I live in central New Jersey in a 48 year old house with a municipal water supply. A water softener was already installed when I bought 12 years ago and I have continued to maintain one. I am in the process of redoing the basement and am considering removing the softener. Is the softener really an advantage to the plumbing system or just a preference for more suds? Any experience with the magnetic softeners that attach to the water pipes?
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Annie, yes the softners are avantageous to the plumbing... hard water is ruff on everything... even you...
magnetic you say... can I interest you in some bridges and prime realestate????
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming
WOW!!! What a Ride!
It depends on how hard your water is. If your water is quite hard you will notice a difference all around the house. You'll have faster buildup of soap scum in the tub, spots on your dishes, and over time you could decrease the efficiency of the water heater.
Your utility can tell you the hardness. You could run your softener in bypass for a couple of months and see how you like it. Or check with your neighbors.
Magnetic "softeners" are a hoax.
Additionally, soft water will make your other fixtures last longer. Our water heater is 28.5 years old.
I agree with the other posts, call your town/city water dept to get a hardness level, anything above 3 ppm will usually benefit from softening. The units are inexpensive to run and maintain and will save you a fortune down the line, just replaced a fellows water heater elements, the calcium build up on the elements was so great that they had burned themselves out. If you have a hot water heating system in your home, think of all that calcium lining the walls of the copper pipes...ugh. Your shower heads, dishwasher and the like will benefit from the softener as well. In my opinion, keep it installed.
Oh, one more thing that Mark's post reminded me of. There are several units used for measuring hardness. Grains per gallon, parts per million, millimoles per liter, and so forth. So make sure you ask for the units when you ask your utility, and use the right units when you use charts to see how hard is hard.