Category Archives: Water Testing

Do You Need Water Treatment?

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In most cases throughout the U.S., the answer to the above question is yes. In some cases though, and so long as there are no health issues with your water, water treatment is not needed. Because all water eventually filters down through several layers of minerals until an aquifer is reached, due to the solvent nature of water, it is going to gather minerals such as calcium along the way. When this aquifer is tapped either by a private well or municipal water distribution facility, the hardness minerals come right along with it. This calcium or lime can cause problems with your water pipes due to deposits on the inside walls of the pipes and plumbing fixtures over the years. The hardness also requires higher levels of soap and detergent to produce suds and lather when bathing or washing laundry and cookware. This calcium in the water poses no threat to health, but no benefit either. It is not the type of calcium that can be absorbed into your blood stream such as the calcium your body gets from food or vitamins. But it sure can be annoying when it comes to plumbing fixtures, washing and deposits left on surfaces such as a shower door or bathtub. If these annoyances do not cause you any bother, and there are no other contaminant issues with your water, you will not require any sort of water treatment.

Chances are though, if you’re reading this, you’ve decided that you do require some sort of water treatment. Once you know what is in your water that is causing the problems, it’s easy to figure out what you need. The best way to determine the nature of the contaminants in your water is to test the water. Simply pick up a water test kit at your local hardware/plumbing supply store or even get one of our Complete Home Water testing kits. There are 2 tests for every kind of water problem common to drinking water. There’s even a single test for bacterial infection.

Now that you know how much of what is in your water, you have come to the right place. Hardness, iron, bacteria, chlorine, fluoride, nitrates/nitrites, copper, taste and oder can all be treated easily with one or two devices. Hardness (and even some iron) can be treated with a regular ion exchange water softener. Iron in its many forms can be treated with one of our iron filter systems or chlorination. Turbidity is normally treated with a sediment filter, chlorine with a carbon filter, and even pH can be raised with a Calcite filter system. Nearly all chemical contaminants in the drinking water can be removed with a reverse osmosis system.

Some water treatment devices might require a pre-treatment method for proper operation. For example, reverse osmosis systems require a hardness level of less than 10 grains per gallon to operate properly. If your water hardness is over 10 grains per gallon and you require reverse osmosis treatment, you will also need to add a softener to your water treatment system.

If you cannot find what you’re looking for, try searching this web site. We take every question we have been asked over the phone for the past 7 years and addressed them in a search-able format. Simply type in your question at the “search this site” box in the left side of this page.

Backwashing Filter Sizing

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Automatic backwashing filters use coarse media to treat water problems such as iron, taste & odor and even to balance pH. Because these filter media are so coarse, they do not allow for the easy passage of water, thus making the rated flow for filter media in general much less than water softener media which is spherical, smooth and slippery. Often times the flow rate for a given media is lower than the required backwash rate. For example, a 10-inch diameter filter media tank containing activated carbon will provide a flow rate of 3 to 4.5 gallons-per-minute (gpm) but has a backwashing flow requirement of 5gpm. So your water supply will need to have a maximum flow rate of 5gpm to backwash the carbon properly, but when the filter is in operation, your 5gpm flow rate will be restricted to 4gpm.

Yet another consideration is the amount of media to use which directly affects the size of the media tank. If you are removing 2 parts-per-million (ppm or mg/L) of chlorine with your carbon filter, then at least 1.0 cu/ft of granular activated carbon should be used. And if you are a heavy water user with several people in the household, then you may want to consider doubling that capacity. But you will first need to make sure that your water system’s flow rate is high enough to handle the 7gpm backwashing flow rate requirement. The more media you use, the larger the diameter of the media tank. The larger diameter of the media tank, the higher the service flow rate, but again, the higher the backwashing flow rate requirement.

There are some filter media that have as high of a service flow rate as the backwash flow rate, but for the most part, filter media needs a high backwash flow rate. The various filter media and their flow rates in different size media tanks can be found at our Filter Media Flow Rate page. Keep in mind that water pressure and temperature can also affect flow rates.

Pharmaceuticals And Hormones In Our Water Supply

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A study by The Associated Press has made quite an impact with the general public lately. The report lists prescription drugs and hormones in our water supplies. This comes as no surprise when you consider what is probably flushed down toilets all over the country. A small amount of drugs will not make much of a difference. But in this country, prescription drugs are used by nearly everyone. Just watch the network news for 30 minutes and count how many of the numerous commercials there are for medications. You will be surprised. The human body cannot absorb all of these hormones and drugs completely, so they are passed out through urine and feces. That is how they make it into our water supply.

Water treatment plants are not currently required to test for nor remove these chemicals. Even if they were, the molecular size of some of these drugs and hormones (probably from oral contraceptives) are too small for conventional filtration. Bottled water comes to mind as a temporary solution, but the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) does not require water bottlers to test for these types of pharmaceuticals (Source). Boiling your water will not help any. As a matter of fact, boiling water will concentrate the levels of contaminates in the water. Boiling water is used to kill bacteria, it will not treat these chemicals (Source).
These chemicals are also getting into our food supply because this tainted water is being used for crop irrigation. So even though the amounts of these chemicals are measured in parts-per-billion or even parts-per-trillion, they are not going away. And very minute amounts of hormones can drastically affect your body.

There are efforts underway to create methods for removing these pharmaceuticals from the water (Source). They are similar to desalination, which happens to rely heavily on reverse osmosis (RO). Desalination can be thought of basically as reverse osmosis with much pre-treatment and some post-treatment.

Now more than ever, we need to take better account of the things we are ingesting. Nobody gives a second thought to a restaurant or workplace banning second hand smoke, so why would second hand pharmaceuticals be any less serious? How do we fix this problem? I really do not know. Convincing people to stop taking pharmaceuticals will probably never happen. If I did know of a solution, I would not be sitting here at this small desk. I’d be out somewhere making it happen. Undoubtedly, the solution to the problem will not be easy to implement. But for now, there is reverse osmosis available to anyone with very little investment. I have found RO systems for as little at $149 at the local home improvement stores. We have a 4-stage system for $168 shipped free along with some more high performance models to choose from.

The main point is, it doesn’t matter where you get an RO system, it’s just best to get one. It certainly does not hurt to make your cooking, coffee, tea or soft drink taste better which is what reverse osmosis does. My favorite uses for RO water are my morning coffee and a glass of water flavored with Propel for the rest of the day. Propel does not have the artificial sweeteners in it, but there are plenty of those brands out there. They make the water taste great without the syrupy texture of sodas or “sports drinks”. And there’s nothing wrong with a plain glass of water when it’s been through the RO treatment. Even your freezer’s ice maker can be connected to it.

When To Change Your Softener or Filter Media

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How long does softener media last? When should the auto-backwashing filter media be changed? Not even the manufacturer of the media knows for sure and with very good reason. First, do you know how much water has passed through your 2001 softener? Any idea how much chlorine it has been exposed to? How about your iron filter media? Has your greensand filter been regenerating often enough or not? The fine coating on manganese greensand media can wear off, but after how long? How many regenerations will occur before it needs replacing?

Softener Media: Let’s start with softener media. Specifically, cation softener media used for exchanging chloride ions with calcium ions. While cation softener resin media can also remove iron to an extent, we’ll focus on hardness removal only. How long before this media needs replacing? Softener resin media is basically very small plastic beads which is described as “polystyrene 8% cross linked with Divinylbenzene”. In other words, small plastic beads. As most of us know, plastic does not deteriorate very much over hundreds of years. Plastic is one of the largest problems we have with landfills at this time. It does not go away. The same thing occurs with water softener resin media; it lasts a very long time. But there are other factors involved with the performance of this media. First and foremost is friction. During the regeneration process that every ion exchange softener goes through, friction is created. If your softener’s media bed is set to regenerate every other day, that’s a great deal of backwashing friction created over the years. There is also the possibility of the presence of chlorine. Chlorine can eat away at the smooth surface of these resin beads. And finally, there is the possibility of the presence of iron. Iron will adhere to these spherical beads and often times cannot be removed as efficiently as calcium is. Once your resin beads are coated with fine iron, they are nearly useless. If you are using your softener to remove iron, you can expect to replace your resin bed much more frequently than water without iron.Ion exchange water softener media.

So when do you replace your softener’s media? When a simple hardness test strip consistently shows the presence of hardness downstream of the softener. Unless your softener is exposed to very high iron or chlorine, periodic testing for the presence of hardness should not start for 5-years after installation date. I have personally found softeners over 20 years old that were still removing hardness. If you are removing iron with your softener or exposing it to chlorine, I would start testing 1 to 2 years after installation, just to be sure.

Automatic Backwashing Filter Media: Depending on the media, this can be even more difficult to predict when to replace than softener media. Activated carbon media is porous and can not only trap contaminants in the water, it can also alter the chemical makeup of chlorine and organic chemical contaminants. As mentioned above, manganese greensand filter media has a fine coating on the media’s granules which trap iron particles. Sediment removal media such as Filter Ag can trap and hold fine silt or sand until backwashing occurs. Calcite is a type of water treatment media which slowly dissolves when low pH water passes through it.

Activated Carbon: There are literally dozens of different activated carbon filter systems out there. Some carbon media is designed to remove tannins (rotted, dissolved vegetation) from water. Other carbons are more suited to rendering chlorine inert, while others are designed to remove hydrogen sulfide. It is the manufacturing method and source material (coconut shell, wood, coal) that make up each carbon’s unique characteristics. Often called the “Taste & Odor Removal Media”, activated carbon in all its forms, makes your water taste much better than without. So how often should it be replaced? When the chlorine, VOCs or hydrogen sulfide you are removing with it starts bleeding through even after a recent backwash cycle has occurred. Test for chlorine or VOCs with a water test strip and check for the hydrogen sulfide with smell or taste.

Manganese Greensand Iron Treatment Media: Manganese greensand media removes iron and typically uses potassium permanganate as a regenerating oxidizer. As mentioned above, it has a thin coating of material on the granules which iron adheres to and hydrogen sulfide is oxidized. This media wears out when the thin coating wears off. The manufacturer does not suggest when this might happen. Simply test for the presence of iron in your water with a simple test strip shortly after and just before a scheduled regeneration takes place. You can try increasing the potassium permanganate dose per regeneration (see your owner’s manual for instruction) to get more performance out of the media, but this also increases operating costs. When iron begins bleeding through the filter media, it’s time to consider changing the bed.Automatic backwashing filter media.

Calcite: Calcite filter media is used to neutralize acidic water. Water with low pH (6.8 down to 5.5) can be passed through Calcite filter media to increase the pH level to a more neutral state of 7.0 – 7.4. As acidic water passes through the filter’s tank, the Calcite media dissolves. If left unchecked, the media will eventually dissolve away to nothing. Calcite media usually does not need replacement, rather it needs to be replenished every so often. That is why Calcite filters sold by us have a “dome-hole” at the top of the tank so that the control valve does not need to be removed just to add media. Calcite filters regenerate on a schedule to keep the media bed from becoming “caked-up” or channeled by water flow, but some Calcite filters may use a simple in-and-out head on them for the water to flow through. When using this type of filter configuration, it is possible for the media to “cake-up” and need replacing. This is a good reason for using a filter with an auto-backwashing control valve.

There are several other media types available for treating water problems, but the ones listed here are the most popular. Basically, once your softener/filter stops removing the contaminant in your water that it is designed to treat, that is a good indication it’s time to replace the media.

Salt-Free Softener vs. Conventional Softener

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The Sirus salt-free water conditioners have been very successful for us and CWG-USA, the manufacturers of Filtersorb SP. These systems have been especially popular with homeowners who desire a simple, maintenance free solution to removing hardness buildup in their water pipes and on their plumbing fixtures. There have also been several successful commercial applications for these conditioners. But with new technology comes new questions. While the documentation we have posted online is extensive and covers every aspect of theory and application, we’re going to attempt to answer the most popular questions concerning the Sirus systems here in plain English.

One of the main concerns we hear from customers after these Sirus systems are installed is that their hardness test strips still show high or higher levels of hardness than before installation. The reasons for this are simple; the Filtersorb SP media does not remove hardness. It alters it’s physical structure so that hardness (calcium) will not adhere to surfaces. It also alters the physical molecular structure of existing hardness buildup inside the plumbing system so that it too is released from the water pipes and flows out of the faucet, toilet, shower head, etc. So when a hardness test strip is used, it will often show elevated levels of hardness for months after installation of the conditioner.

Sirus-10 Salt Free Water Conditioner Most of the benefits that come with using a standard water softener are also realized with the Sirus systems, but we often hear comments concerning the lack of slippery feel with the water that the Filtersorb SP media produces. The Filtersorb SP media will not produce a slippery feel like the salt-based water softeners do. On the other hand, it will allow for the reduction of soaps and detergents by up to 50% just like a conventional softener does. Because the properties of the hardness molecules are altered, there is little to no interference with soap lathering.

Another popular misconception is the belief that our Sirus systems will reduce or remove iron just like a conventional softener. Iron is removed from water with a conventional softener via ion exchange. The Filtersorb SP media does not exchange anything, which is why it does not require backwashing. Iron molecules will pass right through the Sirus conditioner. It does not share the iron removing characteristic that conventional softener media does.

We also get a lot of comments concerning our choice of pre-filtration cartridges. The Filtersorb SP systems that we design are different than others. Some come without any pre-filtration devices and others come with either an activated carbon filter or a sediment filter. We include both. You will not use one of the filter cartridges. The default Filtersorb SP water conditioner comes with a sediment filter cartridge. This cartridge is used for private well water supplies to prevent silt and sediment from clogging the Filtersorb SP media, but the activated carbon cartridge should be used if copper is present in your water supply. Copper reduces the life expectancy of the Filtersorb SP media and the activated carbon cartridge will help protect the media from this copper. You should perform a simple water test to determine if your water supply contains copper.

Water Value Company has also been approached by other media manufacturers who claim to be able to not only compete with the Filtersorb SP media, but outperform it by several orders of magnitude. While these claims are exciting, we will maintain that the manufacturer of Filtersorb SP has been successfully producing and marketing this media for the past 8 years. None of the other manufacturers can come close to that track record. Until another scale removing media manufacturer can demonstrate the consistency and reliability that CWG has, we will continue to carry and support the Filtersorb SP media.

Iron Treatment and Removal With The Terminator

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The Terminator iron treatment system is a three stage system designed to remove iron, manganese, sulfur and turbidity from your well water. The processes included oxidation, gas separation and filtration with a blended media. This method of water treatment is not new. This method has been around for many years and is very reliable. Combine that reliability with professional grade equipment, and you have a proven, highly successful water treatment system. Consider too that while the final stage of the Terminator system is a backwashing filter, no regenerant or chemicals are required for operation. The mixed media bed has been proven to last from 5 to 15 years before changing, depending on the inlet water’s composition.

While the Terminator can handle large amounts if iron, sulfur and manganese, like anything else, it does have limitations. The Terminator will convert dissolved iron into suspended iron for easy filter removal. In other words, it can handle both Ferrous iron (dissolved) and Ferric iron (suspended), but it can only treat small amounts of bacterial iron. In the case of bacterial iron, chlorine should be added to the well water system periodically, or it can be automatically added with a chlorine pellet dropper. The Terminator systems can remove up to 20ppm (mg/L) of iron, 5ppm of sulfur and 125 F.T.U of turbidity. As mentioned above, the Terminator is a three stage water treatment system. They consist of an air injector, a mixing tank and a filter tank.

Typical Terminator installation configuration.

The Air Injector The air injector is typically placed between the underground well pump and the water system’s pressure tank. This air injector uses a nozzle/venturi action to draw air into the water in a fine vapor to provide maximum surface area contact with the water. The air injector requires the use of a submerged water well pump to provide enough flow rate for the air injector to work. An above ground “jet pump” is insufficient for proper operation. This air injector should also have a bypass mechanism plumbed around it. While not always necessary, a bypass can provide a higher degree of control of the amount of air injected into the water.

The Mixing Tank This tank and its internal and external mechanisms enhances the oxidation process by spraying the incoming water through a series of holes. It will also release and bleed off excess oxygen and sulfur gases.

The Filter Tank This tank contains the media which traps the now suspended iron. The control valve on the top of the tank will periodically backwash to release the trapped iron particles and send them down the drain. This backwashing process should occur every 3 to 4 days to keep the media bed redistributed.

Choosing Your Terminator System The size of Terminator system you choose will depend on water flow rates. You will need to consider your water system’s maximum flow rate to provide for a proper backwash to the filter media. The flow rates and backwash flow rates for the Terminator systems are provided in a table in the Terminator Service Manual. For example, if your water system currently has a flow rate of 5 gallons-per-minute (gpm), then either the T1000 or T1500 would work for you. However, if your flow rate is 5gpm, the T2000 would be too large as it requires a backwash flow rate of 7gpm.

The Terminator Service Manual also states that it comes with a Waterite air injector. At Water Value Company, we have had better performance with the more expensive Clack air injector, so when comparing prices on Terminator systems, be sure to make that consideration a part of your final decision.

Another consideration is your water’s pH balance. If your water’s pH is between 7.0 and 8.0, the standard Terminator blended media will work for you. If your water is low in pH (6.0 to 6.9), then the Terminator Plus blended media will perform better. Specify your water’s pH balance from the pull-down menu on the Terminator ordering page, and Water Value will include the proper blend of media for you.

Water Pitchers and Faucet Filters

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There are a number of national TV advertisements for water filtering pitchers and faucet filters. The faucet filters work by attaching to your sink faucet and diverting the water through a replaceable filter cartridge. The filtering pitchers require that you pour tap water into the top of the pitcher and gravity runs it through a replaceable filter element while the filtered water resides in the body of the pitcher.

These TV advertisements use visual tactics which pressure the consumer into thinking that their water could be dangerous to consume – which may or may not be true. For the most part, water in heavily populated industrial areas could indeed have numerous unsafe contaminants. But it is also true that many rural low-population areas can produce water which contains runoff from fertilizers and other chemicals. So the population in your location does not necessarily affect your water’s quality. Many municipal water treatment plants know exactly what is in the local water and they know exactly how to treat it. But it is still often desirable to remove some of the chemicals left over from the treatment process such as chlorine.

While these filtering pitchers and faucet filters do a good job, they are not very convenient or affordable to maintain. The proprietary filter cartridges and elements they use are simply activated carbon and possibly sediment filters. The same carbon and sediment filter elements are quite popular in higher volume and lower cost filter cartridges. These cartridges cost roughly the same as the faucet and pitcher elements, but they contain much more surface area, meaning they will process a lot more water between cartridge changes.

If you want to know what is in your water, check out our easy to use water testing kits.

Water Softener Sizing and the House Size

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QUESTION: We are adding a water softner to a home that is now approx. 3600 sq. ft.  In three months, we are adding and additional 2000 sq. feet. Is 1.0 cubic large enough or do I need 2.0 cubic?

ANSWER: Good question. This is a very popular misconception. The size of any water treatment system is based on the amount of water that flows through it and the amount of hardness in the water – and in the case of automatic filters, the flow rate – so if the number of people using water is two, and you add 2000 square feet of living space but only two people are using water, they will still use the same amount no matter how large or small the home gets.

If the above person were to be adding on bedrooms to his home in anticipation of selling it to prospective buyers who might be considering the home for 5 or more people then yes, you will want to up the size of your softener accordingly. The main point here is that it’s not the size of the home but the size of the family (and water hardness) that determines the proper size of the softener. You would not buy an industrial size clothes washing machine for two people just because you have room for it, would you? Of course not. It would be a waste of water and energy.

Local Installer or Dealer

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So you’ve done the research, tested your water and chose your water treatment equipment, but who do you get to install it? Who is going to service it when it breaks down?

For the most part, the customers who purchase from Water Value install their own systems and as far as working on them goes, all of the equipment we carry is Professional Grade. In other words, it is designed to NOT break down. The vast majority of our customers do not need to worry about repair, only some simple preventive maintenance steps which are outlined in the service manuals.

But what about all the money that can be saved over buying from a local dealer? Well, you can save a great deal of money by purchasing this equipment through us or another online volume dealer, but there’s a reason for that. First of all, the number of systems – water softeners, whole-house filters, UV filters, chlorinators, reverse osmosis – that we sell per day is often greater than a local “hands on” dealer will sell in a month or more. That is why the manufacturers give us such a break on the price, but the local water treatment dealer is going to be equally as proficient as us at water treatment system design and operation. The big difference is, they are a short drive away. It is likely that Water Value Company is over 1000 miles away from you. We cannot put these systems in for you. We can only offer support over the phone or via email. We cannot be there to examine your system, determine the problem (if any) and affect a solution. If there are any problems, we have to rely on your senses and descriptive observations. That is why sometimes, no matter how much money you can save, you should also consider a local water treatment dealer.

Here is an example: A customer sends an email to us explaining that his media tank is leaking. He purchased the water softener five years ago and it’s still under the ten year warranty. “What are you going to do about it” he asks? Well, first we have to determine that there is actually a defect in the tank. The warranty covers manufacturing defects, not sudden impact or freezing several years later. So the customer is asked a series of questions designed to determine the cause for the concern for a leak. Often times, the customer will be asked to take a digital photo of the problem, in this case the leak on the tank, and send it in to us.

After asking these questions, the customer does not have a digital camera and is unable to send in a photo to us. His description of the puddle of water is dead on, but he cannot see a crack or breach in the tank. So is this a defective tank with a leak hidden under the base of the tank? Not in this case. It turns out that after heavy water flow for added irrigation purposes, his tank (and water pipes) produced condensation from the rapid temperature changes. It took nearly a week of correspondence to determine this fact. Near the end, the customer was frustrated thinking that we were not going to honor the manufacturer’s warranty, when in fact we have every intention of covering those warranties. You can choose to contact the manufacturer directly, but they would insist that you send the defective component in to them for evaluation which we will not normally do. But we will perform our examination via email or over the phone.

Not only did we determine that the tank was sound, but we saved the customer a great deal of effort transferring the media over to a replacement tank. Things are not always as they appear and most people are prone to think the worst when something goes wrong.

The point is, if we were able to visit the customer’s home and examine his system, we could have determined the cause of the puddle right away. That is why the local dealers must charge more. They have much higher overhead costs and they do not get the price breaks that we do.

So if you can handle the minor plumbing involved with installation and you can research enough reliable information to make an educated decision, then Water Value Company can save you a great deal of money. But if you have had a visit or two from your local water treatment dealer and had them determine the right solution, it is really not fair to them to purchase from us and ask them to install it. Most local water treatment dealers will want to install their own equipment, even if it is the same as we sell.

For the past 4 years, we have had a section of our web site set aside for water treatment installation professionals where they can add their business contact information and location. So far there have been only a few takers. This is because the local water treatment business feels very strongly that the online volume sales of water treatment equipment is taking away from their “bread and butter”. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is a simple fact that some customers are willing to take a “hands on” approach to their water treatment needs and save themselves a great deal of money in the process, as opposed to hiring someone else to do it. I, for example, do all of my own work on my car. I have hired garages in the past to do things like brakes, water pump replacement, oil changes, etc., but I have yet to find value with hiring someone else to do something I can do for hundreds less. But when it came time to fix the leak in my house roof, I hired a professional. Yes, I could have saved hundreds doing it myself, but I would have had to put up with a real mess up there for several days – praying there would be no rain – to fix it while I worked a full-time job. The professionals had it done in a matter of hours.

The main reason I got into this water treatment equipment business was because I had a friend who worked for a national water treatment company. He told me he could get rid of the iron in my water. I gave him about $1500 and he dropped off a water softener. Yes, I could get it installed, but that would cost more. Because that $1500 was about all I had, I resolved to put it in myself (yes, my friend helped, but it took a case of beer). Once I was done and realized how easy it was to do, I knew there had to be others out there like me that can handle the job themselves who needed a source of equipment with no strings attached.

That is what Water Value Company does. We supply the equipment, advice, experience, diagnostics, prompt service and delivery along with great value for your money. Doesn’t that $1500 I spent on my first softener sound kind of high? Well, that national franchise my friend worked for was paying just about that much for those softeners. My friend got me a great price. They were selling as many of those systems in one year as we do in one week, so naturally Water Value is going to get a bigger break on the price. But we cannot replace the local water treatment expert.

So if you have researched and identified your water treatment needs and can handle the installation and setup yourself, Water Value can save you hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars.

Treating Iron & Hardness With A Water Softener

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How much iron will a water softener remove? There are two drastically differing views on this subject. One the one hand, I have heard that water softener resin will remove up to 8 ppm (Parts Per Million or milligrams per Liter – mg/L) of iron, but that was from a softener resin manufacturer. Then on the other hand I have heard that you should not treat any appreciable amount of iron with water softener resin.

The fact is that common cation water softener resin will also remove iron which is prevalent in a vast number of private wells throughout the country. But how much iron will a softener remove before it becomes impractical? Every answer comes back to knowing what – and how much – is in your water.

If you have a hardness problem and a minor amount of ferrous iron in your water, a water softener is the right choice. The ferrous iron should be 3.0ppm or less. There is no mathematical formula we used to come up with this figure, it’s simply what has worked for Water Value Company over the years on local (West Michigan) private wells. If the amount of iron is between 2.0ppm and 3.0ppm, we will usually consider a turbulator which helps to more aggressively loosen the iron from the softener resin beads. Anything over 3.0ppm of ferrous iron should be treated with one of the various filters designed especially for iron treatment.

There are many water treatment companies that offer special “fine mesh” softener resin media which provides more surface area for iron capture, but the inherent problems with fine mesh resin prevent us from making that available online. Water softener resin is not designed to remove iron, but it does so incidentally. If you really have an iron water problem, you should look into an iron filtration system designed specifically for your type of iron. See the different types of iron here.

For most well water applications, a water softener works out just fine. It will handle mild iron and some pretty high hardness levels. But because iron particles adhere to cation softener resin beads so readily, does not mean that a simple brine (salt saturated water) will remove them efficiently. There are softener salts designed for removing iron from resin media. Morton has one called “Red Out”. This helps a great deal in aiding backwash removal of iron by including a mild acid with the salt pellets. And as stated above, a turbulator can help prevent iron buildup on resin beads.

So if your main water problem is iron, either ferrous (clear water iron), ferric (red water iron) or organic (often the cause of tannins), it is best to consider a water treatment system that is designed for those types of iron problems. Here are some water treatment solutions designed specifically for iron in water problems.