With that said, today’s inquiry came to us from ‘Cass’, a concerned woman from North Carolina with concern over the origin of high hardness in her drinking water.

Hi. Can you explain why water has hardness in when it when it comes out of a well? If rain water becomes well water wehere does the hardness come from? Shouldn’t the water just be water?

Thank you for the question, Cass. When droplets of rain water form in the atmosphere they contain nothing but good old hydrogen and oxygen with no dissolved minerals. In that state the water has a tendency to react with pretty much any and everything it comes in contact with and our atmosphere contains quite a bit of carbon dioxide.

As the water mingles with atmospheric carbon dioxide a weak acid (carbonic acid) forms. That acid makes the water slightly more aggressive and once the water reaches the ground it then filters down through soil, rock, bedrock, etc. where it has a chance to dissolve and then absorb tiny amounts of each of those materials.

The more aggressive the water becomes on its trip down through the atmosphere and/or the more contact the water has with the ground as it makes its way through the Earth and into an aquifer, the more dissolved minerals (i.e. calcium, magnesium, metals, etc.) the water will contain when pulled up by a well for use in one’s home.

Testing for water hardness?

While wet chemistry titration test kits have provided reliable water test results for many years they do not have the same monopoly on accuracy, reliability, affordability and ease of use that test strips such as WaterWorks Total Hardness possesses.

The WaterWorks Total Hardness test strips allow interested parties to perform total hardness in water testing in under 15 seconds and get results they can depend on each time.

Perils of hard water?

Too much dissolved calcium (or magnesium) in water can result in increased soap/detergent consumption for washing machines and dishwashers, lackluster performance of shampoos & conditioners, dry skin, dish (water) spots, bathtub rings, clogged plumbing, and a host of other problems — some of which cost a lot of money to fix!

For more information on the effects of hardness (dissolved calcium & magnesium) in water and/or how to soften, treat or otherwise condition hard water, please check out the articles in Water Testing Blog’s Hardness Archives and Water Softener Archives.

Popular articles in those archives include:

• Water Softener That Does Not Use Salt?
• Is Soft Water Salty?
• Converting Grains per Gallon (GPG) to Parts per Million (ppm)
• What Should You Test if You Have City/Municipal Water?

If after testing your water for hardness you determine that you need (or would like) to purchase a water softener, we suggest taking a look at the products offered by Filter Water, a leading online retailer of traditional ‘salt-based’ water softeners as well as the more modern and environmentally friendly ‘salt-free’ water softeners

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Recently we saw that a company had a link on its web site entitled Online Pool Water Testing… and quite honestly it seemed a bit weird to think that a company could POSSIBLY test your water over the Internet so naturally we went and checked out the link.

We EXPECTED to find a convoluted bunch of advertising hype leading up to asking us to send a sample of our water to a lab someplace bu we did not find anything of that nature.

The company, In the Swim (www.intheswim.com) posted a very simple online form that asked for just a few simple pieces of information that one could obtain by looking at their pool water and using a test strip like the Pool Check 5-Way Pool Test Strips offered in our online store.

The form asked for the following pieces of information: Pool type (pool or spa), water conditions (cloudy or clear & color if cloudy), visible algae, visible stains, pH, total alkalinity, calcium hardness, and free/available chlorine (or bromine).

Then, once we hit the ‘submit’ button it took us to a page where it placed all of our values in a nice, neat table that also contained the industry accepted values for the same pool water quality parameters. This made it very easy for us to see exactly how our pool water quality compared to the way it should be.

We then had a chance to ‘view suggestions’ regarding our personal water quality situation — which we did — and a new page appeared with information regarding possible causes of our pool water woes (we said we had cloudy water and low pH). At this point the program did, of course, give a push for us to add some chemicals to our cart, but never once did the program’s language seem threatening or intimidating… like we have overheard in many pool stores over the years.

• “If you don’t fix this problem right away your pool will rot.”
• “Yeah, you CAN swim in it as-is, but I wouldn’t.”
• “Hey, if the machine says you need these chemicals then you NEED these chemicals.”
• And one of our favorites of all time: “Don’t come crying to us when your skin gets all itchy and your hair turns green, OK?”

Yep. Got to love the untrained, uncouth water testing personnel in some pool stores. Wait, we take that back. No, you don’t have to love them. You SHOULD, however, make use of Pool Check Test 5-Way Strips and the convenient, not-too-pushy Online Pool Water Test program on IntheSwim.Com. No download required, either! It’s 100% online and easy!

Pool Check 5-Way Test Strip

Pool Check 6-Way Test Strip

Pool Check Salt Test Strips

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We had not seen the online water test on In the Swim before and want to thank Water Testing Blog for bringing it to our attention. After playing around w/ it ourselves just now we, too, found the process pretty easy, completely painless and totally worthwhile.

Many pool stores use test methods no more sophisticated than the testing tools than you may already have at home or that you can purchase online at places like In the Swim or from our own Pool Water Test Kit Store.

• Alkalinity – Not having the correct amount of alkalinity in your water will make getting and keeping the pH of your pool water very difficult.

• Calcium Hardness – Having too much calcium in your water could result in deposits forming and could also make it harder for other chemicals to dissolve in the water. Too little calcium in the water could result in pool water becoming aggressive and starting to attack various pool surfaces.

• Chlorine (Free) – If you use chlorine as your sanitizer, check to see if you have any left over from last year… or risk adding more than you need to add at the beginning of the year and ‘wasting’ money.

• Chlorine (Total) – If you use chlorine as your sanitizer and shocked your pool at the end of the previous season (as you SHOULD have), then you may have a lot of combined chlorine in your water that needs to get ‘burned out’ w/ a non-chlorine shock. Combined chlorine does little good when it comes to keeping pool water clean.

• pH – Incorrect pH levels drastically reduce the effectiveness of important pool chemicals such as bromine, chlorine, clarifiers, algaecides, etc.

• Metals – Having unwanted metals such as copper and iron in your pool water when you shock it w/ an oxidizer like chlorine or bromine at the beginning of the season could cause the metals to precipitate out of solution and stain pool surfaces.

• Stabilizer – Also known as cyanuric acid, having too little of this compound in pool water makes it difficult to maintain a free chlorine residual. Having too much of it can keep chlorine in a pool from doing its job.

• Total Dissolved Solids – Too many total dissolved solids in pool water will result in the water not accepting additional material… such as the chlorine powder (granules), tablets, sticks, or pool chemistry balancing chemicals.

So, get your water tested before adding start-up chemicals. Any questions?

Pool Check Salt Test Strips

Pool Check 5-in-1 Test Strips

Pool Check Copper 3-in-1

]]> http://watertestingblog.com/2012/04/26/what-to-test-when-opening-your-pool/feed/ 0 http://watertestingblog.com/2011/04/28/question-what-do-i-need-to-start-up-my-pool/ http://watertestingblog.com/2011/04/28/question-what-do-i-need-to-start-up-my-pool/#respond Thu, 28 Apr 2011 04:07:38 +0000 http://pool-water-testing.com/pool-testing-blog/?p=664 We get this question countless times… because some pool companies either don’t do a good job explaining to customers what they will need to do when swimming season rolls around again OR because people have purchased homes that have a pool — and the former owners didn’t leave instructions.

In either case, we get this question a lot. Below you will find links to four areas of interest for pool owners in the Spring:

Pool Opening Kits	Pool Chlorine
Solar & Winter Covers	Equipment & Accessories

And, of course, an area that too many pool owners neglect: Pool Water Test Kits.

Can’t I just dump a bunch of chlorine in and call it a day?

Sure… but then you will more than likely waste money correcting the problems you’ve created or didn’t solve by simply adding chlorine.

Testing your pool water for at LEAST the basics (metals, pH, alkalinity, free chlorine, total chlorine, calcium hardness and cyanuric acid) will give the knowledge you need to purchase the correct pool chemicals and add the correct amounts so you can get your pool started properly and avoid annoyances such as staining caused by the addition of chlorine to water containing high levels of metals, algae caused by poorly balanced water in which chlorine cannot do its job, etc.

Consider This : 99% of the time it costs MORE money to fix a pool water chemistry issue than it does to test in the first place and add the correct chemicals the first time!

“Overview: This standard covers residential cation exchange water softeners designed to reduce hardness from public or private water supplies. Additionally, this standard can verify the system’s ability to reduce radium and barium.” (source)

Cation-Exchange Softener:

• Typically used to soften hard water (water containing excessive amounts of calcium and/or magnesium) by ‘trading’ minerals with a strong positive charge for those with a weaker positive charge.
• Often referred to as ‘water softeners’.
• You will find most systems of these water hardness treatment systems functioning as whole-house water filtration systems.
• These systems effectively remove calcium and magnesium (water hardness) which can build up and leave depositis in plumbing and faucet fixtures over time. Water softeners can also remove contaminants such as barium which can cause health problems in humans.