Whole house water filters and softeners?

[Fly320s]

Our new house has a well. It will need filtration and softening. I would like to stay away from using salt, potassium permanganate, and other chemicals.

Anyone have experience with Aquasana systems? Or other systems?

[KD5NRH]

Our new house has a well. It will need filtration and softening. I would like to stay away from using salt, potassium permanganate, and other chemicals.

We always just had a strainer to pull any excess sand, and boiled the shower heads in vinegar once or twice a year.

[Scout26]

When we first bought the house, we got city water which was well water.  Northern Illinois is notorious for iron in its well water.  I mean red water.  To the point where you used muratic acid to clean the tub and toilet to remove the iron stains.

Anyway, we got a water softener (using the 50 lb blocks of salt).  It got rid of the iron (and whatever other crud was in the water), but we still drank bottled water and I hated the slick, greasy feeling of my skin in the shower.  (It felt like the soap just never washed off.)

So if I ever have to go to a well again (and I probably will when we move to SC), I plan on getting a whole house filter system, so I'd be interested in hearing about what you (and others) have found.  I do know that a softener is right out.

[KD5NRH]

When we first bought the house, we got city water which was well water.  Northern Illinois is notorious for iron in its well water.  I mean red water.  To the point where you used muratic acid to clean the tub and toilet to remove the iron stains.

9% pickling vinegar heated to boiling is almost as effective, with the bonus that it won't eat holes in your skin after it cools.  Still hell on the trachea, though, so you'll want to wear a respirator while you've got a room full of vinegar steam.  Muriatic acid is faster, but more problematic if you get splashed or fail to neutralize/dilute it fully before stepping into the tub later.

[bedlamite]

When we first bought the house, we got city water which was well water.  Northern Illinois is notorious for iron in its well water.  I mean red water.  To the point where you used muratic acid to clean the tub and toilet to remove the iron stains.

Anyway, we got a water softener (using the 50 lb blocks of salt).  It got rid of the iron (and whatever other crud was in the water), but we still drank bottled water and I hated the slick, greasy feeling of my skin in the shower.  (It felt like the soap just never washed off.)

So if I ever have to go to a well again (and I probably will when we move to SC), I plan on getting a whole house filter system, so I'd be interested in hearing about what you (and others) have found.  I do know that a softener is right out.

Same issues with well water in Wisconsin. My parents got an iron filtration system from http://www.watercare.com/ in the early 90's and it's still working great. No salt to add, no maintenance, fully automatic back flushing system. Water coming out of the tap is better than bottled.

[Scout26]

Same issues with well water in Wisconsin. My parents got an iron filtration system from http://www.watercare.com/ in the early 90's and it's still working great. No salt to add, no maintenance, fully automatic back flushing system. Water coming out of the tap is better than bottled.

Reading through the website, it sure looks like you need to add salt (and clean the salt tank about once a year).

[French G.]

My well water could be distilled to make steel, the town water is the same. We live on iron shale, everybody's water sucks. I use an oxalic acid cleaner, it gets rid of the brown very well.

It seems that more problematic than the iron is the iron bacteria. Contributes the most to the staining and foul taste. Interestingly enough I have a mechanical filter that makes the water mostly palatable so I assume it is getting the bacteria but not the dissolved iron out. That's just my Sawyer filters though, nothing scalable to a whole house solution. And I need something. Previous owners had the softener, but that is a joke, really does not much for the problems.  Right now the sawyer on the tap gives me potable water for drinking.

[bedlamite]

Reading through the website, it sure looks like you need to add salt (and clean the salt tank about once a year).

I'll double check what model it is next time I'm there, but they haven't touched it in years.

[Fly320s]

We always just had a strainer to pull any excess sand, and boiled the shower heads in vinegar once or twice a year.

I don't mind that type of maintenance, but I want good tasting, clean water that isn't too hard.  NH is notorious for having hard, smelly water. 

[Marnoot]

The slick feeling from soft water is just your own natural skin oils. Hard water makes soap scum on your skin with the soap and strips more of those oils away, thus the difference in feel. Took me a few weeks to get used to the difference in our current house, now I prefer it, though I know plenty of people that just can't stand it. I get much less itchy when the air is cold and dry out when I shower with soft water vs hard.

If you look into "salt-free" softeners, just do your research and keep in mind they're not actually water softeners, they're water de-scalers. Unlike softened water, the hardness is still present in the water it is just less likely to adhere to surfaces. You miss out on some of the benefits of soft water, I but don't have the increased sodium (or potassium) or slick skin feeling, and like softened water, won't have the mineral build up on fixtures you'd get from not using anything.

If your reason for not wanting to soften with salt or potassium is taste, or having increased sodium or potassium in the water, you can always put a reverse osmosis system in your kitchen for drinking water which will strip those out. That's the route I went, but it does mean yet one more device in you water system. Hardness aside, if your water just doesn't taste good, RO filters are great for that as well.

I built my own water softener from components (Fleck valve), and have been happy with it.

[Northwoods]

I just know that if a tree (bonus points if it's a cottonwood) falls on my pump house I'll do a little happy dance.  The guy that built out the system must be a cousin to Rube Goldberg.  I must have to fix leaks out there at least twice a year. 

Anyway, we have a cartridge filter before the water goes into a 1000-gal holding tank, then a Kinetico water softener (uses salt to clean the system, but doesn't put salt into the water), then another cartridge filter before it goes to the house.  The filtration and softener are fine.  Just need to redesign the setup so it's (that is the PVC piping) more durable.

I'd also like to get rid of the pressure tank and go to a pump that's capable of on demand pressure supply directly to the house.  Especially if that allowed me to get rid of the pressure switches that seem to fail every 6-18 months.

[bedlamite]

Reading through the website, it sure looks like you need to add salt (and clean the salt tank about once a year).

Talked to them tonight, No salt, zero maintenance. The filter automatically backflushes itself. Installed in '92, after about 15 years they had to have it serviced, not sure what was done.




etu: Edited to unembiggenate.

[brimic]

I built my own water softener from components (Fleck valve), and have been happy with it.

after rebuilding the P, O.S. valve on a GE water softener,I won't own one without a solid valve system again.

The well water at my new hiuse tastes quite good, but im installing a point of use ro system in the kitchen because the arsenic levels test borderline high.

[Marnoot]

after rebuilding the P, O.S. valve on a GE water softener,I won't own one without a solid valve system again.

Yep, I'd read bad things about GE and the other "consumer"-grade softeners, so decided to put one together myself. At the time I was trying to decide between a Fleck or a Clack valve, both good brands.

I'm glad I went with Fleck, as Clack subsequently forbade the sale of their valves (or systems that use their valves) to the public, and now enforce it by cutting off distributors that sell to companies that sell them to the public. Can't be having the unwashed masses doing things themselves.