Semi ethical fizzy water….

Apologies, I know I should do a search. Feel free to tell me so.

I love fizzy drinks, especially water, but feel thoroughly low buying bottles of the stuff.

Looked into CO2 dispenser whotsits but  gassing tap water seems more expensive than just buying it fizzy. I have a vague recollection of someone explaining how you can buy bigger cylinders and just decant it every now and then into the smaller cartridges. Was I imagining it, or do they exist?

Which system?

( Not Soda stream, obvs)

Prickelnd Frisch/ spritzing rather than sanft, if that makes any difference..

Friend of mine had a 5 foot tall CO2 cylinder that we used to top up from. It is doable sadly I can’t remember what the connection was, and he is sadly no more

Andrews Liver Salts 😉

 I have a vague recollection of someone explaining how you can buy bigger cylinders and just decant it every now and then into the smaller cartridges.

As a homebrewer with kegs I have a 3 litre (?) cylinder and a pressure regulator. I get the cylinder refilled at a homebrewing shop and that’s basically what they do. They’ll even freeze my cylinder for me first to make sure it gets fully filled.

I run beer kegs and water kegs for fizzy water. The gas lasts ages. But i run a separate drinks fridge that takes two 19 litre cornelius kegs. You don’t need a ‘system’ as such, you control the level of fizz (volumes of CO2) with a regulator and time.

Iirc Soda stream make a loss on the machines and get it back on the canisters, so buying one of their machines and filling the canister yourself could be viewed as ethical?

Carbonated water has negative, destructive effects on teeth, and result in decreasing microhardness and removal of the adhesive material on etched or sealed enamel. Erosion occurred when the etched enamel of teeth was exposed to carbonated water, particularly in groups exposed to high-level carbonated water.

Your dentist won’t be happy

So you’re saying that fizzy water is better than all the other fizzy drinks, beers and lagers that also have loads of nasty chemicals and sugars in them to rot your teeth?

I feel reassured 🙂

Walk to your local community run pub and buy it from there. If you want to take it home bring a reusable container that you already own with you.

Did you mean ethics or environmental footprint? One is often in the eye of user, the other more calculable.

Isn’t fizzy water on its own bad for your teeth as well ?

Just plain Adams Ale for me 😐

@shoko

Andrews Liver Salts

They don’t make them any more

Isn’t fizzy water on its own bad for your teeth as well ?

Yep. Plus flavoured supermarket varieties seem to contain a load of extraneous additives too. Eg: Tesco apple and raspberry sparkling water:

INGREDIENTS: Carbonated Spring Water, Citric Acid, Raspberry Flavouring (Flavouring), Sweeteners (Aspartame, Acesulfame K), Apple Flavour (Flavouring), Preservative (Potassium Sorbate).

no such thing unfortunately.  Reduce, reuse, recycle,

Isn’t fizzy water on its own bad for your teeth as well ?

Not quite:

https://www.colosseumdental.co.uk/dental-health/is-carbonated-water-bad-for-teeth

It’s a case of option 3 being far better than option 2, if option 1 (plain old water, like Ned Flanders enjoys) isn’t fun enough for you.

I get it for homebrewing from Andover Patio center because it’s rent free which works out a lot cheaper if you only use a little.  Yes you can get adapters to refill sodastream cans from the big bottle, CO2 is supercritical (i.e. there is no liquid or gas in the cylinder, it’s a fluid with gas like properties but a liquid like density) so as long as both bottles are rated to the same pressure there’s no danger unlike decanting butane into camping stove canisters.  You could do it in corny kegs like homebrew, but I suspect that’s more faff than you want to bother with and IME all systems leak slowly if left pressurized for long periods so it’s a waste unless doing homebrew for an event.

Isn’t fizzy water on its own bad for your teeth as well ?

A bit like saying “fruit has sugar in it which makes you fat” (Keto, iDave, 4HB et.al.), yes it does, but to anyone not a dietary sadist, eating fruit instead of pretty much any other snack option makes you less fat.  Very few people will have bad teeth because they drink fizzy water.

From memory the last time this question was asked on here:

Buying bottles is the best option aside from not buying bottles,

Sodastream are Nazis or baby murderers or something, basically evil anyway,

The 1960s-style spritzer bottles are shit (I bought one from a charity shop and rapidly discovered why it’d gone to charity in the first place).

IMHO, carbonated water mings anyway. I can get 2 litres of sugar-free supermarket lemonade for something daft like 17p and it’ll only end up as a mixer with Vimto or suchlike so who cares if it’s been shown a photograph of a lemon once.

no such thing unfortunately.  Reduce, reuse, recycle,

And only drink from puddles that you’ve farted in….

We’ve got loads of saches of stuff from Italy that makes sparkling water -cant remember what it’s called though – ill have a look when i get home.

hold on – brainwave – found it

FRIZZINA

I don’t really understand why you wouldn’t just drink tap water. We can’t even leave water to just be, you know, water. In the same way that a relatively simple, human-powered bicycle has become something with electronic gears, a seatpost that goes up and down wirelessly, has a motor to help your twig-like legs go round and passively hints at burning your house down if you look at it funny.

We’re both really clever and extremely stupid at the same time. Anyway, welcome to fizzy water, the next STW culture war 🙂

don’t really understand why you wouldn’t just drink tap water.

Cos it’s not as nice when it’s not fizzy. I should indeed just drink it as it comes, you are correct.

But sometimes, especially when the alternative is beer or other fizzy drinks it is hard to just go with tap water.

Not properly hard obvs. Not like dying of thirst, drowning or something properly nasty.  More in line with ” what colour decals should I buy” or ” what size coffee grains FTW”

I also love fizzy water but hate bottles and all the plastic…

I started doing carbonation with a welding regulator, a commercial co2 bottle from a catering supply and some jubilee clips and bits of hose from an aquarium supply.

Similar kind of set up to a home made tubeless inflator from a drinks bottle… Fun… but I like a project so I upgraded and got a corny keg which sits under the sink and is plumbed permanently… I used this kit:

Kegland Carbonator Keg Lid – continuous fizzy water solution

it was pretty easy to set up… cost wise Im sure its much cheaper in bottles… but yeah, it was a project…. and soda streams, yuck basically.

also good for carbonating juice and cider Ive pressed 🙂

We are blessed with amazing water out of the tap here. Not so good in places with grim water!

But sometimes, especially when the alternative is beer or other fizzy drinks it is hard to just go with tap water.

Let me rephrase that question: why would you drink fizzy water when you could drink beer? 🙂

Because I can’t drink beer, really.

Anything more than a small bottle gives me a fat hangover 🙁

Soda streams are very convenient. Depending on your views they might not match your ‘ethical’ stance.

as described, the big problem is their tiny CO2 cylinders and their replacement/refill cost. You can get adapters for paint ball gun cylinders. Though depending on the soda stream model these just fit inside the case or hang out the back.

I use a 6kg (I think) cylinder with a regulator, hose, and carbonator connector and carbonation caps on 2-3L soda PET soda bottles.

Google ‘Dave Arnold carbonation rig’ and you’ll be on the right track. For example https://jeffreymorgenthaler.com/how-to-build-your-own-carbonation-rig/

cylinders need a deposit, but refills are a bargain compared with soda stream.

sorry to hear about your beer intolerance OP. It’s the way water was meant to be consumed. Wink emoji

I don’t really understand why you wouldn’t just drink tap water. We can’t even leave water to just be, you know, water

because fizzy water is just better*. It comes out of the ground fizzy in some places. As I’m not in one of those I add CO2 to make it sparkle.

‘just water’ is a nice idea but we add chlorine to it for hygiene in the UK. Some places use tasteless UV light. https://www.unitedutilities.com/help-and-support/your-water-supply/your-water/how-we-provide-clean-water/

nonetheless, I am astonished when I see folks buying bottled water in large containers at the store. We are fortunate to have not just potable but usually delicious water here in Manchester.

*not all the time – still water fresh out of the tap has an important role.

Anything more than a small bottle gives me a fat hangover

I recall from a recent thread that – and this is a brief summary: a full bottle of red wine ‘isn’t much really’, most regular pub-goers consume five or six pints in a session (and that’s not much either) and that alcoholic beverages generally are a safer, more palatable alternative to either still or sparking water. This may not be entirely correct either factually or in terms of what was actually said.

I get what you’re saying btw, Mrs BWD basically will not drink tap water, so exists on an intake of tea, coffee, red wine and herbal/fruit teas unless she’s on a bike, when she grudgingly resorts to actual water.

My take: the sooner beer comes out of actual household taps, the better. Imagine the consequences of a burst main…