# TDS - v - Ca - v CaCo3



## No big name! (Oct 25, 2012)

Just looked at my tap water supplier's data, which states:

Calcium = 26mg/litre, Calcium Carbonate = 65mg/l.

Apparently this is "moderately soft" but I am unsure how this correlates to Total Dissolved Solids.... When I plumb my machine in, will I need a filter/softener?

Searched, but can't find the exact answer.

Cheers,

NBN


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## Xpenno (Nov 12, 2012)

TDS is exactly that, all solids dissolved in the water. Ca and CaCO4 are both contributors to this but not to sum. CaCO4 is the main contributor to scale in coffee machines and I doubt that this figure would really cause major issues, obviously you still have to descale as part of your routine (as you would with any machine). I would still add a filter to remove the bad tasting elements such as chlorine if it were me.


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## No big name! (Oct 25, 2012)

Interesting. I just looked on the Londinium website which confirmed that a certain amount of TDS is desirable for the coffee to taste good. I think the desirable figure is actually more than my tap water! Would a filter remove some more of the (too low already) TDS's?

Also, I recall seeing somewhere that if water is too pure, it will eat the machines innards.... And... Do some filters add salt to the water for some reason?

Might have a point about the chlorine though (and Fluoride?) - I forgot about those

Beginning to wish I'd given more thought to bottled water ha ha


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## espressotechno (Apr 11, 2011)

The inside of your kettle will give a good indication of the hardness of your water supply.


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## Xpenno (Nov 12, 2012)

The SCAE have guidelines for water and they recommend a certain TDS in a specific PH range etc... They publish them on their website. If you start going down this rabbit hole then good luck









If you are looking to increase TDS then you might re-mineralise with something like the BWT Bestmin cartridge. I use this one after speaking with the guys from BWT UK who recommended it. A couple of others on here now use this filter as well. It takes out chlorine and adds in minerals required for good coffee extraction. They are working on new filter specifically for coffee but these are not likely to be available for 6-12 months even if they do well in trials etc..

The "too pure" water is talking about RO/Distilled water. As it contains no minerals at all it can start to dissolve the metals from inside your boiler. This will not be the case with your water.


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