Soda Stream CO2

[billdomb]

If you are going to use the SodaStream flavors, it's always a good ideer to use COLD water in the bottle. Otherwise, be ready for a great foam-over effect sometimes.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by billdomb

CO2 can kill you but simply by oxygen starvation and not metabolic poisoning.

Yes. Normally when people talk about co2 detectors they mean co but in this case with a large bottle of co2 inside a small boat... it may be wise to add co2 detection.

[wsmurdoch]

Originally Posted by BugzyCan

I am curious about the DIY option that says you have to shake the carbonation into the water. When I use my soda stream, it injects it into the water, no shaking needed, so why does the DIY option need to be shaken?

In the Soadstream system (as I understand it) the CO2 is bubbled into the water and the agitation needed to dissolve the gas is achieved by exhausting part of the CO2.

In the DIY system the agitation is achieved not by exhausting part of the CO2 but by shaking the bottle.

Bill

[wsmurdoch]

[QUOTE=ikanode;3210394]

Originally Posted by wsmurdoch

We take a 5 gal box of Diet Coke syrup bought at Sams Club to the Bahamas to dilute our rum. I drain the box with a 'bib tap valve'.

What's the shelf life on the boxes of Diet Coke syrup after opening?

We have never been able to find Diet Coke boxed syrup for sale with an expiration date (Enjoy By date) more than a month or two in the future. We use ours within 5 months of purchase. By that time it is losing sweetness and drifting in taste much as canned Diet Coke does. I don't think "opening" has anything to do with its going bad, just time. No air goes into the bag as the bag is emptied. I just looked a a case of canned Diet Coke bought last week; it has a date of 09 September on the box. I think the problem is the stability of aspartame in mildly acidic water solution.

Bill

[hzcruiser]

Originally Posted by malbert73

Why all that big equipment. We have one similar to this and use the little cartridges

A new cartridge for every single bottle of soda? Are you kidding me? What a waste that is.
I've got a medium size CO2 cylinder with an adaptor for any standard plastic bottle. Easy to carbonize the water and you're not already losing a good part of the CO2 and the pressure the very moment you disconnect the bottle, like the Sodastream system, which I had, too.

[Johnno]

Ahh! time for a soda stream story! While cruising across the top of Australia, we rounded Cape York only to find we didn't have any champers on board to celebrate rounding the cape. So muggins filled the soda stream bottle up with white wine intending to carbonate it. The instructions say "only fill with water". I now know why!! We had sticky white wine from one end of the boat to the other and about 1/2 a cup of sparkling wine!! Took me quite a while to clean up and also to live down!!

[hzcruiser]

Originally Posted by Craig_B

We have a sodastream and in my opinion it Sucks!
Makes visible bubbles but that's it. Cannot tell its sparkling water at all. Flat.

RTFM. It also helps to fizz cold water as it absorbs more CO2 faster. If your tank water is luke warm a brief press will not do much, of course.
The other good thing is one can decide how fizzy one wants his water.

[dlb3]

I’ve used sodastream at home for about 10 years. I agree the artificial sweetener flavors they sell are terrible. But there are places to buy sugar based flavors such as Monn that offers a ton of different flavors. My favorite is raspberry. You save on storage space and trash.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by dlb3

I’ve used sodastream at home for about 10 years. I agree the artificial sweetener flavors they sell are terrible. But there are places to buy sugar based flavors such as Monn that offers a ton of different flavors. My favorite is raspberry. You save on storage space and trash.

You mean Monin? Those are great

[Auspicious]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

But I also looked at the cost of the Soda Stream brand/type of CO2 bottles and based on the cost of this I may as well just have cases of soda.

Here are some numbers from two sources in one article. https://www.digitaltrends.com/home/t...o-be-worth-it/ Sodastream is definitely cheaper but recovering the capital cost of the machine may take a while.

That's without considering the environmental impact of reduced waste and the convenience and reduced physical labor from not having to hump heavy cases of soda or sparkling water. Definitely a big plus for storage.

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

Here are some numbers from two sources in one article. https://www.digitaltrends.com/home/t...o-be-worth-it/ Sodastream is definitely cheaper but recovering the capital cost of the machine may take a while.

That's without considering the environmental impact of reduced waste and the convenience and reduced physical labor from not having to hump heavy cases of soda or sparkling water. Definitely a big plus for storage.

I got similar math results before I started this thread. I personally have decided it isn't worth the hassles and poor taste to buy a sodastream for my boat.

[RickG]

When we lived on land and had a homebrewery we would make 5 gallons of club soda and ginger beer. We also had an adapter for PET bottles that worked well. In the USVI it would probably be worth having a soda stream due to the high price of club soda, $8 US per six-pack. In Grenada we get club soda delivered for $65 EC/$24 US from the same guy that refills soda stream tanks and propane tanks. They also sell ginger beer and other syrups in the grocery store. Still, it probably is not worth it for us. I don't want the hassle of a 5-lb CO2 cylinder and a regulator unless I have room for a kegerator, but we are not on a cat.

Cheers, RickG

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

Here are some numbers from two sources in one article. https://www.digitaltrends.com/home/t...o-be-worth-it/ Sodastream is definitely cheaper but recovering the capital cost of the machine may take a while.

That's without considering the environmental impact of reduced waste and the convenience and reduced physical labor from not having to hump heavy cases of soda or sparkling water. Definitely a big plus for storage.

It's been mentioned before, but worth underlining that this calculus is very different in different markets.


$0.89 per liter for soda!


In Finland, if I drank Coca-Cola, I would be paying €2.00 at least for 300ml cans of it, so €6.60 per liter, almost 10x the price in the analysis. It is possible to buy it in warehouse stores for €3 or €4 for 1.5 liter bottles, but who does that? Prices are similar in other Nordic countries. Much cheaper in Germany and the Baltic States, but still more than in the U.S.



I don't drink soft drinks at all, but plenty of tonic water for G&T's. The savings are substantial in this part of the world, but I don't use SodaStream for economic reasons -- I use it because it radically reduces storage requirements and waste, on a long cruise, as others have mentioned.

[Aquasition]

LOVE my on-board SodaStream (as well as the ones I have at home!). Here's a bit of a brain dump on it:

Saves space, bottles/plastic/waste, and I can make exactly the amount I want. Also, the SodaStream bottles especially when refrigerated do indeed keep the carbonation - for weeks if not more.

There's an adapter called SodaMod that you can get which will enable you to use paintball CO2 tanks instead of the regular SodaStream or SodaClub CO2 tanks. Definitely buy the food-grade CO2 canisters (SodaMod has them, so do others), as there IS a difference and you don't want aluminum shavings and debris ending up in your beverages.

Refills at Dick's Sporting Goods are around $3 per paintball canister, and if you can eek out 40-60 liters of carbonated water, that means you're paying about 6 cents per liter.

Some additional tips/considerations:

• Carbonation is best when you use cold water.
• I have multiple carobating bottles so I always have 1 or 2 cold ones in the fridge and/or cooler.
• There are two ways to make SodaStream CO2 less expensive by filling them up at paintball shops -- one is to get an adapter for the SodaStream bottles (which is what I did first), and the other is how I SHOULD have done it and described above, by getting the adapter that lets you USE actual paintball tanks in the SodaStream machine. If you get the adapter for the SodaStream BOTTLES -- expect VERY funny looks and even refusals-to-fill from your gas supply shop. They really don't like messing with the adapter. It is FAR better to just bring them something the size and shape they're used to that does not require fiddling with an adjustment screw, etc. Trust me on this.
• Carbonate ONLY pure cold water. NEVER add ANYTHING before carbonating -- it will create a massive mess as it bubbles over and gets everywhere. This is a mistake one only makes once... or twice, as the case is.
• Another benefit is that you can re-carbonate flat beverages, but you have to be super careful. Flat carbonated store-bought water can be recarbonated, but anything with syrup or other additives can create above mentioned mess. Trick is to slowly release the pressure in stages before it bubbles to the top.
• Adding a little bit of salt and baking soda to your sodastream is akin to making your own Club Soda. Get some quinine and you can make your own tonic water, too!

I think that's about it for now. Any questions, tag me and I'll try to address them. Sorry if any of this is repetitive to what others wrote - I only had time to read the first 3 pages of the thread and not the last 3! :-)

[lucseawalker]

I carbonate my water for 20 years now and I never saw any downside to it ... other than sometimes frustration in getting CO2 ...
First I used a SodaQuck system, then a SodaStream system. The machines by themselves are not expensive at all and should last you years. Does not take too much counter space and very easy to carbonate a 1/2 l or 1l PET bottle you had kept cold in your fridge.
I got an adapter made (in machine shop) to refill the small original aluminum sparklet gas bottle that comes with the machine (I have a few spares) from my 8l aluminum bottle of CO2 (came from restaurant soda fountain).


By the way, that CO2 bottle also serves me as a engine fire extinguisher to kill a engine room fire by starving it from O2 and NOT covering the engine parts by very corrosive powder that damage your engine as surely as a fire unless quickly completely cleaned).


To fill that big cylinder (8l) that will keep my sparklet filled for more than a year or 3 (depending how much carbonated water you drink) I have to find a industrial gas filling station that will fill my tank. That might not be easy to find nowadays will ramping regulations but possible In SE Asia, where I am now, it is quite difficult to find but I learned an alternative method of filling: get dry ice, break it down in small parts so you can fill you tank yourself (after removing the main tank valve). Be very careful to not overfill.


The second part of the equation and benefits is the syrups. I never bought the overly chemical and expensive syrups sold by the soda machine companies but make my own concentrate from either fresh fruits or from artificial flavors (like cola for my daily Sunset Cuba Libre!). Making my own syrup, I use the best water (watermaker), use the best real organic sugar but in much smaller quantity than commercial mixes and so get much healthier drinks !


Makes you more independent, avoids lugging all these artificial soda bottle, reduces plastic waste, saves you lots of money, increase your choice of flavors and gives you an extra fire extinguisher ... all for just some fiddling at first



A winner for the last 20 years!


PS: I also make my own lite beer (hop soda) way more easily and cheaply but that is another story (that one I made a video on our YT channel Tropical sailing Life