Adelaide West End Brewery Water Fountain

[Vini2ton]

What the ****? Public fountain? West End? Southwark? Is this some kind of a weird dream where I wake up with Dr Cooper handing me a sparkling ale and saying " You're OK son, they found you in Hindley St." Public fountain?

 

[drsmurto]

Sorry Dr, I'll put a comma in. The water at West End comes from the Willunga Aquifer, which meanders through Adelaide and is natural, RO water which is then filtered. I'll double check next week if it goes through a Reverse Osmosis process before the public fountain, or straight from spring to filter.

Whilst we are on the subject, I am subjectively believing my beers have been better since collecting water straight from the garden tap, rather than using the Puratap in the house. With some unwanted phenolic reactions though in my lastest Brown Porter, I believe it could be due to an increase in the chloramine in our supply over winter rains. As antiphile stated, I am seriously/ definitely considering using Camden tablets to counteract it next brew.

Your scientific input would be appreciated.

If you've got a puratap and the filters are changed regularly then you have a simple way of removing the chloramine. Why add a chemical to react with another chemical? Robbing Peter to pay Paul.

The water West End uses in the brewery is undoubtedly RO. The water that comes from the acquifer and is then treated through their RO system is not. Groundwater is not RO. Rainwater is not RO. One passes through the ground picking up minerals and organic compounds, bacteria etc. The other passes through the air picking up impurities before coming into contact with a roof and collecting all manner of quite literally shit before ending up in a tank.

As stated in both my previous posts, Adelaide tap water is great for brewing once you remove the chloramine. I've given a presentation on brewing water chemistry to the local club - South Australian Brewing Club. I will likely give another later in the year. If you are local we'd love to see you at the monthly meeting at the Wheatsheaf Hotel. Next meeting is this coming Wednesday where we'll be judging an internal comp but plenty of opportunity as always to talk brewing.

 

[Brew Forky]

If you've got a puratap and the filters are changed regularly then you have a simple way of removing the chloramine. Why add a chemical to react with another chemical? Robbing Peter to pay Paul.

The water West End uses in the brewery is undoubtedly RO. The water that comes from the acquifer and is then treated through their RO system is not. Groundwater is not RO. Rainwater is not RO. One passes through the ground picking up minerals and organic compounds, bacteria etc. The other passes through the air picking up impurities before coming into contact with a roof and collecting all manner of quite literally shit before ending up in a tank.

As stated in both my previous posts, Adelaide tap water is great for brewing once you remove the chloramine. I've given a presentation on brewing water chemistry to the local club - South Australian Brewing Club. I will likely give another later in the year. If you are local we'd love to see you at the monthly meeting at the Wheatsheaf Hotel. Next meeting is this coming Wednesday where we'll be judging an internal comp but plenty of opportunity as always to talk brewing.

Thanks for the response. The reason i went off using the Puratap was because I believed the tap water was improving the taste of my ales. I'll brew the same beer that is cold crashing at the moment next weekend, but use the Puratap so I can make a proper comparison.

I would like to attend the club meetings, but normally don't finish work until 9pm or later. As it gets way at 7pm, I would have missed most of the proceedings.

 

[Brew Forky]

So I asked a bloke who had worked at West end for 27 years, and he said the water is drawn up from the aquifier, filtered (RO), piped to the brewhouse and that the fountain out the front runs off the same pipe. He asked me whether I was going to get some to brew with and I told him "No, I think I'm just going to go back to using the Puratap"