Anyone familiar with water softeners? My mother needs a new one, and they quoted her $1600 to install one, a 'Peerless 30FME'. The water test came back as

14 grains per gallon

TDS 265 parts per million

PH 7.4

Supposedly,

soft: 0-3.5 grains per gallon (gpg),

moderate: 3.5-7.0 gpg,

hard: 7.0-10.5 gpg, and

very hard: over 10.5 gpg

So on what criteria do you base a water softener purchase?

You size it by the grain removal capacity per recharge.

This is a good reference. http://www.ehow.com/way_544...oftener-do-need.html

On Totally Dissolved Solids (TDS), that can only be removed by R/O.

But lime scale or the grains (calcium and magnesium) is what you really want to remove. If the TDS levels were above 500, then if could cause laundry, dishwashing results issue, so the level you posted is ok.

Water softeners are worth their weight in gold in my opinion. Hard water causes so many issues, especially on hot water sources like water heaters, coffee brewers, faucets, shower heads, dish washers, laundry machines and etc.

quote Originally posted by RWDPLZ: Anyone familiar with water softeners? My mother needs a new one, and they quoted her $1600 to install one, a 'Peerless 30FME'. The water test came back as 14 grains per gallon TDS 265 parts per million PH 7.4 Supposedly, soft: 0-3.5 grains per gallon (gpg), moderate: 3.5-7.0 gpg, hard: 7.0-10.5 gpg, and very hard: over 10.5 gpg So on what criteria do you base a water softener purchase?

Trying to decipher the "Peerless 30FME".
Peerless. Sounds like private label.
The "30" would be 30,000 grain capacity or 1 cubic ft of softening material inside the tank. Good
The letter "F" is the true manufacturer which is "Fleck" not Peerless. Good
The "ME" stands for a meter driven softener. Good
This is more than likely the Fleck 5600 Series. They been around forever and have been updated over the years. 5 yr warranty I believe.

Sizing should be based on pipe size, the raw water quality and the size of the home, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, etc.. I've seen salesmen size systems based on poor little granny living alone, ie.. 1 person. Then when the house is sold you have 4 kids plus mom & dad move in and the softener can't keep up.

At least a meter driven softener (versus a calendar driven) can keep up even if it has to recharge every day which is not good. Overall you can't go wrong with Fleck. The Flecks I install and repair have tanks 42" in diameter and larger; 600,000 to 900,000 grains capacity.

Hope this helps.

Spoon

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"Kilgore Trout once wrote a short story which was a dialogue between two pieces of yeast. They were discussing the possible purposes of life as they ate sugar and suffocated in their own excrement. Because of their limited intelligence, they never came close to guessing that they were making champagne." - Kurt Vonnegut

We have extremely hard water, like the replace faucets and coffee makers annually type of hardness. After losing the water heater we decided to get a softener. I found a GE unit on clearance at Lowe's for $100 (normally $400) and grabbed it. Installed it myself (with a tankless water heater and whole house filter) 7 years ago. Aside from a couple of parts here and there and regular salt fills (about $12 every 2 or 3 months) it has been trouble free.

I'm sure the professionally installed and maintained ones are better, but I can't complain about this one. Well, hauling 40lb bags of salt around gets annoying...

quote Originally posted by tesmith66: We have extremely hard water, like the replace faucets and coffee makers annually type of hardness. After losing the water heater we decided to get a softener. I found a GE unit on clearance at Lowe's for $100 (normally $400) and grabbed it. Installed it myself (with a tankless water heater and whole house filter) 7 years ago. Aside from a couple of parts here and there and regular salt fills (about $12 every 2 or 3 months) it has been trouble free. I'm sure the professionally installed and maintained ones are better, but I can't complain about this one. Well, hauling 40lb bags of salt around gets annoying...

Sounds like you got your moneys worth!!

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"Kilgore Trout once wrote a short story which was a dialogue between two pieces of yeast. They were discussing the possible purposes of life as they ate sugar and suffocated in their own excrement. Because of their limited intelligence, they never came close to guessing that they were making champagne." - Kurt Vonnegut

The water was so hard in San Angelo the women would rather douche than have sex........

All I know about soft water is that it makes it impossible to feel like you've washed all the soap from your body/hands. For that reason alone, I refuse to live in a house with a water softener. I'd rather replace a few faucets every couple of years. My current home (renting 1/2 a duplex) has hard water. (I'm assuming as the shower head gets clogged up and I have to clean/replace it every 6-8 months.) So far, (in almost 3 years) I haven't had to replace a faucet, my old, beat up washer still work and I haven't even opened the built in dishwasher. When I shower, the soap rinses right off so a 15 minute shower doesn't turn in to an hour shower.

You evidently haven't lived somewhere with really hard water. Most soaps won't even lather, clothes don't get clean, dishes end up with a white film on them, and dishwashers built up scale that was very visible. Zest was carried in stores by the boatload, even at Walmart in San Angelo because it was the only one that worked 1/2 way decently. The screens in kitchen sink faucets clogged up so quickly, that everyone learned to just remove them. Wash your car and before long, there was a film build up on it. It was terrible. I'll take soft water any day.

[This message has been edited by maryjane (edited 11-04-2013).]

Extremely hard water also leads to skin problems, complete failure of expensive plumbing fixtures, VERY hard to remove stains and film on everything it comes in contact with, dingy looking laundry and going through soaps and detergents like crazy.

I didn't know that. I assumed (and you know what that gets me) I had hard water since the shower head needs to be cleaned periodically. Can you adjust the softness/hardness of the water with a water softener? Like, on a scale of 1-10 (where 1 is hardest), can you make it a 5 instead of a 10? Seems that would keep the film at bay but still be able to rinse off completely.

"Soft" water, that is water that has had the minerals and other non-H₂O stuff removed actually is slick and adheres to smooth surfaces like skin. A water softener is used to make the water as mineral free as possible. It will feel wetter and soap will lather much better without those minerals getting in the way. You can adjust it to whatever hardness you like, but if you go by how the water feels, you won't see any benefit. I didn't like the feel of it at first, but after a few days my severe dry skin problems reduced dramatically. Now I love how the soap lathers and the water feels on my skin.

When we first moved out here, we were replacing anything the water ran through every few months. Haven't had to replace or clean anything (downstream of the softener) since installing it 7 years ago.