What Is Hard Water? Soften Your Hard Water

You’ve probably heard of hard water before, but do you know what is it? Hard water is water straight from your tap that has different minerals dissolved into the water. Hard water can create problems in your home’s plumbing, appliances, and can even affect your body.

What Is Hard Water?

Water is a great solvent meaning it can pick up impurities. As water runs through the ground and soil, it quickly gathers and dissolves minerals. With the large limestone deposits in Central Kentucky, calcium and magnesium are prevalent minerals in our tap water. The higher the concentration of calcium and magnesium, the harder the water will become. As the water is moved to the water treatment facilities, water companies then add chlorine, chloramine, haloacetic acid, and other chemicals to help purify the water. This combination creates an excess of chemicals and minerals in your water, which can create problems in your home.

What Does Hard Water Do?

While hard water can still be consumed and used throughout your home, it can interfere with almost every cleaning task, in-home appliance, and the overall plumbing of your home. If you have ever noticed that your clean dishes have white spots on them, or your clothes are left feeling rough after being washed, you may be tempted to initially switch your detergent or dish soap. But even after switching your cleaning supplies, you may realize the problems still exist. That’s because of hard water. Hard water creates white deposits on your sink faucet, shower walls, bathtub, etc. This is caused by the calcium and magnesium that are left behind after the water evaporates.

The minerals and chemicals can actually have an impact on your skin as well. When showering in hard water, your skin absorbs water and leaves behind the minerals and chemicals. This can dry out your skin and cause irritation. It can even make your hair look dull after washing it, since the minerals and chemicals bind to your hair once the water dries. So it’s not your shampoo’s fault, it’s hard water. While you may consider these to be only minor inconveniences, hard water can lead to much more costly problems.

Hard Water And Your Plumbing

Hard water can also damage your home’s plumbing. Everything in your house that has water flowing through it can be affected by hard water. Faucets, showers, washers, dishwashers, and coffee makers can have problems due to hard water. It can even cause harm to your water heater. When the elements are heated, they bind together in your water heater and create a barrier inside of the tank, blocking the flow of water.

In tankless water heaters, the problems are a bit different. The heated minerals and chemicals will attach themselves to the inside of the pipes and restrict the flow of water. The deposits can even build up to block the water altogether. The problem lies within heating up hard water, which in return causes the calcium and magnesium to become easily connected to surfaces it flows through. The minerals and chemicals in your hard water attach to each other and then accumulate inside your plumbing.

In your water heater, this amassing can significantly decrease its life expectancy and efficiency. While other parts of the country average a 20 year life expectancy on water heaters, the Bluegrass region sees an average of 8-10 years.

What Can You Do?

If you have hard water you should regularly clean all faucets, showers, bathtubs, washers, dishwashers, and any appliances that utilize tap water. For a quick clean, you can use a combination of water, vinegar, and lemon juice to remove any hard water deposits.

However even with regular cleaning, hard water will still cause regular build ups and problems for your plumbing. These problems will exist mainly inside of the pipes and be impossible to simply clean. There are easier ways to keep your plumbing and appliances clean and your water purer. With a water purification solution, you can keep your appliances efficient and your water clean.

Water Softeners:

A Water Softener will attack hard water at the source, and neutralize any minerals in your hard water. Calcium and magnesium are positively charged ions, which result in their ability to bond with other materials. Softeners neutralize the minerals so they won’t bind to surfaces. Water Softeners will stop the build up of calcium inside your plumbing system to keep it running efficiently.

Flow-Tech Home System:

The Flow-Tech Home System is a maintenance-free, eco-friendly, and cost efficient water treatment device that controls limescale build up, and clears your home’s pipes. Using technology derived from years of research and development from a team of chemical engineers and scientists, Flow-Tech has created the most advanced chemical-free water treatment system available today. It works by sending high frequency waves through your home’s plumbing system, and neutralizes all minerals and deposits. While Water Softeners are a great option, the Flow-Tech System has no water waste, and is a more cost efficient way of cleaning your water.

Flow-Tech Home System & Carbon Filter:

To remove all minerals and chemicals in your water, choosing both of these options will result is pure, clean water. While the Flow-Tech Home works to soften your water, a Carbon Filter targets the chemicals in your water.

For more questions about your Indoor Water Quality, or for further hard water solutions, Give the Expert Plumbers at H2O Maestro a call today at 859-361-7925.