We live a a hard water area and which means watermarks on everything and monthly de-scaling of taps etc. A Scalemaster Softline 100 water softener has been suggested but I don’t know anything about them – reliability, running costs etc?

cheers

Water softners should only be used for appliances, such as heating boilers and washing machines. Drinking and general water should bypass them as it makes the water taste foul.

My advice is don’t get ripped off by companies charging vastly inflated rates to fit them, I’ve seen quotes over £1,400. You can buy one from Wickes to fit yourself for £400 and the salt tabs aren’t too expensive to run it.

I have one and I am very pleased with it.

had a quick google of the one you are looking at, don’t see anything wrong with it. It doesn’t appear to need special salt blocks so should be easy to get salt at a good price.

We have a softener on water for the whole house and it doesn’t make it taste foul. However it does of course add more salt than normal to the water so you have to take care with very young children if your water was very hard. Theoretically a service is 150eur a year but we only do it every 2

We had one and loved it. The appliances (Washing machine etc) looked like brand new even after many years of use. As above we had a separate feed by-passing the softenor for drinking water. The softenor was mounted under the sink. We bought large bags of salt pellets from a wholesaler

Water softners should only be used for appliances, such as heating boilers and washing machines. Drinking and general water should bypass them as it makes the water taste foul.

if you say so…

He have one. All our water comes from chalk aquifers (Chilterns) so is very hard. It makes cleaning bath, sinks etc easy – no more limescale remover. Simple thing about taste – we have a drinking water tap straight from the mains.

Thanks all
That’s decided definitely getting one

Cost of salt seems to work out at about £1 per person per month. I easily save that on less soap, washing powder etc, not to mention less time cleaning the bath etc.

For the record I have a kinetico 2020c, cost a fortune, and has been pants. Certainly wouldn’t buy another. Depending on your usage patterns, I’d either go for the cheapest you can find(1), or the cheapest one that has some intelligence/proportional brining(2) (sp?).

(1) if you have consistent usage patterns.
(2) if you have variable consumption patterns.

kinetico 2020c what was the issue? Just about to place an order on one

Basically never worked as advertised. Didn’t switch between tanks consistently, which ends up meaning hard water. It had 7yr parts, but every visit to ‘fix’ cost £65!! Gave up, and just force a regeneration when it goes hard. As I live on my own, it’s only about once a week. Now one cylinder doesn’t give soft water, so have to regen it twice!

Had it about 10yrs now, been meaning to replace it for about 5.

For balance a friend has two of them and has no trouble.