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Saltless water softener

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No experience with saltless water softener. However, i do have a recommendation: if you have an unfinished basement, get yourself enough Pex to reach from pre-softener to where the spigots go outside for your hose. 100 feet is under $30, and you'd need a handful of fittings. Cut and cap off the existing lines near the spigots. Then connect the pex to the spigots. No more salt in the garden. No more salt on the vehicles when washing. If the salt killed off plants in your garden, you must have some seriously hard water! But, in the long run, rerunning the plumbing to the outside spigots could save you money, since watering a garden uses so much water, leading to more frequent water softener regeneration. The cost of that salt really starts to add up. Speaking of which, I used to think salt is salt. My wife insisted that we switch to the Morton's rust removal salt. I thought it was simply salt with a different colored bag - and a $3/40 pounds higher cost. I was wrong - there are additives in it that really help remove the iron.

As far as saltless water softeners, it was hard to find a source I trusted. http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/...-need-to-know-about-water-softeners/index.htm Apparently, a standard by which to test these magnetic softeners is still being developed. Culligan and another distinguished water softener company have both attempted to make magnetic based softeners - and both gave up, because they're not as effective.
 
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The slimy feeling is your natural oils behind left behind not drying the crap out of your skin. As was said before your system was plummed wrong if you are softening your outside spigots.
 
I am quite sure the Magnetic Water Softeners are a gimmick. What typically makes water hard is Calcium and in some cases Magnesium. A magnet will do nothing to remove these. The typical water softener/brine tank setup passes water thru a cation resin which removes the Calcium. When the resin won't accept more calcium it is recharged with passing the brine (salt water) thru it. This replaces the Ca ions with Sodium and the process repeats. Like others said, You should not be watering with "soft" water for garden/lawn etc. I have a feeling your current softener is not functioning properly. The resin does have a finite life. How old is your current softener?
 
echo4747 said:
I am quite sure the Magnetic Water Softeners are a gimmick. What typically makes water hard is Calcium and in some cases Magnesium. A magnet will do nothing to remove these. The typical water softener/brine tank setup passes water thru a cation resin which removes the Calcium. When the resin won't accept more calcium it is recharged with passing the brine (salt water) thru it. This replaces the Ca ions with Sodium and the process repeats. Like others said, You should not be watering with "soft" water for garden/lawn etc. I have a feeling your current softener is not functioning properly. The resin does have a finite life. How old is your current softener?
Click to expand...

I know people who have water softeners for their irrigation systems, mainly because they are close to the house and/or landscaping and would get hard water on them, staining the areas.

Softened water does not harm their landscaping.
 
JBT said:
The slimy feeling is your natural oils behind left behind not drying the crap out of your skin. As was said before your system was plummed wrong if you are softening your outside spigots.
Click to expand...

I thought the slimy feeling was the surfactants that normally bind to the minerals in unsoftened water not being able to bind anything, thus keeping the slippery feeling.
 
I actually want to run an extra outdoor spigot plumbed in after my softener to use for washing the car. My water is so hard it leaves awful water spots on everything and would be terrible to wash the car with.

As mentioned, you shouldn't be getting actual salt in your water out of your faucets. If you are there's gotta be something wrong.
 
I made a mistake above - there is no salt in the softened water. There is, however, sodium in the softened water. The sodium ion from the sodium chloride (salt) is what binds to the resin, replacing the hard mineral. If you're getting salt, I would guess that your water softener isn't back washing sufficiently to remove the salt and minerals after it regenerates.
 
What you need is a non-electric water softener. There is a ~$700 price premium over conventional salt-using softeners. The non-electric version works just as well but uses far, far less salt. As far as I know the "softeners" which use zero salt are snake oil.

Non-electric softeners are the way to go for the OP.
 
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