TSD Cleaning Articles

Hard Water

Imagine a one pound rock coming out of your showerhead every week. Over 80 percent of the homes in the United States are affected by hard water, and most families don’t even know that they have it. Hard water is what causes your shampoo to not lather up in your hand, why your dishes come out with a white, filmy residue, and how those nasty stains get in the porcelain. That’s right, it’s probably not your brand of shampoo and you really don’t need those additives in the dishwasher to take off spots–you need to soften your water supply.

Hard water is the result of a build up of natural minerals, and nearly 85 pounds of solid rock minerals are deposited into your appliances each year through hard water. That’s solid rock in your dishwasher, your clothes washer, your hot water tank, the toilet, and your sink and shower faucets. The build up of these deposits can result in the above mentioned irritants, but it can also cause your appliances to give out long before they should naturally wear down, ( hot water heaters can run up to over half of the efficiency that they should) and cause too much magnesium to get into your drinking water.

This means that hard water can cause you to have to repair or replace appliances that should run well for years. It is much more cost efficient to install a water softener than it is to repair washing machine that is already nearing 6-9 years old.

Need more proof of the affects of hard water on your budget? Clothing laundered in hard water wears out around 20 percent faster than clothes washed in soft water. Bathing in hard water leaves your hair frizzy and your skin dry. Men who shave their faces with hard water tend to cut themselves more often. You will also spend more time cleaning porcelain surfaces as a result of hard water damage.

So let us live in the solution. First, you need to know the extent to which you have hard water. If the above mentioned symptoms of shampoos that don’t lather and hard water marks on the tub and tile are visible tell tale signs of hard water in the home, then the next step is to purchase hard water test strips from the hardware store and test for the mineral content. It is suggested to buy hard water test strips from these retailers, rather than soft water salespeople. Home improvement centers have no investment in selling you a soft water installation kit, which costs anywhere from $300 to over a thousand dollars. Should you find the need for a soft water unit, you can install it yourself, but it needs to be adjusted to recycle water at the proper rate for which your home uses it, so read the instruction manual carefully for settings and always make sure that the unit has the correct amount of salt added. (Salt is the magical mineral that turns hard water to useable soft water.) Salt is used along with the resin beads in soft water units to regenerate the beads and turn hard water to soft. Retest your water every year to determine the hard water level and to see if adjustments need to be made.