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Water Softeners
17 Answers
My present water softeners appear to be on its last legs (25 years old). With so many companies offering this type of unit, can anyone recommend a make and or supplier. Many thanks
E Davis
E Davis
Answers
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I would only ever consider one of the dual cylinder ones (Kinetico, Harveys etc). I've had one for almost 20 years. Conventional ones use all sorts of wizardry to measure your usage and calculate when you need to regenerate but they can only look at the way you have used water over the past few days/weeks. If you have a sudden change of usage eg, go away on holiday...
15:58 Sun 27th Apr 2014
I would only ever consider one of the dual cylinder ones (Kinetico, Harveys etc). I've had one for almost 20 years.
Conventional ones use all sorts of wizardry to measure your usage and calculate when you need to regenerate but they can only look at the way you have used water over the past few days/weeks. If you have a sudden change of usage eg, go away on holiday for a few weeks and come back to a load of washing, wash the card for the first time in several weeks etc, they can get it wrong and your water goes hard. Dual cylinder models measure the water you've used, when it reaches the limit for regeneration they switch to the other cyinder, regerate the first cylinder and so on. The water never goes hard.
My current softener is coming to the end of its life and I wouldn't consider any other type.
Conventional ones use all sorts of wizardry to measure your usage and calculate when you need to regenerate but they can only look at the way you have used water over the past few days/weeks. If you have a sudden change of usage eg, go away on holiday for a few weeks and come back to a load of washing, wash the card for the first time in several weeks etc, they can get it wrong and your water goes hard. Dual cylinder models measure the water you've used, when it reaches the limit for regeneration they switch to the other cyinder, regerate the first cylinder and so on. The water never goes hard.
My current softener is coming to the end of its life and I wouldn't consider any other type.
Well, when we had a Culligan, admittedly a fairly basic one, we were regularly finding the water starting to go hard, especially if we had visitors. The problem is that once you realise it's starting to go hard you have to force a regeneration, which means you have fully hard water for the time it takes to regenerate. Also, once hard water gets into the hot water system it can take days before it becomes fully soft again.
I do take your point though, that they are more expensive than the single-cylinder sort.
I do take your point though, that they are more expensive than the single-cylinder sort.
why not just force a regeneration when the visitors arrive? Ive got single cylinder culligan and never had a problem with it touching wood. Do you get yours serviced stayahead? I got a man in do do mine thinking i will need a new one and he got it going like new again for about 170 quid....muh cheaper than a new one.
Not quite as simple as it seems, Buildersmate. Suppose the softener is just on the point of regenerating when you go away on holiday. You come back with a dirty car and several loads of washing. Bearing in mind that regenerations are usually programmed to take place overnight, you will have completely hardened the water by the time a regeneration takes place. OK, as Woolgang suggests, you can force a regeneration before you start to get around the problem, but that takes manual intervention (and waiting for the regeneration to complete before you can use any water).
The ONLY way to ensure a constant supply of soft water is to have a dual-cylinder system - at a cost.
You pay your money and take your choice.
The ONLY way to ensure a constant supply of soft water is to have a dual-cylinder system - at a cost.
You pay your money and take your choice.
Black-cat:
Hard water contains calcium salts which react with soap to create scum and also leave deposits on eg, kettle elements called scale. A water softener simply replaces these calcium salts with sodium salts, in a process called ion-exchange. After a while the medium containing the sodium salts gets used up so no longer works - think of it like a battery getting flat. At this point the water softener runs salt solution through the medium (sodium chloride) and the sodium in that replaces the calcium which is in the medium - think of it as recharging the battery. The medium is then good to start softening water again.
The regeneration process in the softener is kicked off by different mechanisms, depending on the softener. Some measure the amount of water passed through the machine, others do it every so-many days. The problem is that whilst the regeneration process is taking place any water drawn at the taps will be hard. In order to prevent this being inconvenient, regeneration is normally programmed to take place during the night when it is unlikely that any water will be drawn at the taps.
You put salt in your softener every now and again so that the softener can use it to refresh its softening system.
Hard water contains calcium salts which react with soap to create scum and also leave deposits on eg, kettle elements called scale. A water softener simply replaces these calcium salts with sodium salts, in a process called ion-exchange. After a while the medium containing the sodium salts gets used up so no longer works - think of it like a battery getting flat. At this point the water softener runs salt solution through the medium (sodium chloride) and the sodium in that replaces the calcium which is in the medium - think of it as recharging the battery. The medium is then good to start softening water again.
The regeneration process in the softener is kicked off by different mechanisms, depending on the softener. Some measure the amount of water passed through the machine, others do it every so-many days. The problem is that whilst the regeneration process is taking place any water drawn at the taps will be hard. In order to prevent this being inconvenient, regeneration is normally programmed to take place during the night when it is unlikely that any water will be drawn at the taps.
You put salt in your softener every now and again so that the softener can use it to refresh its softening system.
That's it - just make sure there's plenty of salt in it and it will look after itself.
The only problem comes when your water usage changes dramatically, so the ion-exchange medium gets used-up sooner than expected, then your water is hard until a regeneration takes place. There is usually a method of forcing the softener to regenerate outside its programmed cycle but your water will be hard whilst this process is taking place (usually less than an hour, depending on the softener). So, for instance, if you come back from holiday with 6 loads of washing and a dirty car you can force a regenerate, then do all the washing (and the car), and then do another regenerate to make sure you're OK until the next programmed regeneration.
This is the point I was trying to make about the twin-cylinder models - you can just ignore them as they regenerate when needed, but don't supply hard water whilst regenerating because they switch to the other cylinder. They're more expensive to buy but more convenient to use (like many other things in life) and, possibly, cheaper on salt because they always fully use-up the ion-exchange medium before regenerating, whereas the other type estimate when a regeneration will be needed and do it the night before.
The only problem comes when your water usage changes dramatically, so the ion-exchange medium gets used-up sooner than expected, then your water is hard until a regeneration takes place. There is usually a method of forcing the softener to regenerate outside its programmed cycle but your water will be hard whilst this process is taking place (usually less than an hour, depending on the softener). So, for instance, if you come back from holiday with 6 loads of washing and a dirty car you can force a regenerate, then do all the washing (and the car), and then do another regenerate to make sure you're OK until the next programmed regeneration.
This is the point I was trying to make about the twin-cylinder models - you can just ignore them as they regenerate when needed, but don't supply hard water whilst regenerating because they switch to the other cylinder. They're more expensive to buy but more convenient to use (like many other things in life) and, possibly, cheaper on salt because they always fully use-up the ion-exchange medium before regenerating, whereas the other type estimate when a regeneration will be needed and do it the night before.
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