Difference between distilled water and drinking wateR?

Mojoed

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Jul 20, 2004
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Distilled water is water nearly devoid of impurities. By definition it's water which has been purified via distillation. Ever try to boil distilled water? See what happens. ;)
 

DrPizza

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Mar 5, 2001
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you can drink distilled water. MOST of the impurities are removed by distilling, not all of them.

There are certain things you can't remove with simple distillation, such as alcohol, although you can decrease its concentration.
 

FoBoT

No Lifer
Apr 30, 2001
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distilled water has gone through a distiller, thus it is just water without the bonus materials/ions
 

Goosemaster

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Apr 10, 2001
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Originally posted by: DrPizza
you can drink distilled water. MOST of the impurities are removed by distilling, not all of them.

There are certain things you can't remove with simple distillation, such as alcohol, although you can decrease its concentration.

Aye. But distilled water tastes horrible. Actually it tastes like nothing, but somewhat "Stale" and plasticy. Many people would be surprised how much of a difference the minerals make...it give it that metalic taste...


 

KMurphy

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May 16, 2000
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Distilled water also has the power to leech out excess minerals in your body that cause kidney/bladder stones.
 

her209

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Oct 11, 2000
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Originally posted by: KMurphy
Distilled water also has the power to leech out excess minerals in your body that cause kidney/bladder stones.
I will take that over peeing it out.
 

BigJ

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Nov 18, 2001
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Originally posted by: Mojoed
Originally posted by: masterxfob
what happens when you try to boil distilled water?

It doesn't boil. :)

Eh? I was always under the impression the impurities in regular water allowed it to boil at a higher temperature. So no impurities = lower boiling point. Distilled Water = no impurities = lower boiling point?
 

eelw

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Dec 4, 1999
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Originally posted by: KMurphy
Distilled water also has the power to leech out excess minerals in your body that cause kidney/bladder stones.

But essential minerals from other organs will also be potentially leeched out to dangerously low levels.
 

KMurphy

Golden Member
May 16, 2000
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Originally posted by: eelw
Originally posted by: KMurphy
Distilled water also has the power to leech out excess minerals in your body that cause kidney/bladder stones.

But essential minerals from other organs will also be potentially leeched out to dangerously low levels.

That's why you're not supposed to drink too much. If you're a heavy coffee drinker, about a glass a day will be alright. Don't sustain yourself on it though.
 

PlatinumGold

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Aug 11, 2000
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Originally posted by: KMurphy
Originally posted by: eelw
Originally posted by: KMurphy
Distilled water also has the power to leech out excess minerals in your body that cause kidney/bladder stones.

But essential minerals from other organs will also be potentially leeched out to dangerously low levels.

That's why you're not supposed to drink too much. If you're a heavy coffee drinker, about a glass a day will be alright. Don't sustain yourself on it though.

not true. i've been drinking distilled water for about 15 yrs now. if it were indeed leeching minerals from my body, i'd probably be in the hospital by now.

that's just one of those myths that are perpetuated.

we have a great water distiller unit in our house. 8 gallons a day. the only issue in our house with distilled water is my kids don't get as much flouride, so we supplement it. other than that, my 8 yr old who was given distilled water in his formula and basically only drank distilled from birth and my 5 yr old and my 4 yr old are all healthy above average weight and height kids (only about 60th percentile weight).

 

Atomicus

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May 20, 2004
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the only thing bad about distilled water is that it tastes flat because it is very low in dissolved oxygen content. Minerals or lack thereof in your water is pretty neglegible.
 

PlatinumGold

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Aug 11, 2000
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Originally posted by: Atomicus
the only thing bad about distilled water is that it tastes flat because it is very low in dissolved oxygen content. Minerals or lack thereof in your water is pretty neglegible.

thank you. someone that knows something about nutrition.

this is the most common comment i get when people see my water distiller. where you gettin your minerals.

duhh, i never got my minerals from drinking water, i get them from THE GREENS i eat. calcium in milk NOT, calcium you get from milk doesn't do your body anywhere NEAR as much good as the calcium you get from your greens.

Basically, if you want minerals don't drink stuff, eat your greens.
 

Toastedlightly

Diamond Member
Aug 7, 2004
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Originally posted by: AbsoluteParadigm
Originally posted by: Mojoed
Originally posted by: masterxfob
what happens when you try to boil distilled water?

It doesn't boil. :)

Distilled water boils. Why wouldn't it boil?

Ever watch the mythbuster where they boiled distilled water? I believe the water was at ~250 or so, and they stuck a fork in it. MASSIVE release of energy caused boiling water to splash all over.
 

newnameman

Platinum Member
Nov 20, 2002
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Originally posted by: Toastedlightly
Originally posted by: AbsoluteParadigm
Originally posted by: Mojoed
Originally posted by: masterxfob
what happens when you try to boil distilled water?

It doesn't boil. :)

Distilled water boils. Why wouldn't it boil?

Ever watch the mythbuster where they boiled distilled water? I believe the water was at ~250 or so, and they stuck a fork in it. MASSIVE release of energy caused boiling water to splash all over.
From this site:
Q: My 13 year-old daughter and I saw on MythBusters (Discovery Channel) an episode in which they stated that distilled water, in comparison with tap water, will not boil. Rather, it will have a slight violent reaction. We tried the experiment at home but cannot get the same reaction. If they were correct, can you tell us how and why this reaction takes place so we can try it at home?

A: MythBusters is a neat program but unfortunately I didn?t watch that episode. If they said distilled water won?t boil, they are incorrect.

Craig Bohren, meteorology professor at Penn State University, puts it stronger: "I bet them $10,000 that I can get distilled water to boil the same way that tap water boils." Exactly what you observed.

Distilled water will boil but (with sufficient care) at a higher temperature than normal ? that?s the trick. The delayed boiling can be explosively violent ? not slightly violent. Downright dangerous.

I?ll describe a "thought" experiment to explain how Mythbusters got such a reaction. Why does it happen? Because we suppress bubble nuclei. So, when bubbles finally do form, they form in a hurry ? explosively.

I?m not recommending we actually do this experiment. Scalding hot, exploding water makes me nervous. This is a thought experiment.

First, let?s be clear on what we mean by "boiling". Of course, water evaporates at the boiling point. But, more than that, "boiling means bubbles," says Bohren.

We set a pot of water on the stove and turn on the burner. As it heats, little bubbles form along the bottom and sides of the pot. Pretty soon they rise, get big, and make it to the surface where they burst. The pot?s boiling.

To pull off the trick of delaying the onset of roiling bubbles until the water reaches a higher temperature ? we discourage bubble formation. It?s that simple, almost a matter of definition. We delay bubbling by minimizing the number of tiny bubbles in the pot when we start and reducing the air dissolved in the water.

Unfortunately for us bubble suppressors ? a pot of water abounds in tiny bubbles. Pour tap (or distilled) water into a pot and, bingo, you?ve trapped all kinds of bubbles in the invisible cracks and pits of the pot?s inside surface.

Bubbles begin life as tiny air bubbles, but once they grow to visible sizes, they are almost entirely water vapor mixed with a little air. Water surrounding the tiny air bubbles evaporates into them, causing them to grow.

Agh! No wonder you had trouble with this experiment. So did I. In 1874, John Aiken was one of the first to succeed. "Water from which gasses have been expelled may be heated in polished metal vessels to a temperature far above its boiling point, and ... when boiling does take place under these circumstances, it does with a wonderful violence."

Aiken heated water to 244 degrees Fahrenheit (118 degrees Celsius) before it exploded.

How did he do it? Bohren gives a recipe: a vessel with smooth sides (a glass flask, for example), really clean water, and ridding as much dissolved air as possible.

"Preparing ultra clean water is a heroic task", says Bohren, who finds ordinary distilled water "intolerably filthy". Many years ago doing light-scattering experiments, he had to doubly distill the water and pass it through micropore filters before he could use it.

Those are essential ingredients to a successful boiling-at-high-temperatures explosion. Be careful.

For more on bubble growth in water, please read pages 83 through 90 in Craig Bohren?s wonderful book, What Light through Yonder Window Breaks?