zxcvbob wrote:
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Robert Gammon" wrote in message
oups.com...

Lets be perfectly clear about this. Water softeners work by replacing
calcium, magnesium and other metals in carbonate groups with either
sodium or potassium.They do not remove minerals from water. The
only processes that I know about that we can do as consumers to REMOVE
minerals are either Distillation,or Reverse Osmosis.

The amount of sodium (or potassium) added to water is trivial. Drinking
64oz a day of this stuff, 7 days a week will add less Sodium to your
diet in a month than eating ONE of ANY fast food joint's quarter pound
hamburger with cheese

I don't care about the dietary aspect, but I have a question. At a
friend's house, the water at the 2nd floor faucet has a definite
salty taste that's NOT present at the 1st floor faucets. All pipes
are copper - relatively new house. Why would this be?



The kitchen faucet cold water might be plumbed with hard water. (My
house is like that.) The first floor bathrooms might also be plumbed
with hard cold water to the sink and/or toilet. The upstairs surely
has only softened water running to it because they wouldn't run a
third pipe up there for the hard water.

Water softeners replace each calcium or magnesium ion with 2 ions of
sodium -- but it's not as much as you would think because there's not
much calcium and magnesium in the water.

Bob
Take it from someone who has LIVED with a water softener in place for
over 20 years.

WATER SOFTENERS DO NOT MAKE WATER SALTY TO THE TASTE!!!!!

And it could be just the other way around. Second story branches off
BEFORE the water softener, and no one thought to warn/tell the
homeowner. Second story hard, unconditioned water, mineral taste to
it, vaguely salty, but more mineral tasting than salt. Ground floor,
nice tasting water as it comes off of the softener.