Clever Homemaking

Do you know the hardness of your tap water? It actually pays to know whether you have hard or soft water. One major benefit to soft water is it will save you on your laundry expenses. Soft water requires much less detergent and lower pretreatment amounts.

Research Your Water Hardness

There are two main ways to learn the hardness of your water.

• The first is to purchase an inexpensive water test kit. These are easiest to find in a store that sells aquarium or pond supplies. In my opinion, the easiest test kit you can buy is a set of pond test strips you simply dip into the water, wait a few seconds, and read the results.
• The second source of water information is from your city. Your city is required to perform annual water testing, but according to USA Today, “cities rarely release water test results”. I am very fortunate to live in a city that mails every household a copy of their annual water report. It doesn’t hurt to ask your city before purchasing your own kit. You may be able to obtain the results for free.

Interpreting Your Water Hardness Level

Water test kits are easy to read, and often the results are shown in terms of “soft” or “hard”. Water hardness from your city, however, is reported in terms of parts per million (ppm).

Soft water has a degree of hardness less than 50 ppm. Anything higher becomes hard water. Hardness above 200 pm is very hard water.

What if I have soft water?

Soft water requires less soap, shampoo, and detergent. This means you will need less than the recommended amounts. According to softwater.com, you only need to use 1/2 the recommended amount. This knowledge can cut your cleaning supply budget in half!

What if I have hard water?

Hard water can actually damage your laundry causing your clothes to turn grey or yellow and become stiff. To help alleviate the affects of hard water, you can add water conditioner to your laundry water.