Water softener Vs scale inhibitor...

[MDMetal]

..actually I know the difference but I'm.curious what people's views are of the two?

We're in Cambridgeshire, 5 bed 4 bath, kettle and taps and shower are always filthy and covered in scale. Water tastes reasonably ok and if I was bothered I'd fit a filter on the kitchen tap.

The softener route is pricy, and you'll need to feed it salt, the metered 2 tank versions look to be the way to go on that route.

Or do you go with something like https://www.screwfix.com/p/bwt-2-stage-whole-house...

Reduces scale but not hardness, cheaper initially but filters will add up over time (probably more faff to change the filters too)

What are people's views/experiences?

[sammyb349]

I went with a aquabion. Works as described, which is that with a a sacrificial piece of zinc it causes limescale to form a powder rather than crystallise, where said powder can be easily wiped off.
I also coupled this with a whole house filtration set up for delicious water and reduced chlorine output in the shower

[Murph7355]

We had a salt based softener when we bought our place (we're 30mls south east of Cambridge). Other half hated it - it was apparently ruining her hair, clothes washing wasn't great etc...and we still had scale (water is very hard/limescale rich here).

So we fitted what I think is similar to the one you linked to....ours is a Monarch Scaleout.

We don't seem to have any more scale than we did with the salt based softener but the OH is much happier with the water quality.

Ours has a string filter cartridge that should be replaced every 12mths and a bunch of resin balls in the other housing that apparently last 4yrs or so.

IMO it's an improvement over what we had, but as you note they do do different things.

(I bought some water testing kits recently (our of curiosity) to see what, if any, difference there is between the mains water and the water served by the Scaleout. Haven't done the tests yet but will do and will post up here

[johnoz]

MDMetal said:

..actually I know the difference but I'm.curious what people's views are of the two?

We're in Cambridgeshire, 5 bed 4 bath, kettle and taps and shower are always filthy and covered in scale. Water tastes reasonably ok and if I was bothered I'd fit a filter on the kitchen tap.

The softener route is pricy, and you'll need to feed it salt, the metered 2 tank versions look to be the way to go on that route.

Or do you go with something like https://www.screwfix.com/p/bwt-2-stage-whole-house...

Reduces scale but not hardness, cheaper initially but filters will add up over time (probably more faff to change the filters too)

What are people's views/experiences?

It depends what you want, soft water, or filtered hard water!

With a salt based softener it does what it says on the tin, 100% soft water 100% of the time scale free house, and save money on products used.

As some say the Scale out will reduce scale but won't soften, so marks will still appear.

You say a twin tank version softener, with your size of house, how many people? what size main? what type of water system? these are all factors to look at when sizing the softener you may require.

Hope that makes sense.

[MDMetal]

johnoz said:

MDMetal said:

..actually I know the difference but I'm.curious what people's views are of the two?

We're in Cambridgeshire, 5 bed 4 bath, kettle and taps and shower are always filthy and covered in scale. Water tastes reasonably ok and if I was bothered I'd fit a filter on the kitchen tap.

The softener route is pricy, and you'll need to feed it salt, the metered 2 tank versions look to be the way to go on that route.

Or do you go with something like https://www.screwfix.com/p/bwt-2-stage-whole-house...

Reduces scale but not hardness, cheaper initially but filters will add up over time (probably more faff to change the filters too)

What are people's views/experiences?

It depends what you want, soft water, or filtered hard water!

With a salt based softener it does what it says on the tin, 100% soft water 100% of the time scale free house, and save money on products used.

As some say the Scale out will reduce scale but won't soften, so marks will still appear.

You say a twin tank version softener, with your size of house, how many people? what size main? what type of water system? these are all factors to look at when sizing the softener you may require.

Hope that makes sense.

2 adults, 2 children, mains is 22mm. I think a reduction is fine, I don't believe i'd ever make the money back from using less soap, that argument seems somewhat odd whenever I see it listed, a £600 softener is going to need to reduce my soap bill from 1200 to 600 to pay for itself on that logic.

[rossyl]

sammyb349 said:

I went with a aquabion. Works as described, which is that with a a sacrificial piece of zinc it causes limescale to form a powder rather than crystallise, where said powder can be easily wiped off.
I also coupled this with a whole house filtration set up for delicious water and reduced chlorine output in the shower

Aquabion sounds interesting. How has it performed? Any scale, how hard is the water?

Also how many Aquabions do you need? Do you know if it effects pressure/flow?

Their website has an awful lot of content, but nothing very useful.

[johnoz]

MDMetal said:

2 adults, 2 children, mains is 22mm. I think a reduction is fine, I don't believe i'd ever make the money back from using less soap, that argument seems somewhat odd whenever I see it listed, a £600 softener is going to need to reduce my soap bill from 1200 to 600 to pay for itself on that logic.

Well its a true fact with a softener you use a lot less products so in turn save money.

Like washing power/liquid you will use less than half you would normally, so a saving.

Shampoo, conditioner, soap, cleaners, descales there is a 100& saving there, the list is endless.

Time spent cleaning the showers, loos and baths will be a lot less too.

Existing scale is cleared away, thus saving money.

[Inspectorclueso]

Read this with interest and hope you don't mind me jumping in to increase my knowledge. I live in South Staffordshire, in the place we're in now, frequently the taps get that rock hard coating all around the edges etc, old shower furred up. I've just had a nice new bathroom fitted and got to thinking, I must try and sort this before I get the same issue again. So what's the easiest and lowest maintenance solution to this...? I'm not sure I'm bothered as to the water being hard or soft, I just want rid of the limescale issue ?

[silversurfer1]

Scale reducers are all a total waste of time the only way is an ion exchange sodium based softner.

Spent years de scaling boilers with scale reducers on them

Ss

[johnoz]

Inspectorclueso said:

Read this with interest and hope you don't mind me jumping in to increase my knowledge. I live in South Staffordshire, in the place we're in now, frequently the taps get that rock hard coating all around the edges etc, old shower furred up. I've just had a nice new bathroom fitted and got to thinking, I must try and sort this before I get the same issue again. So what's the easiest and lowest maintenance solution to this...? I'm not sure I'm bothered as to the water being hard or soft, I just want rid of the limescale issue ?

Its simple get rid of the hard water and the problem is solved

The most efficient way to do this is a salt based ion exchange water softener, all you problems will then be solved.

[Trustmeimadoctor]

Waits for the "but what about all the salt in the water"

[johnoz]

Trustmeimadoctor said:

Waits for the "but what about all the salt in the water"

We get that question asked almost every week

[wjwren]

I've got a bwt softner. Kids cant seem to tell the difference but I think it's great. Use a lot less soap. Kettle is fur free. Also no need to add salt to the dishwasher.

[Jeremy-75qq8]

Trustmeimadoctor said:

Waits for the "but what about all the salt in the water"

There is no salt in the water. It is used to clean ( reverse the process ) of the membrane. Salt goes to drain

[Trustmeimadoctor]

Jeremy-75qq8 said:

Trustmeimadoctor said:

Waits for the "but what about all the salt in the water"

There is no salt in the water. It is used to clean ( reverse the process ) of the membrane. Salt goes to drain

Yes I was joking as it gets asked every time softeners get mentioned. And we explain the above every time

[sammyb349]

rossyl said:

sammyb349 said:

I went with a aquabion. Works as described, which is that with a a sacrificial piece of zinc it causes limescale to form a powder rather than crystallise, where said powder can be easily wiped off.
I also coupled this with a whole house filtration set up for delicious water and reduced chlorine output in the shower

Aquabion sounds interesting. How has it performed? Any scale, how hard is the water?

Also how many Aquabions do you need? Do you know if it effects pressure/flow?

Their website has an awful lot of content, but nothing very useful.

I think it’s doing a good job. After three years the kettle has some flakes, but a fraction of that before. The taps (which I fully descaled of rock solid crud) remain completely clear



I have one (large) device. Lasts 8 years or so if I recall correctly. The zinc can be replaced / device recycled which I like the idea of

I have a pressure reducing valve after the filter so pressure not an issue for me.

[dba7108]

sammyb349 said:

I think it’s doing a good job. After three years the kettle has some flakes, but a fraction of that before. The taps (which I fully descaled of rock solid crud) remain completely clear



I have one (large) device. Lasts 8 years or so if I recall correctly. The zinc can be replaced / device recycled which I like the idea of

I have a pressure reducing valve after the filter so pressure not an issue for me.

Sorry to resurrect old thread but what do you mean by whole house filtration and which one did you buy.

[petrolbloke]

dba7108 said:

Sorry to resurrect old thread but what do you mean by whole house filtration

Filters the water just after the main inlet to the house, so the water to the whole house (bathrooms, taps, appliances, heating system) is all filtered.

Like the OP I also live in Cambridgeshire and have very hard water and am looking at the options to address it (before I get bathrooms re-done!).

Water softeners are expensive, take up a lot of space, require frequent salt top-ups and don't seem to be that green/eco friendly.

The filtration systems lock you in with replacement cartridges which is going to suck if the supplier goes out of business or starts price gouging.

The Aquabion sounds quite good, but they seem to be very secretive on pricing and it'll still need replacing after 7 years (claimed) and I suspect that depends on usage so could need replacing sooner if you wash your car a lot.

While searching the web I also came across an "Aquavort", but that seems to be a snake oil type product.

I'm interested to hear about what other solutions PHers have gone for. At the moment I'm leaning towards an Aquabion.

[mikeiow]

Aquabion does sound interesting…..maybe.

Not so helpful for boiling water taps, by the look of things…

Anyone got one, & had experience with them?

[dba7108]

Have also looked at aquabion but not too much info as to their effectiveness online.