Softening Water

[AshleyMckendree]

Clearly we all know "Soft" Water will aid the cleaning process greatly,
BUT does it matter HOW the water was "Softened"?

My point is, does a Water Softener system create soft water that will out-perform water that has only had a "Water Softening agent" added too it?

Such as:

Borax

Soda Ash

Whatever-the-hell-is-in Calgon

?

 

[gasaxe]

i use a kenetico. I am very good freinds with the family that owns the local kentico. I manly got it for the large mineral content of the water in my area and the fact that i use 230+ water temps. Ive had the same unit for 8 or 9 years. I keep it mounted on the truck so to always have soft water if i have to fill tank on the job. Not sure about improvement in cleaning. Before i got it i had bad problems with mineral deposits inside filters and fittings etc. more so on well water. My old units, i did not have fresh water tank so i used out of customers spigot. After the k. ive had no problems at all. Its easy to maintain just add salt once a month or two.

 

[Shawn Forsythe]

Those particular chemical agents do a "marginal" job at sequestration of metallic ions in practical terms.

However using chemical sequestration is problematic for two reasons.

1) It is the most expensive means, on a per gallon basis.
2) Use of chemical sequestrants usually means cutting back on other active ingredients of a cleaning formulation because of solubility barriers. You can only dissolve so much solid in a given amount of water in the concentrate.

However, most well formulated products still do have softeners in them to account for those situations where hard water is certainly always encountered. The most common are NTA (sodium nitrilotriacetate) and EDTA (ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid). Soda Ash and Phosphate builders only have very marginal softening abilities, and maybe only on select mineral/metallic ions.

 

[Shawn Forsythe]

Nine times out of ten, you are already using chemical softeners in the better chemical formulations. However, it takes you only to a small fraction of the requisite softening power to dramatically impact your chemical efficiency if you start with hard water. Use a water softener to get the results you are looking for.

 

[Greenie]

Water softeners make sense, but if a guy was determined to have the best quality water and keep his chemical usuage down and leave as little residue as possible, why not just use a pure water set up like an RO system? With a softener you are exchanging salts for minerals, with RO you are simply removing both and left with Pure H2O.

You could probably make an arguement and show where the RO would pay for it's self over a couple of years in chem savings alone as well as salt etc.... What do those Kinetico fancy softeners go for these days?

 

[AshleyMckendree]

Water softeners make sense, but if a guy was determined to have the best quality water and keep his chemical usuage down and leave as little residue as possible, why not just use a pure water set up like an RO system? With a softener you are exchanging salts for minerals, with RO you are simply removing both and left with Pure H2O.

You could probably make an arguement and show where the RO would pay for it's self over a couple of years in chem savings alone as well as salt etc.... What do those Kinetico fancy softeners go for these days?

I agree, R/O or even R/O + DI would be the absolute BEST.

BUT the only "Portable" RO systems I can find (Although very affordable 150+ ) are VERY low flow on the scale of only 100 gallons per day.

I have found a high flow R/O system but it starts at around 3k :shock:

 

[Greg Loe]

RO and DI water is considered to be very aggressive. They will corrode copper lines and stainless steel.

use a water softener

 

[ronbeatty]

Kenetico setup about $2800.00 each.

 

[gasaxe]

i got a deal on my unit. It was a repo from a little old lady that passed away so i just payed what she had left on it. I use a bag o salt maybe every month and a half or two. I go through 200 gallons a day on average.
what does a portable ro system cost that can be used to top off on site?

I try to carry just what i need for water for a day. Sometimes i guess wrong and have to add some before the days over. My main need for it is high mineral content in my local water even "city" water as it is drawn from local corp. resevoir is pretty hard.

 

[Farenheit251]

I keep hearing how RO/DI will eat metals but a few have run them for years and claim no problems. Best I can tell it is all just theorized in someones head and repeated. I know I have seen lots of units scaled up from tap water.
No doubt RO/DI is agressive towards minerals. That is why it should disolve soil better. How long will it take to damage a TM. If my HX only last 10 years I'm OK with that.