Water - Is It Ok To Use Hot Water Tap?

[manticle]

Neither copper nor iron are heavy metals

Let me say this little tidbit came directly from my arse. Copper IS considered a heavy metal despite the definition of heavy metal being slightly non-standard.

Man enough to admit when I'm wrong but I'd rather not be so in the first place.

 

[jayse]

I love Heavy Metal :super:

 

[kegpig]

I replaced my system a few years back and was a stainless steel gas unit we cut the tank open and if you saw what crap was in it you would never drink from your hot water tap again

 

[Gout]

poo ..... kegpig - looks like you have set my mind. say no to Hot water?

 

[crundle]

Meh, I use hot water all the time for brewing. It saves me time and the beer tastes ok by me.

Maybe I should issue a health warning on my beers from now on - brewed with Adelaide water from a hot water service.

Crundle

 

[jayse]

I have seen a lot of things you think you wouldn't want to use again.


But you do

 

[jayse]

Meh, I use hot water all the time for brewing. It saves me time and the beer tastes ok by me.

Maybe I should issue a health warning on my beers from now on - brewed with Adelaide water from a hot water service.

Crundle

I have been doing the very exact same thing as you for many years, the HWS is my friend (but I have never had to put him to bed drunk).

 

[Tony]

like hot water

Your skin is the largest organ in (on) your body and absorbes just about everything you put on it.

I refuse to use bug repellants after seeing airoguard make a plastic hard hat so brittle it shatered. Your skin soaks it up!

All the chemicals in soap, shampoo, sunscreen, and god knows what else that we rub on ourelves.

Im buying goats milk soap now for the family and its curing my kids Excma and skin conditions. No nasty chemicals.

who is having a cold shower tonight?........ we wouldnt want heavy metal poisioning from the hot water.

Im off for a nice warm sower.

cheers

 

[jayse]

like hot water

Your skin is the largest organ in (on) your body and absorbes just about everything you put on it.

I refuse to use bug repellants after seeing airoguard make a plastic hard hat so brittle it shatered. Your skin soaks it up!

All the chemicals in soap, shampoo, sunscreen, and god knows what else that we rub on ourelves.

Im buying goats milk soap now for the family and its curing my kids Excma and skin conditions. No nasty chemicals.

who is having a cold shower tonight?........ we wouldnt want heavy metal poisioning from the hot water.

Im off for a nice warm sower.

cheers

Theres something peotic in the way that reads, not sure of the meaning but can you do it Poe style?

 

[MHB]

Dragging out the old plumber and digging into memories probably best left buried.
There are two classes of hot water systems
Instantaneous and Storage
Instantaneous are basically not going to be a problem, the gas ones are just a copper heat exchanger hanging over a fire, water goes in cold and comes out hot, newer ones (about 10 years or so) have a tempering valve that mixes hot and cold so the water wont scald people. The modern ones can have a computer controlled mixer that lets you dial up the desired temperature. The only possible downsides are that you might get some copper in the water; and that the newer ones are not really hot enough. Lets ignore Electric instantaneous as they are fairly rare now days and getting rarer.
Storage tanks are a whole different ballgame. I think you will find they all have sacrificial anodes (yes all, Stainless and especially Solar units - they have huge anodes), these are going to be made of Magnesium or Aluminium or and alloy of the two. The amount of Aluminium goes up as the hardness of the local water supply increases. Anodes should be replaced every 5 years (read your warranty paperwork some time).

Does it matter? Well apart from the never ending arguments about the link between Aluminium and Alzheimer's not a dam.

I think most of the muck in the bottom of storage systems is decayed Anode, very reactive metals like those chosen for Anodes will react, most of the Aluminium will wind up as Aluminium Hydroxide (if your water is chlorinated). Some Magnesium may get into the brew water but unless there is something seriously wrong with your hot water system I doubt it will be enough to cause any trouble.

Copper is more interesting, potentially the cause of lots of problems, in small dosed it accelerates protein condensation (trub formation) and tends to get bound up in the trub, not a problem and arguably beneficial.
Too much will shorten the shelf life of beer by catalysing (speeding up) the formation of permanent haze; the old brewers saw goes, No Copper Downstream of the Kettle, for very good reasons.
Way too much is a cumulative heavy metal toxin and could seriously ruin your whole day, not to mention your beer. We are talking extreme cases here; the tap water would be coming out blue/green or would taste Tinny this is usually only caused by faulty wiring or appliances leaking to earth via the plumbing.

For most of us I dont think using water from a HWS is an issue defiantly not in the case of modern well maintained systems, but if you have problems that you cant track down it is one place to look.

Isnt brewing fun
MHB

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I think you are more likely to notice brewing problems than have health issues, or at least I hope so because I have been cooking pasta, veges, soups - everything really - in water from the hot tap all my life......

Copper & Zinc while needed by yeast in very low amounts, are both detrimental to yeast health and general beer quality at higher levels; and iron is, apart from actually toxic stuff, pretty much the worst of the worst ions you could have in your brewing water. So I can see a potential for beer quality issues with old and/or poorly maintained piping and hot water systems - but if you aren't noticing problems... then really there isn't one.

As MHB said, if you are noticing problems.. maybe consider your use of hot water from the tap as a place to look, but thats about it. I'd use it if it were available in my brewery.

I'd be more inclined to suggest that the OP stop using his garden hose to fill his HLT than to worry about using hot water.

TB

 

[Wisey]

Sensitive lot.

If you were Chinese, taking your brewing water out of the downstream yantzee river - you would have a valid concern

 

[beerDingo]

Otherwise I'm heading for an early grave. My dying words to my lady will be: "that's right sweetheart, it wasn't all the beer that shot my liver out, it was those damn water pipes".

:lol:

 

[blackbock]

Storage tanks are a whole different ballgame. I think you will find they all have sacrificial anodes (yes all, Stainless and especially Solar units - they have huge anodes)

No they don't. Mine is an Everlast tank, I know for a fact there is no anode.

After a while, the anode itself becomes coated in other material anyhow and that is why they become ineffective and tanks rust out.

 

[Gout]

I'd be more inclined to suggest that the OP stop using his garden hose to fill his HLT than to worry about using hot water.

TB

How do you fill your brewery? i tend to brew 50Lt or 100Lt and apart from the hose (which i run for a while to clean it out) i could only bucket the water - which takes ages

i cant detect any effect from the hose but if there is a better way i would like to know so i can change my setup and use a new method before i move the brew stand

cheers

edit: also the hose i use is about 5m long just to get from the tap to the brewery

 

[bradsbrew]

Garden Hose = Bad IMO. especially with hot water, think of the taste you get of warm water out of the nylex..it tastes like...well...garden hose??. Use Pots

Brad

Edit for why i dont use hose.

 

[quincy]

FFS....

I've been drinking water from the tap all my life. Still do it now. If I'm outside doing stuff around the yard and feeling a bit parched, I turn on the hose and have a drink.

Have been using hot water from the tap for cooking, washing etc. If I make a coffee or tea in summer and don't want it boiling hot, I turn on the hot water and use that.

I sometimes use hot water in my HLT if time is tight....does it change the taste of the resultant beer - f**ked if I know

IMHO my beer is very drinkable - perhaps not award winning but I doubt if my taste buds (and many others for that matter) would be able to say "that beer has been brewed using hot water from the tap".

My 2c

Cheers
Q

 

[Synthetase]

Gout: the big green shed sells potable water hoses designed to carry drinking water and don't contribute any plastic "hose taste".

 

[Gout]

sorry i use the garden hose only with cold water, hot water i use a 20Lt drum

synthetase - if i have a hot tap this hose you mention would be perfect! and given i plan to pump from chiller to the 100Lt fermenter it would also be great for that too. thanks very much i will have a look see

cheers

 

[Fantoman]

I think you will find that a lot of the crap at the bottom of Hot Water System's is also sediment that is picked up from the local water supply - remember, there are many meters of copper pipe before your hot water system, and god knows what kind of pipe in the water grid, all of which are likely leeching into the water. Also, your cold tap water just comes from a large tank at the top of the local hill anyway in most cases.