[Wet Thumb Forum]-Water Softener

[Carson]

I've had good luck in the past with planted tanks and city water, but am now on what was hard water ran through a softener.
It looks like I am getting about zero GH and about 12 KH.
I realize that I'll have to raise the GH some but is my KH going to be a problem?
Is the high KH from the sofener?

[Eric686]

Is there any tap in your house that is not run through the softner. Maybe you could do your changes from thoes taps and be back to the hard water.

[Keithjon]

Softeners generally do not effect the alkalinity. You would have to talk to the manufacturer of you softener to find out what chemistry they are using. Since KH is an indication of the buffering capacity of water i.e. its ability to resist a change in pH, I would not worry about KH or more properly alkalinity. You can reduce the alkalinity by boiling the water. Is the pH ok?

The water softener is adding sodium ions to the water to replace the calcium and magnesium ions that are present in hard water. I do not know what effect the sodium is going to have on the plants, but, plants do not like sodium.

I would call your local city water utility and find out what the hardness is in mg/l. With this information you can use the following formula to mix city water with your softened water to get a hardness that you want.

V1*C1 = V2*C2

V1 is the volume of hard city water, C1 is the hardness or concentration of the city water in mg/l, V2 is the volume of water you want to add to the tank, C2 is the hardness or concentration of the water you want to add to the tank.

As an example, if you want to add 2 liters of water to your tank that has a hardness of 180 mg/l and your city water has a hardness of 391 mg/l then you would need:

V1 is the liters of city water needed, C1 = 391 mg/l, V2 = 2 liters, and C2 = 180 mg/l

V1 = (2 * 180)/391 = .9207 liters or 921 ml
You would put 921 ml of city water in a container and fill it up to the two liter point with your softened water.

The alkalinity will also be reduced when you mix the softner water with city water. You can use the same equation to calculate what the new alkalinity will be.

Keithjon

[Carson]

Actually I've went from city water to well water through a softener.
I used to haul water from my parents house in town for water changes. ( what a pain).
After an extensive remodel, we have installed a softener.
I've started doing water changes with our water .
I'm trying to learn how to adjust to the new chemistry.
The presoften water is about 12 GH and about 11 KH.
The PH is way up there.
I use pressurized CO2 to keep the PH in check.
So far I've been using the softened water, but have read it's not a good idea.
The tank water at present is stil about 7GH.
Should I be using the unsoften waer or maybe a mix of the two?

[Amphiprion]

Have you ever considered an RO unit? Mixing tap and the RO water in certain ratios will give you the chemistry you need and is probably the easiest long-term approach to getting the water you want. You just dont want to use 100% RO, since it has practically nothing in it. I believe there are several places to get a decent unit for a good price.

[Tonka]

Another ideal is to use potassium chloride rather than sodium chloride in your water softener's salt tank. It's more expensive, but there is a beneficial rather than detrimental effect on your plants. RO is a good idea, but you need to be willing to waste 5X plus more water as "waste" from the unit, have a storage tank, and wait for preparation.