactic acid for pH, according to Bru'nwater. After the mash and sparge I treat in the kettle with salts to adjust my Chloride:Sulfate ratio according to the style of beer I am making. I've tried adding the salts to the mash, but it throws off my efficiency every time, so I always do in the kettle now.

Those who tell you, "I see no difference between brewing with tap water and bottled water" are assuming that your water profile and theirs are the same. This is an unfounded assumption. All potable water can be used to brew, but only some water needs no adjustment to be good brewing water. Most unadjusted water is good for some styles but not for others--this is why styles are historically regional. Occasionally water would need so much adjustment that it would be silly to try. If you're on municipal water get a copy of the water quality report-they have to provide it--and enter this into a water program, like Bru'nwater. If it tastes good you can make beer with it, but it may need adjustments to make the best beer.

If you *really* want to know... here is the Water Quality Report for Baltimore for 2112. (The chlorine level averages .52 parts per million with a max and a goal of 4 parts per million so it's good for that.)

But how do you determine if this is a "good" report or a "bad" report? I'm not sure. Unless I've heard bad things about the water or if I had heard my water was hard or softer than typical, I wouldn't worry.

Here's a google. Make of it what you will.

=====
Well, according to clukk's post directly above mine this program when fed in values from this report, will tell you what you need to do to your water. Good luck!

My water tastes good from the tap but I always got off flavors when brewing with it. Since going to spring water my beers have been great. I got my water tested and it seems OK though some of the minerals seemed not to jive with each other. I will try my tap water using a filter to see if that makes it better. Though spring water is cheap enough and it is already measured in gallons lol

Malty_Dog said:

I'll second this. For an inexpensive, fast turnaround experimental batch you may want to try Biermuncher's Centennial Blonde: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/centennial-blonde-simple-4-all-grain-5-10-gall-42841/

There's an extract version near bottom of first page.

Ooops, nevermind - looks like you're going with Cream of 3 Crops - another great choice!

Click to expand...

I'll be bottling Centennial Blonde in a few days. I just moved it to 70 degrees after 5 days around 66 degrees.

Johnnyhamer said:

Going to make some calls and try to find out if my area uses chloramine or chlorine. Apparently chloramine can't be boiled off. Baltimore county/city if anyone may know.

Click to expand...

Even if they only use chlorine, the chlorine can meet up with ammonia released from decaying organic matter and form chloramines.

Another tap water brewer here. Dont sweat it though. The real test is if all of your brews turn out to have the same sort of 'off' flavor, try a batch with RO. If that fixes it for you use RO. It is all personal preference unless you want to get into the whole water chemistry thing, but for me as long as I cannot smell chlorine when the tap is running or I am drinking the water from a glass I just use it. Though you can always remember that what you make is the sum of its parts and water chemistry does affect your brews and if using RO there are few dissolved solids in there which you may desire to add back.

Did I confuse you enough?

In short:

No. It's *not* a terrible idea. It's really good and sensible idea. There are only two reasons you shouldn't do it:

1. You are -f-u-s-s-y- discriminating. There is nothing wrong with being fu... er, discriminating. You are entitled to be discriminating. You just need to be aware that your discrimination is beyond what the majority of home brewers would consider the pale. Most homebrewers do use tap water and aren't as discriminating as you are.

2. Your tap water isn't up to par. You can check just whether it is or isn't up to par by reading a water quality report. Usually the reason it might fail to reach par is that there is too much chlorine or chlorimes, or it is noticeably too hard or soft. In either case there are remedies you can employ. Or you could use bottled water.

I have an in-line water filter. Love it:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001DVW0PI/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I brew only with rainwater; my whole house water system is rainwater, with filters and a UV light. The water is very soft, and I think I can taste that in the beer.

billpaustin said:

I brew only with rainwater; my whole house water system is rainwater, with filters and a UV light. The water is very soft, and I think I can taste that in the beer.

Click to expand...

That is really cool.

I have only one brew under my belt but deal with water a lot for the kidney dialysis industry. The water here in Cincinnati isn't too bad but I can taste chlorine which is the only reason I drink filtered water (not afraid of chlorine just don't like the taste).

When setting up for my initial brew I looked into a few different ways to filter the water just enough but not too much. I went with a carbon block filter which reduces chlorine depending on your flow rate and is a particle filter too. I tested pre and post filter and did have a significant drop in chlorine and taste test was good as well. Carbon takes out all sorts of other stuff that most municipalities don't test for too and that may help taste as well. If you want total chlorine and chloramine removal you would need to go with granular activated carbon (or GAC) and you would need a set flow rate through that tank for proper reaction time. Nice but I don't think it will be totally necessary.

One thing I'll add... if you do use carbon and reduce chlorine, make sure to, at a minimum, air dry any hoses or fitting post filter as they will provide an easier place for bacteria to grow.

Buy campden tablets. One will treat 20 gallons of water and a 100 of them are only a couple bucks. Crush one up and stir half in your mash and half in your sparge. Done.

Unless I'm brewing a pilsner or something that requires very soft water, its all I use.

It should be no surprise that the effect of water quality on beer can be profound and that, therefore, the influence your particular water has on your particular beer depends a great deal on the quality of your water. So the first step is to find out what your water quality is. Send off a sample to Ward Labs. The Baltimore city report someone posted is pretty useless to a brewer. It does mention the use of chloramination. Use 1 Campden tablet per 20 gal treated and chlorine/chloramine are taken care of.

Given where you are the expectation is that your water will be pretty nominal east coast municipal water like. You can go to https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewing-water-chemistry-primer-198460/ to get some ideas as to how water influences beer and what to do to brew a good beer independent of the water you have. You can go way beyond the recommendations of that Primer. Water treatment can get to be a pretty intricate subject which can be greatly simplified simply by diluting or using RO water.

It should be no surprise that the effect of water quality on beer can be profound and that, therefore, the influence your particular water has on your particular beer depends a great deal on the quality of your water. So the first step is to find out what your water quality is. Send off a sample to Ward Labs. The Baltimore city report someone posted is pretty useless to a brewer. It does mention the use of chloramination. Use 1 Campden tablet per 20 gal treated and chlorine/chloramine are taken care of.

Given where you are the expectation is that your water will be pretty nominal east coast municipal water like. You can go to https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewing-water-chemistry-primer-198460/ to get some ideas as to how water influences beer and what to do to brew a good beer independent of the water you have. You can go way beyond the recommendations of that Primer. Water treatment can get to be a pretty intricate subject which can be greatly simplified simply by diluting or using RO water.

I can probably get a better analysis for Baltimore for you.

You can add me to the list of tap water brewers. I used to drive an hour to get mountain spring water, but got tired of doing that. We are blessed with soft water here where I live. I just put an inline RV water filter on the end of a hose to take away some chlorine/ metallic flavors from the water. Works pretty well. Brewed a really good Kolsch recently that got 2nd place in its category at a local comp

aproud1 said:

I can probably get a better analysis for Baltimore for you.

Click to expand...

Thanks, how?

I'm also in Baltimore County, and I've been using tap water. I treat it with campden tablets.

Only bad thing about brewing with tap water is that the quality can change especially if your city uses surface water. Not such a big deal if it's an all well water plant.

The old adage "if it tastes good, it's good brew water" is not always true. My water tastes great out of the tap but it doesn't make for good brewing water especially in the spring when ammonia is high and large amounts of free chlorine are necessary to quench it and still leave a chlorine residual in addition to that.

I've had our water analzyed and we get some crazy numbers due to being a lime softening plant as well. I posted my water report here and the experts were scratching their heads like no other. Basically told me to run for the hills and buy bottled water. I did just that and my beer quality went from below average to great instantly.

Johnnyhamer said:

Thanks, how?

Click to expand...

Sorry lost track of this... I can get a water report from north baltimore if you want it? might be a couple of months old.

Ok, I'm completely new to homebrewing, but I do know something about dechlorinating tap water from having an aquarium.

Boiling will certainly remove chlorine by accelerating it gassing off. Then again, simply letting tap water sit in an open container will do the same in a day or two as the chlorine gas will escape.

Neither boiling nor allowing water to stand will remove chloramines, however. These, not chlorine, are the usual culprits in creating that chlorine smell. Some municipalities use one, the other, or both, and sometimes it varies within the same municipality season to season.

I guess in the end I'd suggest just trying it, perhaps on a small batch, and see what happens.

And who knew I'd ever be able to link my aquarium hobby to my newfound homebrewing hobby?