Water softeners

[redsturgeon]

We are in a hard water area and looking to install a water softener. I was thinking of getting a salt based system but they do require regular feeding with salt and the water is not great for drinking or cooking.

I have also looked at an electronic system like this and wonder if anyone has experience of either type to share.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005FWYX9C? ... experts-21

John

[richlist]

We have had an electronic water softener installed for the last 25 years. It's not as good as other systems, we still get a little scale build up, but it does work well and extends the life of, for example, immersion heater elements.

The advantages are that it's very easy to install, you plug it in and forget it, it doesn't require topping up with salt and its considerably cheaper than salt systems.

The only disadvantages are that we need to switch it off when refilling our hot tub x3 times a year....but that's no big deal.

I've also fitted them in my rental properties.

I only paid in the region of £40 each so I suggest you look around a bit more for a lower price.

[martint123]

My brother has installed something similar ISTR. I said "snake oil" he said "the water tastes better".
I'll get the details and post again. I''m sure it must have been cheaper than that though knowing him

[stewamax]

No experience of that one. It has a 12 month guarantee though so it might be worth a punt. The Amazon reviews seem laudatory.

I did install one of the inline magnetic filters many years ago and it made no difference whatever.

What I know works is the Combimate Cistermiser: one of my daughters lives in the Bath 'ultra hard water' area and was having the heat exchanger in her W-B combi boiler changed every two years or so (I kid not - you can cut Bath water with a knife). She fitted one of these devices and tops it up (@£25) about once a year. Result: a happy boiler and much less scum around the bath and taps. Plumbers in the Bath area who sell these gadgets probably all drive Ferraris.

[tea42]

I fitted one of those electrical jobs after the seals in my new shower pump lasted only 4 weeks. That was in 1991. The shower pump is still going after all these years on the replacement seals. We still get scaling but not so much. I recently had a plumber around doing a couple of jobs he checked our hot water cylinder which was also replaced in 1991, there is hardly any scale in it. Before 91 we had to replace cylinders every 10 years or so.

[martint123]

ISTR a notice in my boiler docs (not to hand) but spotted this on the W-B site

Can I use artificially softened water in the heating circuit with my boiler?

You can have a water softener in combination with our boiler as it will prevent the hot water circuit from scaling up and losing efficiency. However, the central heating circuit should be filled with hard water and a chemical inhibitor. This can be done by using the water softener bypass when filling or topping up. Alternatively, the filling loop feed can be connected upstream of the water softener.

[Watis]

I had a water softener for about 20 years and enjoyed the soft water experience. It had to be removed when we got a condensing boiler as I was told by the plumber that it was not compatible with softened water. Having discussed it with him since, it seems there are ways around this, which involve topping up the heating system differently.

Water softeners seem to be the last domestic appliance built to industrial standards. Ours never required attention during those 20 years and, perhaps because of that, I can't recall which brand it was.

I'm interested to read about these electronic systems though. To get the benefits of nearly softened water would be a fair trade-off for the reduced initial cost, ease of installation and lower running costs (no salt!)

Watis

[bungeejumper]

I'm interested to read about these electronic systems though. To get the benefits of nearly softened water would be a fair trade-off for the reduced initial cost, ease of installation and lower running costs (no salt!)

We live near Bath, and we can confirm that (in the words of the old joke) our water is so hard that it's got LOVE and HATE tattooed on its knuckles. (Sorry. )

We had one of the static-magnet jobbies fitted to our shower feed more than 20 years ago, and although it probably wasn't as effective as the plug-in variety, it worked in the same way. We only ever had to decoke the shower head about once a year, and when I took it out recently it was all as clean as a whistle. Not bad.

Now, there are some (indeed many....) who say that these softeners are all a load of voodoo. The "principle", as far as it goes, is that the magnetic currents scramble the polarity of the chalk particles as they come through the pipes, which then makes it harder for the chalk to form into a sediment in your pipes. There was a proper study done into these gizmos about ten years back (ISTR it might have been at Loughborough Uni?), and it found that the currents did indeed scramble the polarity, but only for about two hours, after which it reverted to its normal state. Which would seem to imply that the electric gizmos would be useful for water that was 'just passing through', but useless for any water that was being stored in a tank.

The sceptics, of course, will say that the whole idea is garbage. WRT the OP's question, our friends who swear by their salt softener say that you need to install your softener downstream of the connection to your kitchen sink taps, or to any other tap that you might want to use for drinking water. It takes a bit more plumbing but isn't that difficult to arrange.

BJ

[martint123]

Just to update what little brother uses.
I knew he was a tightwad - He got a couple of items below. Says water tastes a lot better. Not had long enough to observe any other effects.

ebay item 282212864467 or https://tinyurl.com/yc89mhmt or Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/Electronic-Des ... ctronic+p2