Water Quality in the UK ....

[foomar]

Normally get through the year useing just stored rainwater for plants and drinking , very dry spring means we have to resort to tap water after years.

Tastes awfull and reeks of chlorine , shows 420 ppm solids and a pH of 9.0 , meters are both callibrated and accurate , needs a large amount of acid to bring it down.

I would not wash the car with this , let alone drink it.

Anyone else haveing local supply quality issues or is this the norm ?

 

[darkhorse]

my water sits about ph 7.0 and has zero ec/ppm value but looks cloudy.
i dont drink it but i give it to my plants.

 

[daoboxer]

Hiya foomar.
I've also had to use tapwater lately, as like you, I've run out of rain!
I filter with a britta and try to leave it standing for a day....helps with the chlorine.
We, here in the SE, have very hard tapwater...I s'pose that helps to get some Ca into them, if nothing else.
A reliable friend told me that the pH of our water here rises if left to stand for a day, from 7ish to 8ish. I never check water pH, only the soil.
Peace.

 

[jaded1]

My water usually comes out at 8.1/8.2 and just over 300ppm but occasionally both will rise to above stated levels,most of the country has hard water but it's nearly all cal and mag.

 

[theherbalizor]

Yeah I'm round the corner to dao and our water is at 0.4-0.6 ec and ph of 7.1

As said a bucket of nuts at 1.2 ec pH 5.8 will raise easy to 6.7 in under 24 hours. Shit water.

 

[BIGGS]

Water in the midlands is very good. Ec 0.1, ph around 8

 

[VerdantGreen]

mine is similar to foomars - pH 8-9. i leave it to stand for a day or two and use citric acid as pH down - my plants love it. no cal/mag problems here.

i spoke to our water company the other day (SE) and they said that they add lime to tapwater these days to make it more suitable for drinking.

afaik filtering with brita filters isnt so good because it adds salt...

VG

 

[roll it large]

Ec 0.4 ph 7 been cloudy here for few weeks must have been doing work on the lines
plants love it

 

[speedemon]

Background Ec 0.25
ph 7.0

Perfect

 

[daoboxer]

mine is similar to foomars - pH 8-9. i leave it to stand for a day or two and use citric acid as pH down - my plants love it. no cal/mag problems here.

i spoke to our water company the other day (SE) and they said that they add lime to tapwater these days to make it more suitable for drinking.

afaik filtering with brita filters isnt so good because it adds salt...

VG

Salt....as in NaCl? Ooooooo...that's not good. Cheers for the heads-up.
We've had rain today, so hopefully I'm back to rain again.
Peace.

 

[VerdantGreen]

i think so, there is something bad about filtered water im sure.

all you need to remove chlorine is to let it stand. i just fill up the can after ive watered my plants and use it a day or two later when i next water them (after adding citric acid).

yeah we had a reasonable amount of rain today - first time in months. hopefully more later too.

VG

 

[foomar]

Looks like others have similar to deal with , did a search of severn trents site and they have detailed local analysis online from postcode.

Full pdf for a very localised area runs to eight pages , this is the relevant bit.

Non Mandatory (Disinfectant)

Free Chlorine mg/l 96 0.030 0.182 0.430 -*² - 101-.00
Total Chlorine mg/l 96 0.100 0.287 0.540 -*² - 101-.00

Non Mandatory (Hardness)
Hardness Total as CaCo3 mg/l CaC03 12 121.000 173.417 214.000 -*² 0 0.00

Non Mandatory (Indicator)
Ammonium mg/l 36 < 0.009 < 0.010 0.026 0.5 0 0.00
Chloride mg/l 8 30.100 48.188 60.100 250 0 0.00
Clostridium perfringens No. / 100ml 36 0.000 0.000 0.000 0 0 0.00
Coliform Bacteria No. / 100ml 96 0.000 0.000 0.000 0 0 0.00
Colony Count After 48 Hours at 37ºC No. / 100ml 36 0.000 1.278 19.000 -*³ - 101-.00
Colony Count After 72 Hours at 22ºC No. / 100ml 36 0.000 6.667 180.000 -*³ - 101-.00
Conductivity µS/cm at 20ºC 36 344.000 486.694 659.000 2500 0 0.00

pH pH value 36 7.070 7.267 7.490 Max 9.5, Min 6.5 0 0.00

Sulphate mg/l 8 46.800 64.488 77.600 250 0 0.00
Total Organic Carbon mg/l 8 1.280 1.853 2.070 -*³ - 101-.00





This zone is phosphate dosed for plumbosolvency control.

Plumbosolvency seems to involve adding phosphate to reduce corrosion in lead pipes , probably going to have to get an RO unit soon.

 

[r1rider]

Mines 7.2 ph 0.20 ec, gonna use citric acid in the future as ph down.

r1

 

[JB72]

Mines with Severn Trent and it's so hard it's untrue, I used to use lemon juice to bring my ph down but it isn't very stable and the ph doesn't hold very long at all, I haven't looked back since switching to coco, using proper coco ph down helps loads as well.

 

[Dr. D]

My water is pretty good here ph is about 7 7-5 and e.c is about 3-4.
I know know how much use those charts are from Severn Trent, i live five minutes walk from my mums house and her ph is 8.5! And the water in my old flat which is less than five minutes the other way was also different( ec was 2)
Theres a big article in one of the Urban Garden magazines on the different water qualities all over britain and what goes into the different areas water etc.
Peace

 

[Marathanman]

I've found it varies a lot, 6 months ago it was 8.5 now its dropped to around 7.5 from the same tap. Of all the places I've lived the best water came from the Lake District very soft.

 

[Big Eggy]

just out of intrest how much Lemon Juice (Jif) would i need to add to 5litres of 7.5ph water to bring it down to 6.5ph?

Eggy

 

[Dr. D]

just out of intrest how much Lemon Juice (Jif) would i need to add to 5litres of 7.5ph water to bring it down to 6.5ph?

Eggy

Not sure about lemon juice i'd use citric acid thats whats in Lemon juice anyway. I dont think lemon juice is very stable to use to control ph.

 

[b8man]

E Anglia - Ph about 7.2, EC 0.8. There are nute mixes specifically for the bad water quality, but it doesn't stop it creating a thick scale on all of my reservoirs and destroying water pumps in a few weeks. Don't know how pipes stay flowing when there are so many solids in the water.

 

[Big Eggy]

sadly i don't think my local tesco's sells citric acid.. no grow shops for miles either ; (