Gringoes.com: What Happens if I drink the water?

Mineral water for ice cubes makes for nice clear cubes, which look nicer in a drink (if you are in a bar/restaurant business). In hard water areas, tap water can leave a white sediment in the cube, but normally freeze with a cloudy colour.

My mum used to chop garlic and other herbs and freeze them in an ice cube tray for use as single portions that are easy to defrost. It did make the G&T taste funny when she also made ice cubes in the same tray..

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Here the city water has so much chlorin that the bugs won't live in it, but the solids in the water can cause problem.

I have 3-stage RO filter for drinking water and two clear rough filters before it. In a week you can see the brownish sludge in the clear filters. I need to swap the pre-filters 2-3 times a year. They cost around $4 each. When moved here I had like 5 few years stock within our moving stuff.

The RO works great and requires only once a year filter swaps. The RO removes the chlorin taste and harmful solids (like heavy metals etc).

I have not bought bottled water for a long time. In TX you could buy the water from the dispensing units with $0.75 5 gallons, as the water was not drinkable there either (South TX). Higher solid count than here actually. The bottled water here shows very low solid count so it is pretty ok, don't know about bacteria levels. I have only solid measurement unit with me. It gives rough idea about the water quality.

Running the city water through RO, cuts the solids down to 1/20 of the bottled water count. It creates about 15 gallons per day. I needed to buy permeate pump though to get it work faster, as the city water pressure is very low, varying between 0 to 40psi. Minimum for the RO to work properly is basically 40psi.

When the city water cuts off (few times a week), we have boosterpump that starts automatically to give the needed pressure (and back flow preventer valves so that the water does not run back to the city network). Our 2000liter tank is on ground level, we dont' have that 10m tower in the back of the building, that could give you the gravity based pressure. But this way even the lower city pressure (which would not anymore run the shower e.g.) will still fill in the tank, and the booster runs it to the house. Easy for the cleaning as well. Of course we have rough filter on the front of it, but it has to be really coarse to work on the low pressure. So it will still leave some sludge in the tank after 6 months or so.

Edited by tamte - 25 May 2012 at 19:31

life's too short to be living without you, babe.

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Author	Message
hpeak13 Gringoes.com Guru Joined: 14 July 2009 Location: Brazil Online Status: Online Posts: 2125	Posted: 25 May 2012 at 13:00
	my wife makes me use the bottled water for the ice trays.....after a few months of doing it I stopped because I believe it to be absurd. now it's just tapwater ice cubes...shhhhhhhh
	We all have to decide for ourselves how much sin we can live with. -Enoch Nucky Thompson
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finrudd Senior Member Joined: 06 November 2005 Location: Brazil Online Status: Offline Posts: 816	Posted: 25 May 2012 at 13:14
	Mineral water for ice cubes makes for nice clear cubes, which look nicer in a drink (if you are in a bar/restaurant business). In hard water areas, tap water can leave a white sediment in the cube, but normally freeze with a cloudy colour. My mum used to chop garlic and other herbs and freeze them in an ice cube tray for use as single portions that are easy to defrost. It did make the G&T taste funny when she also made ice cubes in the same tray..
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sven Gringoes.com Guru Joined: 14 March 2007 Location: Brazil Online Status: Online Posts: 12762	Posted: 25 May 2012 at 13:20
	I use ice cube trays for chicken broth for those purposes. You should have seen the sogras face when she found out drinking a coke with chicken broth
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tamte Senior Member Joined: 20 March 2011 Location: Brazil Online Status: Offline Posts: 342	Posted: 25 May 2012 at 19:22
	Here the city water has so much chlorin that the bugs won't live in it, but the solids in the water can cause problem. I have 3-stage RO filter for drinking water and two clear rough filters before it. In a week you can see the brownish sludge in the clear filters. I need to swap the pre-filters 2-3 times a year. They cost around $4 each. When moved here I had like 5 few years stock within our moving stuff. The RO works great and requires only once a year filter swaps. The RO removes the chlorin taste and harmful solids (like heavy metals etc). I have not bought bottled water for a long time. In TX you could buy the water from the dispensing units with $0.75 5 gallons, as the water was not drinkable there either (South TX). Higher solid count than here actually. The bottled water here shows very low solid count so it is pretty ok, don't know about bacteria levels. I have only solid measurement unit with me. It gives rough idea about the water quality. Running the city water through RO, cuts the solids down to 1/20 of the bottled water count. It creates about 15 gallons per day. I needed to buy permeate pump though to get it work faster, as the city water pressure is very low, varying between 0 to 40psi. Minimum for the RO to work properly is basically 40psi. When the city water cuts off (few times a week), we have boosterpump that starts automatically to give the needed pressure (and back flow preventer valves so that the water does not run back to the city network). Our 2000liter tank is on ground level, we dont' have that 10m tower in the back of the building, that could give you the gravity based pressure. But this way even the lower city pressure (which would not anymore run the shower e.g.) will still fill in the tank, and the booster runs it to the house. Easy for the cleaning as well. Of course we have rough filter on the front of it, but it has to be really coarse to work on the low pressure. So it will still leave some sludge in the tank after 6 months or so. Edited by tamte - 25 May 2012 at 19:31
	life's too short to be living without you, babe.
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