Our well water before filtering was high hardness according to the builder when we moved into our new house and we saw that the first time dishes got done. We had SPOTS on all the glasses plates and cups. Then the bathtub junk started and we had lots of scummy caked on stuff that we had to clean out of the showers a lot. SO we put a water filter in and the scummy junk all but disappeared… but water now feels slippery and like it dowes not get all the soap off us when we shower. Is that normal?

After doing a bit of research we found conflicting answers regarding why softened water feels slippery to the touch.

• We read in a Culligan Water (Mid-Missouri) article that soft water does not have ‘scum’ (calcium & magnesium ions bonded to soap particles) that gets deposited on your skin and since your skin therefore has no ‘scum’ on it to cause friction, water then feels slippery.
   
• On a Collective Science Q & A Site we read that the slippery feeling comes from the depositing of soap ions that would ordinarily have bonded with the calcium and magnesium that the water softener took out. Apparently in the absence of those metals the skin’s weakly positive charge becomes a magnet for negatively charged, free-floating soap particles. Therefore, the deposits on skin make water seem slippery.

Which do we believe? Although both answers seem somewhat plausible, we believe that the first answer has a lot more merit. Why do we believe that? Quite simply, since soft water fails to leave deposits on other surfaces that possess weakly positive charge, why would it selectively leave deposits on the skin?

Testing for water hardness (aka: total hardness)

The simplest water test method for hardness involves using a dip-n-read testing product such as the WaterWorks Total Hardness Test Strip. Just dip the indicator test pad into a water sample, remove it, and match the developed color to a corresponding color on the product’s color chart.

Will too much or too little hardness hurt me?

We have yet to hear of any cases where overly hard water negatively affected the health of a person and, coincidentally, we have also not heard of a case where softened water negatively affected a person’s health.

Hard water WILL, however, shorten the life expectancy of plumbing, water heaters, refrigerator ice makers, washers, and any other devices that use (or transport) water in your home. Oh, and it will increase the amount of cleaning you will have to do in the shower stall to get the ‘soap scum’ off of, well, pretty much every surface.

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

If you have a green thumb, or at least TRY to have a green thumb, then the following information about water filtration products for gardening applications may benefit you.

First of all, determine if you have excess water hardness coming out of your garden hose using a test kit such as the WaterSafe Chlorine & Hardness Test Kit pictured on the left.