Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.





--
Dave - The Medway Handyman www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

On Apr 7, 9:00 pm, The Medway Handyman
wrote:
Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

+1

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

filter no - water softener yes (but I expect you already knew that ;)

Jim K

In article ,
says...
What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.


Yup - it's called a water softener.

--
Skipweasel - never knowingly understood.

"The Medway Handyman" wrote in message ...
Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and discharging beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone
knows of a filter that removes it I'd like to know.





--
Dave - The Medway Handyman www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

Well they can't spell. It mentions "Femail 1" BSP fitting" twice in the installation instructions.

--
Graham.

%Profound_observation%

The Medway Handyman wrote:
Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.


Other than a water softener, no, but ICBW. Temporary hardness can be
removed by heating the water above a critical temperature, which
converts the vaguely soluble calcium salt into a non-soluble salt, which
then deposits itself on the heating element.

As to the rest. It's a sealed unit, so how can it increase the oxygen
without splitting the water? It's claimed to be a filter that will
remove viruses and bacteria, but not protozoa from well water. Which are
the same size or bigger.

It says it will soften water, but in the list of chemicals it claims to
remove, there is no mention of calcium, and as hard` water is high in
calcium compounds.....

On the good side, they do offer a three month "Like it or get your money
back" offer. Though I doubt they'd refund the labour for fitting and
removing it.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember The Medway Handyman
saying something like:

Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

Ditto that.
Still, there's one born every minute.

If this thing did half of what they appear to be claiming, it would be
pretty miraculous and the surprise would be that we hadn't already
heard about it.

" Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox."
- gets my vote!

On Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:00:21 +0100, The Medway Handyman wrote:

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

+1

An awful lot of use of the weasel marketing term "up to" in the list
of things it might remove as well.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

Filter no, the lady needs a softener, ion exchange or reverse
osmosis. I think the cheapest and most common type is ion exchange.
The ion exchnage column needs "regenerating" at regular intervals but
a decent one will do that automagically, though that does pour water
straight down the drain. Not sure if it's enough to worry about if on
a meter. It will need a supply of salt for the regeneration process
as well, bit like a dishwasher needs salt.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On 07/04/2011 23:43, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:00:21 +0100, The Medway Handyman wrote:

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

+1

An awful lot of use of the weasel marketing term "up to" in the list
of things it might remove as well.

I loved that as well. "Removes up to 98%". Like the hair colouring
stuff which promises "up to 100% gray coverage".


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

"The Medway Handyman" wrote in message
...
Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and discharging
beneficial negative ions

- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a filter
that removes it I'd like to know.



I recall a thread on this ng a while back (2-5yrs) where a water softener
was referred to as a 'feel good' item.
Has the consensus changed?
My old Permutit still goes strong after about 30 years.
It does feel good and reduces soap/detergent usage. No scale in
kettle/washing machine/dishwasher etc.
Presumably the DHW and CH are also benefiting.
Boiler is of an inderterminate age but certainly more than 32 years. Alas,
the poor old thing is now on its last legs.

Nick

In message o.uk, Dave
Liquorice writes
On Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:00:21 +0100, The Medway Handyman wrote:

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

+1

An awful lot of use of the weasel marketing term "up to" in the list
of things it might remove as well.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

Filter no, the lady needs a softener, ion exchange or reverse
osmosis. I think the cheapest and most common type is ion exchange.
The ion exchnage column needs "regenerating" at regular intervals but
a decent one will do that automagically, though that does pour water
straight down the drain. Not sure if it's enough to worry about if on
a meter. It will need a supply of salt for the regeneration process
as well, bit like a dishwasher needs salt.


Sodium alert - the website said so



--
geoff

On Apr 7, 9:00*pm, The Medway Handyman
wrote:
Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

* activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

* - all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. *Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

--
Dave - The Medway Handymanwww.medwayhandyman.co.uk

You are right to be suspicious, there is a lot of ******** in there.
Filters fall into two catgories.

Ones that filter out fine particles. Thes particles are mostly
harmless anyway.

Activted carbon filters that remove anything that carbon reacts with.
Theoretically herbicides and other trace nasties that may/may not be
there.

There are possiblenasties which they don't remove as well.

One thing they do remove is chlorine. Chlorineis a nasty but
neccesary to eliminate nasty microbes in the water. Once the chlorine
is removed, there have been cases where the bugs have bred in the
filter itself. Epecailly when the house owners go away on holiday and
there is no flow of water in the pipework.
Personally, I would leave the water alone. This also applies to these
water/ice cube dispensers found on some refrigerators which ofetn have
an (expensive to replace) carbon filter.

There are a few filters that remove heavy metals. However you need to
be somewhat paranoid to imagine they are present in the first place.
Naturally these firms like to convince you that htey lurk everywhere.

On Apr 8, 12:27*am, "Nick" wrote:
"The Medway Handyman" wrote in ...



Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

*activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and discharging
beneficial negative ions

*- all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. *Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a filter
that removes it I'd like to know.

I recall a thread on this ng a while back (2-5yrs) where a water softener
was referred to as a 'feel good' item.
Has the consensus changed?
My old Permutit still goes strong after about 30 years.
It does feel good and reduces soap/detergent usage. No scale in
kettle/washing machine/dishwasher etc.
Presumably the DHW and CH are also benefiting.
Boiler is of an inderterminate age but certainly more than 32 years. Alas,
the poor old thing is now on its last legs.

Nick- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Water softeners, especially your sort, are a good thing in hard water
areas. They are not filters. Filtering does not soften hard water.
In technical terms, it is a reactor.
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water. Hard water is
good for you due to the calcium.

On Fri, 08 Apr 2011 10:15:12 +0100, Tim Streater
wrote:

In article
,
harry wrote:

It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.

Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.

Bit about it down this page, though it looks like they're not sure why !

http://tinyurl.com/da9j8

Andy C

The Medway Handyman wrote:

Customer has asked my opinion of these.

I think this paragraph is the one to point at and laugh uproariously:

"When immersed in water these ‘Active Ceramics’ display physical
properties of semi conductivity, magnetic properties and light emission
(in the far infra red spectrum)."

--
Scott

Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

In article 150f1e2e-5cfd-48d5-9cd0-509804188be9
@d12g2000vbz.googlegroups.com, says...
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water. Hard water is
good for you due to the calcium.


Though it's the potential for picking up too much sodium that makes it
unwise to drink water from a conventional softener.

--
Skipweasel - never knowingly understood.

In article d874821d-a718-407b-be06-
, says...
Activted carbon filters that remove anything that carbon reacts with.


Well, strictly it's not reacting with the charcoal, it's adsorbed onto
the (very large) surface.

--
Skipweasel - never knowingly understood.

Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:

It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.

Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.

Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much sodium
is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium in the
diet can increase blood pressure.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

On Apr 7, 9:38*pm, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
*The Medway Handyman wrote:



Customer has asked my opinion of these.

http://www.uk-water-filters.co.uk/wh...ters.html#cert

Phrases like "The system operates quietly around the clock, increasing
oxygen, reducing molecule size,

* activating the metabolism, increasing alkali in the water and
discharging beneficial negative ions

* - all of which have known health benefits."

Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. *Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

It may well be a reasonable filter, filtering the stuff it claims to
filter. But I don't see how increasing the alkali in the water can
*reduce* hardness.

There's a certain a mount of new-age b/s in there, IMO. "Reduced
molecule size" would be one such.

Also this stuff about the body being too acidic is I suspect crap too.
The body is, except maybe under extreme conditions, going to be the
right pH, else you'd quickly be quite ill. Life hasn't spent millions of
years evolving for nothing. It has quite efficient mechanisms already
built in to ensure a proper pH balance, thank you very much. [1]

Oxygen is transported around the body by the haemoglobin in your red
blood cells. Oxygen is a very corrosive and reactive element. To be
safely delivered to the cells in your body requires that it be very
safely packaged up for transport. It does *not* just make its way around
the bloodstream on its own, waiting to be helped by all these negative
ions.

So, in short, too much obvious cobblers making it hard to judge the rest.

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.

Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.

MBQ

On Fri, 8 Apr 2011 00:31:01 +0100, geoff wrote:

The ion exchnage column needs "regenerating" at regular intervals
but
a decent one will do that automagically, though that does pour
water
straight down the drain. Not sure if it's enough to worry about if
on
a meter. It will need a supply of salt for the regeneration
process
as well, bit like a dishwasher needs salt.

Sodium alert - the website said so

Good point, an ion exchange softener swaps the calcium/magnesium ions
in the water for sodium ones. Too much sodium is reckoned to be not
that good for you.

I guess this is why the drinking supply in place with a ion exchnage
softener is seperatly treated... the ion exchnage softened water
being used to prolong the life of appliances heating water, like
boilers, HW cylinders, dishwashers and washing machines by not
clogging 'em up with scale.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.
Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last
year we tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener,
and a filter jobby on the kitchen tap.

Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much
sodium is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium
in the diet can increase blood pressure.

Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a hand-waving
argument unless someone does the sums. If I use thus-softened water to
make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily basis, how much extra sodium
is that giving me over and above what I'm getting anyway? If I know
that, I can make a judgement.

Too many variables, starting with the amount of calcium in the water
that's supplied to your house. The end of the chain is your personal
susceptibility to excess sodium.

The extra amount per day if you only drink treated water is probably
less than I put on a portion of chips, but then I do like a few chips
with the salt and vinegar.

Reducing overall sodium is a risk reduction strategy. Too little sodium
is also harmful.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:

Too many variables, starting with the amount of calcium in the water
that's supplied to your house. The end of the chain is your personal
susceptibility to excess sodium.

Far too handwavy.

So find out how much calcium is in *your* local supply, find out how
susceptible *you* are to sodium-assisted hypertension, and work out how
much sodium *you* get from other sources in your diet. There is no
single one-size-fits-all answer.

The government recommend between 1500 and 2300 milligrams of sodium per
day as the maximum, depending on your medical circumstances. That's
equivalent to about 3 to 6 grams of salt. Minimum recommendation is well
under a gram, unless you're sweating a lot, in which case you need
rather more.

Tciao for Now!

"Ciao" doesn't have a "T" in it.

Deliberate mis-spelling in the .sig file. It's been like that for decade
or more.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

On Apr 8, 11:10*am, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
*John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:

It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.

Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.
Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much sodium
is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium in the
diet can increase blood pressure.

Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a hand-waving
argument unless someone does the sums. If I use thus-softened water to
make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily basis, how much extra sodium
is that giving me over and above what I'm getting anyway? If I know
that, I can make a judgement.

--
Tim

"That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed,
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" *-- *Bill of Rights 1689

It depends on the hardenss of your local water. The harder is/was
after treatment the more sodium there will be. So, no-one can tell you.

"harry" wrote in message
...


Water softeners, especially your sort, are a good thing in hard water
areas. They are not filters. Filtering does not soften hard water.

You can soften water with a filter.. reverse osmosis filters will do it.
They tend to require power (to get lots of pressure) and maintenance (they
clog) for any large amount of water.
They are quite common for aquarium use.

"Scott M" wrote in message
...
The Medway Handyman wrote:

Customer has asked my opinion of these.

I think this paragraph is the one to point at and laugh uproariously:

"When immersed in water these ‘Active Ceramics’ display physical
properties of semi conductivity, magnetic properties and light emission
(in the far infra red spectrum)."

Its probably true..
but so does the human body and other materials.
Without specifics of what these properties are and how they affect the water
(or not!) it's irrelevant.

"Man at B&Q" wrote in message
...

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.

Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.

However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.

harry wrote:
On Apr 8, 11:10 am, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.
Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.
Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much sodium
is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium in the
diet can increase blood pressure.
Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a hand-waving
argument unless someone does the sums. If I use thus-softened water to
make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily basis, how much extra sodium
is that giving me over and above what I'm getting anyway? If I know
that, I can make a judgement.

--
Tim

"That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed,
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" -- Bill of Rights 1689

It depends on the hardenss of your local water. The harder is/was
after treatment the more sodium there will be. So, no-one can tell you.

well one can set an upper limit.

we use 25kg of sodium chloride a month in a pretty hard water area

I'd say the majority of the water usage (no meter) is in bog flushind
and baths, with a small but in washing up, washing machines and the
like. I'd estimate 2000 liters a week maybe. So say 8000 liters per
month.I doubt whether all the sodium ends up in it, either.

But let's say it does.is about 3gm of sodium per liter, absolute worst case.

Now we drink maybe a half liter of water a day, pus maybe another half a
liter in terms of coffee and tea.

Say a litre. So that's an excess of about 3gm/day of sodium ions.Roughly.

According to the interwebby thing, that's half a teaspoon of salt.

Its also half the recommended daily dose of salt. Yes folks, a teaspoon
of salt a day is all you are supposed to eat.


"Only 2 per cent of 268 salads checked at shops, cafés and fast-food
chains had less than the 0.5g salt contained in a bag of Walkers crisps.
One in 10 had more salt than the 2.1g found in a McDonald's Big Mac."


So there you go.


HOWEVER it is the law that a non softened tap be provided, and since we
fill the kettles and glasses from that, we don't even get the 3g a day.

Or you can use bottled water..


HOWEVER again. recognise that my calculations are very much worst case.
Hard water is water with more than 100mg/liter of calcium ions. Not
3000mg/liter (3g/liter)

So its entirely possible my figures are out by a factor of ten, putting
sodium content of softened water at 300mg/liter,. making the daily dose
from coffee and tea less than that from a packet of crisps.

Most people do not like the taste of softened water. It tastes of sodium
bicarbonate and carbonate. I don't mind it. It tastes like mineral water
to me.

BTW most blood pressure pills contain things that make you **** out
sodium big time,. This leads to the normal side effects of muscle cramps
which are associated with loss of too much sodium through sweating.

If your blood pressure is high, don't worry about sodium, see a doctor
and get a pill. As my doctor said when reviewing my alarming cholesterol
levels 'eat as much fat as you like. The pill will get rid of far more
than you ever will through dietary changes'.

That's the sort of doctor I like.

On Apr 7, 11:43*pm, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
On Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:00:21 +0100, The Medway Handyman wrote:
Make me thinks its a load of overpriced bollox.

+1

An awful lot of use of the weasel marketing term "up to" in the list
of things it might remove as well.

What the lady wants to achieve is a reduction in limescale to reduce
cleaning. *Thats all. Very hard water area, so if anyone knows of a
filter that removes it I'd like to know.

Filter no, the lady needs a softener, ion exchange or reverse
osmosis. I think the cheapest and most common type is ion exchange.
The ion exchnage column needs "regenerating" at regular intervals but
a decent one will do that automagically, though that does pour water
straight down the drain. Not sure if it's enough to worry about if on
a meter. It will need a supply of salt for the regeneration process
as well, bit like a dishwasher needs salt.


the advice used to be (I assume still is) that you should not drink
water that has been softened because it has too much sodium since the
calcium is replaced by sodium.

When I replumbed the house I ran three pipes everywhere (soft hot,
soft cold, hard cold) but never got round to fitting the softener.


Robert

On Apr 8, 1:35*pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.

Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.

However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.

So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.

MBQ

On Apr 8, 1:39*pm, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
harry wrote:
On Apr 8, 11:10 am, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
*John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.
Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.
Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much sodium
is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium in the
diet can increase blood pressure.
Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a hand-waving
argument unless someone does the sums. If I use thus-softened water to
make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily basis, how much extra sodium
is that giving me over and above what I'm getting anyway? If I know
that, I can make a judgement.

--
Tim

"That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed,
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" *-- *Bill of Rights 1689

It depends on the hardenss of your local water. The harder is/was
after treatment the more sodium there will be. So, no-one can tell you.

well one can set an upper limit.

we use 25kg of sodium chloride a month in a pretty hard water area

I'd say the majority of the water usage (no meter) is in bog flushind
and baths, with a small but in washing up, washing machines and the
like. I'd estimate 2000 liters a week maybe. So say 8000 liters per
month.I doubt whether all the sodium ends up in it, either.

But let's say it does.is about 3gm of sodium per liter, absolute worst case.

Now we drink maybe a half liter of water a day, pus maybe another half a
liter in terms of coffee and tea.

Say a litre. So that's an excess of about 3gm/day of sodium ions.Roughly.

According to the interwebby thing, that's half a teaspoon of salt.

Its also half the recommended daily dose of salt. Yes folks, a teaspoon
of salt a day is all you are supposed to eat.

"Only 2 per cent of 268 salads checked at shops, cafés and fast-food
chains had less than the 0.5g salt contained in a bag of Walkers crisps.
One in 10 had more salt than the 2.1g found in a McDonald's Big Mac."

So there you go.

HOWEVER it is the law that a non softened tap be provided, and since we
fill the kettles and glasses from that, we don't even get the 3g a day.

Or you can use bottled water..

HOWEVER again. recognise that my calculations are very much worst case.
Hard water is water with more than 100mg/liter of calcium ions. Not
3000mg/liter (3g/liter)

So its entirely possible my figures are out by a factor of ten, putting
sodium content of softened water at *300mg/liter,. making the daily dose
from coffee and tea less than that from a packet of crisps.

Most people do not like the taste of softened water. It tastes of sodium
bicarbonate and carbonate. I don't mind it. It tastes like mineral water
to me.

BTW most blood pressure pills contain things that make you **** out
sodium big time,. This leads to the normal side effects of muscle cramps
which are associated with loss of too much sodium through sweating.

If your blood pressure is high, don't worry about sodium, see a doctor
and get a pill.

Excercise.

MBQ

Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:35 pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.
Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.
However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.

So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.

Just let me Google thatfor you:-

http://physrev.physiology.org/content/85/2/679.long

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

On Apr 8, 2:48*pm, John Williamson
wrote:
Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:35 pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.
Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.
However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.

So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.

Just let me Google thatfor you:-

http://physrev.physiology.org/content/85/2/679.long

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

Having only read as far as the abstract, I've already read "The
mechanisms by which dietary salt increases arterial pressure are not
fully understood" and "chronic exposure to a high-salt diet appears to
be". In other words, they don't really know for sure.

MBQ

Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 2:48 pm, John Williamson
wrote:
Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:35 pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...
[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.
Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.
However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.
So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.
Just let me Google thatfor you:-

http://physrev.physiology.org/content/85/2/679.long


Having only read as far as the abstract, I've already read "The
mechanisms by which dietary salt increases arterial pressure are not
fully understood" and "chronic exposure to a high-salt diet appears to
be". In other words, they don't really know for sure.

So toss a coin and take your chance.

The full article shows in some detail that a statistically valid
correlation between average levels of salt consumption above a gram a
day and an average increase in blood pressure has been found, especially
showing that chronically high salt consumption causes inceasing blood
pressure with age. Just because they don't know the precise reasons,
that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. The article, is, in turn, an
abstract of the research that went into producing it, which can be viewed.

The "Executive Summary" that you might give to top level management is
that increase in blood pressure with age, is, on average, proportionally
linked to salt consumption over a gram per day.

It's just the first link I found to one of a number of studies, all
showing similar results, with similar recommendations as to the
prevention of the problems. Scientific American, New Scientist, Nature
and a couple of French magazines I read have all printed articles with
similar findings in the past. Maybe they're *all* wrong, though I'd
doubt it.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:35 pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...

[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.
Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.
However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.

So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.


I suspect there is just such..certainly the Asian community who
traditionally eat a lot of salt due to their native climate, see
predisposed.

Whether its a causality, a correlation or a coincidence, is less clear.

And certainly drugs that lower salt content dramatically reduce blood
pressure.

MBQ

Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:39 pm, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
harry wrote:
On Apr 8, 11:10 am, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:
Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
harry wrote:
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.
Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least). Last year we
tried to find out as we will be installing a water softener, and a
filter jobby on the kitchen tap.
Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in hard
water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too much sodium
is bad for you. In people who are prone to it, excessive sodium in the
diet can increase blood pressure.
Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a hand-waving
argument unless someone does the sums. If I use thus-softened water to
make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily basis, how much extra sodium
is that giving me over and above what I'm getting anyway? If I know
that, I can make a judgement.
--
Tim
"That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed,
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" -- Bill of Rights 1689
It depends on the hardenss of your local water. The harder is/was
after treatment the more sodium there will be. So, no-one can tell you.
well one can set an upper limit.

we use 25kg of sodium chloride a month in a pretty hard water area

I'd say the majority of the water usage (no meter) is in bog flushind
and baths, with a small but in washing up, washing machines and the
like. I'd estimate 2000 liters a week maybe. So say 8000 liters per
month.I doubt whether all the sodium ends up in it, either.

But let's say it does.is about 3gm of sodium per liter, absolute worst case.

Now we drink maybe a half liter of water a day, pus maybe another half a
liter in terms of coffee and tea.

Say a litre. So that's an excess of about 3gm/day of sodium ions.Roughly.

According to the interwebby thing, that's half a teaspoon of salt.

Its also half the recommended daily dose of salt. Yes folks, a teaspoon
of salt a day is all you are supposed to eat.

"Only 2 per cent of 268 salads checked at shops, cafés and fast-food
chains had less than the 0.5g salt contained in a bag of Walkers crisps.
One in 10 had more salt than the 2.1g found in a McDonald's Big Mac."

So there you go.

HOWEVER it is the law that a non softened tap be provided, and since we
fill the kettles and glasses from that, we don't even get the 3g a day.

Or you can use bottled water..

HOWEVER again. recognise that my calculations are very much worst case.
Hard water is water with more than 100mg/liter of calcium ions. Not
3000mg/liter (3g/liter)

So its entirely possible my figures are out by a factor of ten, putting
sodium content of softened water at 300mg/liter,. making the daily dose
from coffee and tea less than that from a packet of crisps.

Most people do not like the taste of softened water. It tastes of sodium
bicarbonate and carbonate. I don't mind it. It tastes like mineral water
to me.

BTW most blood pressure pills contain things that make you **** out
sodium big time,. This leads to the normal side effects of muscle cramps
which are associated with loss of too much sodium through sweating.

If your blood pressure is high, don't worry about sodium, see a doctor
and get a pill.

Excercise.


Some of us do that already.

MBQ

On Apr 8, 3:29*pm, John Williamson
wrote:
Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 2:48 pm, John Williamson
wrote:
Man at B&Q wrote:
On Apr 8, 1:35 pm, "dennis@home" wrote:
"Man at B&Q" wrote in ...
[1] From which you can conclude that all this "detox regime" stuff is
just another scam, given that we have a whole organ, called the liver,
dedicated to the process.
Same as the excess salt BS. The body copes very well in maintaining
the correct balance and excreting the excess.
However just because it can excrete the excess doesn't mean it isn't doing
harm by having to excrete the excess.
The human body can excrete many poisons but they still do harm.
So refer me to a well designed, double blind, peer reviewed study that
shows incontrovertibly that excess salt causes high blood pressure.
Just let me Google thatfor you:-

http://physrev.physiology.org/content/85/2/679.long

Having only read as far as the abstract, I've already read "The
mechanisms by which dietary salt increases arterial pressure are not
fully understood" and "chronic exposure to a high-salt diet appears to
be". In other words, they don't really know for sure.

So toss a coin and take your chance.

The full article shows in some detail that a statistically valid
correlation between average levels of salt consumption above a gram a
day and an average increase in blood pressure has been found, especially
showing that chronically high salt consumption causes inceasing blood
pressure with age. Just because they don't know the precise reasons,
that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. The article, is, in turn, an
abstract of the research that went into producing it, which can be viewed..

The "Executive Summary" that you might give to top level management is
that increase in blood pressure with age, is, on average, proportionally
linked to salt consumption over a gram per day.

It's just the first link I found to one of a number of studies, all
showing similar results, with similar recommendations as to the
prevention of the problems. Scientific American, New Scientist, Nature
and a couple of French magazines I read have all printed articles with
similar findings in the past. Maybe they're *all* wrong, though I'd
doubt it.

I'm still not convonced. unfortunately I can't find the article that
first alerted me. It all goes back to some dodgy reesarch around the
time of WWII that involved a population on a very strange/poor diet.
There's certainly no concensus as far as I can tell.

I respect the writings of James Le Fanu who seems to agree with me. A
quote "the journal Science has described as "the most vitriolic and
surreal dispute in all of medicine". It's certainly one of the most
long-lasting, with a clutch of blood pressure experts writing to The
Lancet 20 years ago, complaining that the proponents of salt reduction
were engaged in "an evangelical crusade" "

Then theer's the Journal of the American Medical Association's 1998
meta-analysis of 114 clinical trials that did not support a general
recommendation to reduce salt intake.

I'm willing to concede that some people can be especially sensitive to
salt, but there's is no basis for the over zealous nanny state
preaching thatgoes on.

MBQ

On Fri, 08 Apr 2011 15:29:37 +0100, John Williamson wrote:

The full article shows in some detail that a statistically valid
correlation between average levels of salt consumption above a gram a
day and an average increase in blood pressure has been found, especially
showing that chronically high salt consumption causes inceasing blood
pressure with age.

Correlation =/= causation

Though if I were prone to high blood pressure I'd adopt the precautionary
principle. (Maybe it's connected with me not using a lot of salt that I'm
not prone to high BP?)

--
John Stumbles

This message has been rot13 encrypted twice for added security

John Stumbles wrote:
On Fri, 08 Apr 2011 15:29:37 +0100, John Williamson wrote:

The full article shows in some detail that a statistically valid
correlation between average levels of salt consumption above a gram a
day and an average increase in blood pressure has been found, especially
showing that chronically high salt consumption causes inceasing blood
pressure with age.

Correlation =/= causation

Though if I were prone to high blood pressure I'd adopt the precautionary
principle. (Maybe it's connected with me not using a lot of salt that I'm
not prone to high BP?)

Or you're not prone to it anyway. My BP is annoyingly normal (according
to my doctor's expession every time it's checked) in spite of a high
salt diet followed by a person who is rather larger than he ought to be.

My cholesterol's annoyingly normal, too, considering the amount of fat I
haven't removed from my diet.

My brother, on the other hand, would have lethally high BP if he didn't
take the tablets.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

John Stumbles wrote:
On Fri, 08 Apr 2011 15:29:37 +0100, John Williamson wrote:

The full article shows in some detail that a statistically valid
correlation between average levels of salt consumption above a gram a
day and an average increase in blood pressure has been found, especially
showing that chronically high salt consumption causes inceasing blood
pressure with age.

Correlation =/= causation

Though if I were prone to high blood pressure I'd adopt the precautionary
principle. (Maybe it's connected with me not using a lot of salt that I'm
not prone to high BP?)

Heck neither do I and mine was sky high.

'runs in the family' etc.

In message , Tim
Streater writes
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
John Williamson wrote:

Tim Streater wrote:
In article

,
harry wrote:
It's not considered a good idea to drink softened water.
Agreed but no one has ever explained why (to us, at least).

year we tried to find out as we will be installing a water
softener, and a filter jobby on the kitchen tap.

Because water softeners work by replacing the calcium salts in
hard water with equivalent sodium salts, and it is known that too
much sodium is bad for you. In people who are prone to it,
excessive sodium in the diet can increase blood pressure.
Well I know all that and it sounds good, but it's only a
hand-waving argument unless someone does the sums. If I use
thus-softened water to make my tea/coffee/soft drinks on a daily
basis, how much extra sodium is that giving me over and above what
I'm getting anyway? If I know that, I can make a judgement.

Too many variables, starting with the amount of calcium in the water
that's supplied to your house. The end of the chain is your personal
susceptibility to excess sodium.

Far too handwavy.

Tciao for Now!

"Ciao" doesn't have a "T" in it.

Abyssinia,


No - Venetian, actually

--
geoff