I am confused..Hard water

[SPP]

Hi Guys,

I was trying to learn of soft & hard water or Calcium Hardness of pool water against a water test report of a well water that mentioned Total Hardness CaCO3.

I am a tripple dummy when it comes to chemistry....

Calcium hardness is the measure of calcium and magnesium salts dissolved in the water, said one website.
Pool School stated CH is a measure of the amount of calcium in your water
So my test kit TF-100 CH reading, is it reading calcium only ?
So is really CH and Total Hardness CaCO3 the same actually ?

Water for home use should be soft, so I was told, because it will prevent scaling and so on.

The data I got is this :
Soft 0 - 17 ppm
Slightly hard 17.1 - 60 ppm
Moderately hard 60 - 120 ppm
Hard 120 - 180 ppm
Very Hard 180 ppm & over

Pool school reccomended that for plaster pool CH should be 250-350 ppm.
One pool care product website stated for tiled pool 200-275ppm is reccomended.

I have surfed TFP on why CH must be set as such for pool, I mean my tiled pool.

So technically my pool water falls under "hard to very hard" category, its now at 180 ppm.
For a tiled pool, I am quite close to the reccomended range.

However most drinking quality related website said that at this hardness level, it is said that water heater will have problems with mineral clogging. I don't have a water heater but my friend does and his pool is tiled like mine. 99% of pool in my country is tiled BTW.

Now for the second confusion on my head. People are saying that soft water feels good, so how does one get "soft feeling" water if even fiberglass pool is reccomended to have CH of 220-320. The lowest one will be vinyl pool at 50 - 300. Does this mean that people with vinyl pool can have more comfortable water because by pool material it can use a softer water at say CH 50 ?

This is confusing for a chemistry dummy like myself

 

[Guest]

Total hardness is a measure of calcium and magnesium hardness. Calcium hardness is a measure of only calcium hardness. The test kits for total hardness only have two reagents while the test for calcium hardness have three reagents.
These instructions from the Taylor calcium hardness/magnesium hardness test kit illustrates this:
http://www.taylortechnologies.com/produ ... umber=5095

As far as making the water 'feel softer', adding salt to about 200 ppm and adding borates to 50 ppm should make the water feel more 'comfortable' since it brings it closer to the bodies isoelectric point.

 

[SPP]

Thank You Obi-Wan....

I did not know that my TF test kit is Taylor's twin brother. Much appreciated for the link.

I will have to check what borate is and if it is available in my country from industrial source.
I will run a test on a 25 gallon water first...

I will Google borate. :idea:

 

[Guest]

Thank You Obi-Wan....

I did not know that my TF test kit is Taylor's twin brother. Much appreciated for the link.

I will have to check what borate is and if it is available in my country from industrial source.
I will run a test on a 25 gallon water first...

I will Google borate. :idea:

borates for pools are under these brands: Protean Supreme, Bioguard Optimizer, PoolLife Endure, Guardex Maximizer. The grocery store version is 20 mule team borax. The chemical name is sodium tetraborate pentahydrate for the pool products and sodium tetreaborate decahydratte for the 20 mule team. They are identical except for dosing because the pentahydrate has 5 water molecules attached and the decahydrate has 10 water molecules.

This thead should be helpful:
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=4921

 

[SPP]

WOW...for my 135,000 liters ( 35,000 gallons ) pool....
For 200ppm salt, I must add 27kg ( 59 lbs ) of salt
For 50 ppm Borax I need 59kg or 130 lbs
Acid compensation at 29 liters or 7.7 gallons...

that is a lot.... Must make sure I get the test kit first if I ever want to try this

Thanks WB.