How To Determine What Size Water Softener You Need

H2o softeners are useful household products that plough hard water into soft water. Difficult water contains mineral ions such every bit magnesium and calcium. Telling signs of hard water include residue on appliances, soap scum in sinks, and dry pare later showers.

Untreated hard water can cause long-term impairment to your utilities and increase repair costs. Mineral buildup tin can restrict h2o menstruum, reduce pressure and damage your pipes.

Efficient water softeners remove mineral ions from your water to provide soft h2o. This tin meliorate the quality of your drinking water also as forbid mineral buildup in household appliances. Dishes, wearing apparel, and your skin will experience softer and cleaner than before. There are several benefits of installing a h2o softener in your household.

However, there are several water softeners in the market place that come in various shapes and sizes. A h2o softener that is the incorrect size for your household can be inefficient and cause more impairment than benefits.

Getting a correctly sized water softener that meets your requirements can be intimidating. This guide explores the factors you lot need to consider when purchasing a water softener. It will help you selection a correctly sized water softener to ensure a steady supply of soft water for your household.

Can a water softener be too big?

It is better to get a h2o softener that is bigger for your requirements than smaller. All the same, there are problems that volition arise if your water softener is too large for your household.

H2o softeners that are besides large for your household needs do not regenerate oft enough. This tin can damage the resin chaplet and lead to bacterial growth in the tank.

Additionally, larger h2o softeners cost more upfront. It is recommended to get a water softener that can be upwards to xxx percent larger than your needs to embrace high usage periods. Annihilation larger than this is ultimately detrimental.

H2o Softener Sizing Chart: How to summate the right size for your h2o softener?

To calculate the size of the water softener you demand, in that location are two important factors to consider. These are the hardness of your h2o and your daily h2o consumption. Following this, you may calculate other factors like a daily softening requirement, grain capacity, and salt efficiency. These factors combined will help you lot make up one's mind the right size of the h2o softener you demand in your household.

Footstep one: H2o Hardness

You measure water hardness in grains per gallon(gpg), parts per million(ppm), or milligrams per liter(mg/L). You can determine the hardness of your water past purchasing dwelling testing kits. You could also get your h2o tested by professionals for more reliable results.

It is of import to have an exact number that measures your water hardness. Merely guessing this number tin pb to improper sizing. Below is the range of numbers you can see to make up one's mind h2o hardness.

The acceptable range of water hardness:

Soft water – 0-60 mg/Fifty or ppm; 0-3gpg

Moderately hard – 61-120 mg/L or ppm; 3-7gpg

Hard – 121-180 mg/50 or ppm; 7-10gpg

Very hard – >180 mg/Fifty or ppm; >10gpg

Pace two: Daily Water Consumption

The next step is calculating how much h2o your household consumes on a daily basis. The virtually reliable style to do this is to refer to your water bill. Information technology will provide a monthly or quarterly amount of water consumed over a certain timeframe. Use this to calculate your daily water consumption.

If you do not take access to this data you tin use a unproblematic calculation. It is estimated that a unmarried person uses between 80-100 gallons of h2o per day.

Multiply the number of people living in your household by 80 to 100. Utilise eighty if y'all use water fairly conservatively and 100 if y'all are lavish in your water consumption. This will requite you an interpretation of the gallons of water your household uses per day.

For instance, if y'all have 4 people in your household and you multiply that with 100 gallons per person you get 400 gallons of h2o per twenty-four hour period.

Step 3: Daily Softening Requirement

This step is calculating your daily softening requirement. To practise this, simply multiply your water hardness past your daily water consumption. For example, your tests show yous have h2o hardness at 10 grains per gallon. From footstep 2, you know that your household consumes 400 gallons of water per day.

Multiplying these numbers gives you 4000 hardness grains per day. This means your new water softener volition have to remove 4000 hardness grains per day to encounter your requirements.

Step 4: Total Grain Chapters of Water Softeners

Water softeners take a regeneration cycle. This means that they tin can only remove a certain amount of hardness grains before needing to regenerate. At some point, all the resin beads become saturated and cannot demark any more mineral ions.

Regeneration involves washing out the accumulated minerals and recharging the resin bed with sodium or potassium.

Water softeners take different regeneration cycles ranging from daily to once a calendar week. To calculate total grain chapters, multiply your daily softening requirement by the number of days in the regeneration cycle.

For example, if a h2o softener has a six-twenty-four hour period regeneration bicycle. Using the statistics used in previous steps, you multiply 4000 past 6. This means 24,000 grains is your total grain capacity.

Step 5: Common salt Efficiency

Information technology is important to also consider common salt efficiency. Regenerating a water softener's resin bed to 100% requires a unduly high amount of salt. Partial regeneration thus becomes a lot more efficient.

For example, effectually 12 pounds of salt are required to fully regenerate a xxx,000-grain system. The same model tin can use less than two pounds to regenerate ten,000 grains.

Recharging but 40% of the softening bed requires merely 1-fifth of the table salt amount. 3-fifths of the table salt amount can recharge up to 85%. If you crave a water softener that requires the removal of 24000 grains per week as calculated above, it is recommended to choose higher grain capacity water softeners.

This will relieve a lot of money and use less salt in the long run. Servicing your system will exist easier and there will be less wear and tear on your water softener.

Letting your water softener regenerate to 100% will make it exhaust faster. It is recommended to choose a water softener that is effectually 30% larger than your requirements.

This volition ensure that your water softener isn't too big, which can lead to regeneration not occurring often plenty. This in plow volition impairment resin chaplet and increment repair costs.

Therefore the best-sized water softener as calculated in previous steps in a 32000-grain capacity filter. This size is the best choice for the household in this example.

Pace half dozen: Water Flow Rates

After y'all've determined the advisable size for your water softener, it is too important to consider h2o period rates. If your water softener cannot evangelize enough soft h2o during peak usage, hard h2o may leak through and water force per unit area will reduce.

This is particularly important when in that location are multiple taps running, for example in the morning time when the entire family unit is getting ready for their 24-hour interval.

Water flow is measured in gallons per minute(GPM). The more people live in your house, the more flow rate you need.

Single households can use effectually five GPM while bigger families should ensure that they get systems providing at least 15 GPM.

How practice you lot size a commercial water softener?

The period rate or gallons per minute are of import considerations in sizing commercial water softeners. You want a h2o softener that keeps up with consumption and regenerates often.

There are several other considerations such equally water temperature, h2o pressure, chapters per cubic pes of each softener tank, and how much space is available. This is a much more complicated process than sizing a h2o softener for home use.

Therefore, it is highly recommended that you contact a specialist who tin can factor in all the elements and correctly size a commercial water softener for your establishment.

Decision

H2o softeners are useful household products that can offer several benefits in treating hard water. The soft water that these products provide has several benefits from more efficient cleaning to healthier drinking h2o.

In order to get the most out of a water softener, and bask good h2o quality, it is of import to get 1 that meets the requirements of your household.

Incorrectly sizing your water softener tin can compromise the benefits they offer and atomic number 82 to long-term harm and expenses. Calculating the size you need is as simple equally acquiring information about your household and its requirements.

Oft Asked Questions:

ane. At what hardness is a water softener needed?

Generally, water is considered hard if it tests for over 100 ppm or mg/50 and over 7 gpg.

You can determine how hard your water is by testing it with a DIY kit or by hiring professionals. Your h2o should measure out between 0-60 ppm or mg/L and between 0-3 gpg to be considered soft h2o that is safe for your household.

What size water softener do you lot need for a family of five?

The size of the water softener y'all need for a family of 5 is determined past how hard your water is and how much water is used daily. You may follow the steps in the sizing guide to get an verbal requirement.

By and large, if your water measures 10 grains per gallon and each member uses 100 gallons of water per twenty-four hour period you need 5000 grains softened daily. Multiply that past each day of the week and y'all get 35000 total grain chapters.

It is advisable to get a softener that is around 30% larger than your requirements.

In this instance, you will need a water softener with a 45000 full grain capacity. If your water is not that hard or you use less water per mean solar day, this number can exist reduced.

Alternatively, if your water is harder and you swallow more water, this number will increment.

How many cubic feet is a 48000-grain water softener?

A 48000-grain water softener will measure 1.5 cubic feet.

How practise you convert grain gallons to PPM?

1 grain per gallon(gpg) is 17.1 parts per one thousand thousand(ppm). You can utilize this data to convert betwixt gpg and ppm. For instance, 10 gpg is 171 ppm.

About The Author

Judith— a passionate water treatment specialist — is a waste h2o direction enthusiast, clean drinking h2o abet, and someone with deep personal experience and knowledge about various water equipments. Her piece of work was mentioned in countless notable water associations. Previously she was an editor at Water Alliance.