Water Softeners – What do I need to get?

Paul_D_Minkey

Hi,


I’m looking toget a Water Softener and need some advice.

So far I’vespoken to a number of companies and I’m just getting a hard sell. Really off putting.They all want to tell me how bad each others systems are and that they’rereally unreliable.

I have a 4bedroom house. With 2 occupants and 2 Bathrooms. I’m getting quotes anywhere between £600-£1600.It seems so extreme. Do I really need to spend that much cash? PLEASE HELP

If anybody hasany good or bad experiences with any companies please let me know.

Thanks,
Paul

Pincher

I have this


http://www.pozzani.co.uk/water-treatment-200/index.html


and the Black Box electronic de-scaler. Just bought the stuff and got my plumber to fit them. What hard sale?


They do water softener too, but I'm happy with what I have. I live in London, where the water is pretty hard.

matelodave

Have you got a water meter, if so you should have a good idea of how much water you use. You can then look at softeners to gauge what sort of through-put you'll need. Get one that's too small and it won't cope and could cost you a lot in salt and in regeneration flushing. Too big and it will just cost you up front.
We've got a TapWorks AD11 which gets through about 50kg of salt a year and we use about 65cum of water a year. I'm sure it could cope with significantly more but as there are only two of us it's plenty big enough.


Regarding costs I have no idea. Are you installing it yourself or getting a plumber or softener company to do it. The cheapest will be if you buy it yourself and install it yourself or get a plumber to install it. Probably the most expensive will be a man in a shiny van from a water softener company.
Ours was installed by the plumber when we re-plumbed our bungalow four years ago

Captain_Cuttle

I have just moved house and want to install a Tapworks AD11 water softener. I asked my regular plumber to quote for supply and fitting. I asked him because he had never given me any cause for complaint (quite the contrary!). He quoted me £983 to supply and fit. I had already checked the price of the unit - readily available for about £440 - and so I asked him to itemise his estimate. He wanted £570 to supply the unit and the remainder for his labour. When I queried the unit price he said that he would have to pay "about £120" for a "high-flow unit", which was an extra. I checked with a local plumbers' merchant, who assured me that the units were supplied with these as standard. They were definitely not an extra. I then found an installation guide on YouTube - and that did not describe a procedure that looked as if it would justify a labour bill of more than £400. I will buy the unit myself and then find a plumber to fit it. I can't see it taking so long - or requiring so many additional bits and pieces - that fitting could reasonably cost £400+. Could it???

Chickereeeee

That depends - mainly on where the water supply comes into the house, where the softener is to be installed, where the un-softened tap is, and how difficult the pipe run is.

In my case, the water supply comes into the house in the downstairs lavatory, and the kitchen (where the softener and un-softened tap is) is at the other end of the hallway. So the pipework had to be installed to allow a flow from lavatory > kitchen (T-off for tap, pressure reducer, plumb in water softener) and then back from kitchen > lavatory to carry the softened water back into the system.

I selected a Wrekin ECO15. Seems pretty good.