[Ilovemypentax]

Words make a big difference. I compared Kroger bottled 'Drinking Water' to Kroger bottled 'Purified Drinking Water.' Big, big difference. The drinking water grade if pretty filthy compared to the purified drinking water. See photos at the end of the bottle water tests.

Distilling water is a quick acid test you can do to find out what residue is in your water. | Daniel D. Teoli Jr.

[vonBaloney]

While interesting to see how much is leftover, not really the best test to determine good vs bad. "Something" in the water is not necessarily bad -- minerals in drinking water can be good (that's why people drink spring water, after all). Water from a unspoiled mountain stream will have plenty of "residue" in it (although still should be purified before drinking because of animal wastes, etc), but it isn't poison. Is it totally distilled water you want to be drinking? Not me. Only if the source is suspect, or there is no other way to purify it. (If you put your food in a dehydrator and remove all the moisture -- what is leftover? The food! The nutrients! Gotta get that stuff from somewhere -- some of it is in the water.)

[bxf]

Interesting, though too much info to read it all in detail.

I would not expect any natural water to be free of all residue. This is not distilled water, and inevitably, some "stuff" is picked up along the way. Also, I would not assume that any residue is necessarily harmful. It depends on what it is and whence it came.

[reeftool]

The water in our area has a high mineral content. People travel to Saratoga from around the world to bathe in it. Much of the surrounding area has similar water. Some of it is strong in sulphur. Others are naturally carbonated as it comes out of the ground and some is slightly radioactive. Every spring and every well will be different. I have village water and it's pretty good although the chlorine level is sometimes high. I filter all the water as it comes into the house and have an additional filter system for drinking water. Our reservoir is from a spring fed pond on the slope of a mountain. It's as clean as Adirondack water gets and better than most wells because well water is a crap shoot. Of course, this pristine water is delivered through 100 year old iron pipes, the reason for my filters. The village has been steadily replacing all the water mains in the past few years. I got hooked into the new main last year.

Almost all bottled water is from the tap from whatever town it is bottled in. You can buy bottled Saratoga water and it tastes pretty good. I can be endlessly entertained in the Saratoga parks when people drink out of the natural springs, only to gag and spit it out. Actually, some of them are pretty good but many have a strong sulphur taste.

[vonBaloney]

The water in our area has a high mineral content. People travel to Saratoga from around the world to bathe in it. Much of the surrounding area has similar water. Some of it is strong in sulphur. Others are naturally carbonated as it comes out of the ground and some is slightly radioactive. Every spring and every well will be different. I have village water and it's pretty good although the chlorine level is sometimes high. I filter all the water as it comes into the house and have an additional filter system for drinking water. Our reservoir is from a spring fed pond on the slope of a mountain. It's as clean as Adirondack water gets and better than most wells because well water is a crap shoot. Of course, this pristine water is delivered through 100 year old iron pipes, the reason for my filters. The village has been steadily replacing all the water mains in the past few years. I got hooked into the new main last year.

Almost all bottled water is from the tap from whatever town it is bottled in. You can buy bottled Saratoga water and it tastes pretty good. I can be endlessly entertained in the Saratoga parks when people drink out of the natural springs, only to gag and spit it out. Actually, some of them are pretty good but many have a strong sulphur taste.

Manitou Springs (right next to Colorado Springs) in CO is like that -- they have a number of natural mineral springs around town they've hooked up to fountains. Interesting thing is they are all different -- some carbonated, different minerals, different tastes. But they are strong as hell, you usually do spit them out. We spent a few hours finding them all while taking pictures around town. A couple of them were ok out of the fountain, most you had to dilute heavily with other water to appreciate...

[gaweidert]

The water in our area has a high mineral content. People travel to Saratoga from around the world to bathe in it. Much of the surrounding area has similar water. Some of it is strong in sulphur. Others are naturally carbonated as it comes out of the ground and some is slightly radioactive. Every spring and every well will be different. I have village water and it's pretty good although the chlorine level is sometimes high. I filter all the water as it comes into the house and have an additional filter system for drinking water. Our reservoir is from a spring fed pond on the slope of a mountain. It's as clean as Adirondack water gets and better than most wells because well water is a crap shoot. Of course, this pristine water is delivered through 100 year old iron pipes, the reason for my filters. The village has been steadily replacing all the water mains in the past few years. I got hooked into the new main last year.

Almost all bottled water is from the tap from whatever town it is bottled in. You can buy bottled Saratoga water and it tastes pretty good. I can be endlessly entertained in the Saratoga parks when people drink out of the natural springs, only to gag and spit it out. Actually, some of them are pretty good but many have a strong sulphur taste.

I have to admit that Saratoga bottled water is pretty good. If you go into Saratoga Spa State Park there is a spring there where you can fill your own bottles with natural spring water from a spigot. There is always a line of cars there with people waiting their turn at the tap. I had well water at my first house. It had a lot of iron and calcium in it. Plus a smell of sulfur. We used to fill a few plastic milk jugs with it and put them into the refrigerator to sit overnight. The hydrogen sulfide gas would work itself out. After that it tasted pretty good. Took a long time to get used to "city water" when we moved to the burbs.

[graphicgr8s]

"The water left a brown residue that has a foul smell. The resulting distilled water has to be distilled a second time to make it taste like spring water that has been distilled once. I don’t know what the brown residue is,"


After reading this I stopped reading. Anything he says after is worthless. What is the "brown residue"?
Keeping tropical fish water is a very important factor. Water quality is key. Any water you drink that tastes good has dissolved solids. TDS. Total Dissolved Solids. Then it needs to be broken down into what those solids are. The ph of the water will also have a factor in what minerals are in that water. Hard water we would expect a lot of calcium and magnesium. Well water we know will have a lot of bacteria. If you use untreated well water look in your toilet tank. See all that brown?
Then of course in addition to ph we need to look at Gh, KH, DGH for just the basics.

One thing I can guarantee. There is stuff in every water we drink. Some good. Some not so good.

We use RO for tropical fish. Mostly we try to get it as pure as possible so that we can control all of those aspects of the water. If we are breeding harder fish we sometimes we need a low ph with few minerals. Some fish require the exact opposite. RO allows us to control all of that.

I'd be more worried about what the municipal water company is adding. Fluoride, chlorine, chloramine etc.

[reeftool]

I have to admit that Saratoga bottled water is pretty good. If you go into Saratoga Spa State Park there is a spring there where you can fill your own bottles with natural spring water from a spigot. There is always a line of cars there with people waiting their turn at the tap. I had well water at my first house. It had a lot of iron and calcium in it. Plus a smell of sulfur. We used to fill a few plastic milk jugs with it and put them into the refrigerator to sit overnight. The hydrogen sulfide gas would work itself out. After that it tasted pretty good. Took a long time to get used to "city water" when we moved to the burbs.

The trick is to know which spring to fill your jugs.

The best one is along the road across from the Geyser picnic area.

[graphicgr8s]

I have to admit that Saratoga bottled water is pretty good. If you go into Saratoga Spa State Park there is a spring there where you can fill your own bottles with natural spring water from a spigot. There is always a line of cars there with people waiting their turn at the tap. I had well water at my first house. It had a lot of iron and calcium in it. Plus a smell of sulfur. We used to fill a few plastic milk jugs with it and put them into the refrigerator to sit overnight. The hydrogen sulfide gas would work itself out. After that it tasted pretty good. Took a long time to get used to "city water" when we moved to the burbs.

I had the same problem with sulfur in our well in my last house. Wound up adding a chlorinator and filter to get rid of the smell and some of the iron. Had a softener too but I hated the feeling of soft water and soap. Yuck.

[csa]

Had a softener too but I hated the feeling of soft water and soap. Yuck.

Well water in this area is so hard, no soap will lather up! When I first moved up here permanently, I used well water for the household. Within one year, the hardness of the water burned out my water pump, and also corroded the heating element of my water heater so badly, it had to be replaced. I have to haul all my water; so for household I go to my family's business in town, and get city water (chlorinated). For the yard, I haul well water from my neighbor to another tank outside. For drinking water, I've been using the Costco 40-pk purified bottled water, with minerals added for flavor; according to the label.

[vonBaloney]

Well water in this area is so hard, no soap will lather up! When I first moved up here permanently, I used well water for the household. Within one year, the hardness of the water burned out my water pump, and also corroded the heating element of my water heater so badly, it had to be replaced. I have to haul all my water; so for household I go to my family's business in town, and get city water (chlorinated). For the yard, I haul well water from my neighbor to another tank outside. For drinking water, I've been using the Costco 40-pk purified bottled water, with minerals added for flavor; according to the label.

Why not use a water softener on the well water?

[csa]

Why not use a water softener on the well water?

I have absolutely no room that a full house water softener would require. Also I cannot carry the bags of salt, nor an area to store them.

[ChrisPlatt]

Driving on The Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island once I spotted a picturesque splash of water cascading down a rocky outcropping at the side of the road.

I pulled over and had me a drink. It nearly knocked me over! It was like drinking gasoline.

Chris

[p38arover]

Do any of you use rain water? We've lived in several places where we had rain water tanks as that was the only source of water. We didn't boil it, we just drank it straight from the tank.

Our bottled water comes from the kitchen tap.

"Evian" = naive spelled backward.

[aslyfox]

Do any of you use rain water? We've lived in several places where we had rain water tanks as that was the only source of water.

Our bottled water comes from the kitchen tap.

"Evian" = naive spelled backward.

I know of a local Midwestern grocery store chain where it is possible to buy the store brand bottled water which proudly proclaims on its label for all, to read:

"Bottled at a Iowa municipal site"

In other words, the consumers are buying city water from an unknown Iowa municipality which means it could be treated ground water or treated lake or treated river water. They have no idea what Iowa municipality.

Didn't PT Barnum say something about a sucker being born every minute or something like that?