Best filter for coffee shop with hard well water

Hi guys,

I operate two coffee shops, and at one of my locations, I can't seem to get the water right. The company who own the coffee equipment have installed a Pentek GS-10ALS inline on the coffee equipment, and the coffee still tasted bad. I since put a Filtrete system in. It's better, but it's not right. There is also a master sediment filter from the well.

We had the well tested by a lab:
Hardness - 82 PPM
pH - 7.3
Odor 1
Turbidity 0.82
Iron / Manganese / Nitrite - None detected
Sodium - 5.4
Sulfate - 25
Nitrate - 1.7 PPM

Somebody told me I need to soften the water.... then I also read somewhere else that if the water is softened, the coffee doesn't extract well when brewed.

Any advice on what might be the best solution? I'm looking for something I can put inline just on the coffee equipment, because the well services 4 buildings and I don't want to pay to improve their water!

Thanks in advance!
Chris

> Somebody told me I need to soften the water....

The pH and hardness are fine.

> then I also read somewhere else that if the water is softened, the coffee doesn't extract well when brewed.

Extracts "too well": pulls the bitters into the coffee.

Turbidity is at the upper end of a public supply.

Turbidity (muddy, not perfectly clear) clears-up with fine filters.

What is "Odor 1"? What does it smell like to you? Some odors will react badly with coffee aroma. You might talk to your brewer vendor about specific smell/taste.

Most odor is reduced by activated carbon filtering.

I too would start with something like Pentek GS-10ALS... in fact I have one on my kitchen tap. You do want to run water to drain for 10 minutes to clear the dust in a new filter. Sometimes you get a bad sample; I had one such filter didn't taste right, put on my spare and it was delicious. I think another, I connected *backward* and ran it into the sink a few minutes to back-flush. That's been working great.

If you make a profit, if your customers really care: start with a fine paper filter. For small coffee sales, a 5"-tall with a 1 micron, just to get the big/medium stuff out. Then to your inline carbon filter. As far as I can tell they are mostly all the same except size brand and price. Bigger will flow faster longer but that may not be vital in a coffee shop.