Thursday, December 12, 2013

Response to question buildup in an in-floor heating closed loop system.


This question was sent as a response to my post "Acid Water and PEX Tubing":

 What about the buildup in an in-floor heating closed loop system? The contractor used black iron fittings to connect manifolds to loop piping. There is a significant amount of rust and there is no filter or inhibitor in the system. What, if any inhibitors do you recommend? on Acid Water and PEX Tubing

For in floor closed loop systems where the water will contact any ferrous material (i.e. boilers and black pipe fittings), the PEX tubing to be used needs to have an oxygen barrier.  Regular PEX tubing for potable water does not need nor have an oxygen barrier.  The oxygen barrier prevents air from permeating the tubing (which it can do) because air will cause the iron and steel components to deteriorate into rust.

There are a few ways that PEX producers create an oxygen barrier.  Two that I know of include what is called PEX-AL-PEX tubing which is a layer of aluminum sandwiched by two layers of PEX.  The other type is Wirbo brand HePEX which has a compound that coats the inside to prevent oxygen diffusion.

If your plumber used HePEX, then you can somewhat see through it.  Whenever fresh water is started off in a closed loop system, it is still full of enough oxygen to cause some corrosion for about 72 hours, before what some of us in the water industry say the water becomes dead.  The HePEX will change from clear to a dark orange or even black.  That is possibly what you are seeing.

Whatever type of PEX your plumber used, it will be labeled, and you can check the labeled name on the internet to ensure that it is actually an oxygen barrier type tubing.  If it is not oxygen barrier tubing, then there are some issues that will need to be addressed.  email me at ctcleanwater@gmail.com for further questions.  I will need your phone number or email address to be able to consult with you.

*And I need  to add this note; inhibitors will not do the job if the wrong tubing was used.

 

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Unmanageable Hair - Why does hard water cause this?

Dear Clean Water Man:

I moved from the city to the suburbs where I have my own well.  The water is very hard and my hair has become absolutely horrible.  Why does hard water make hair so unmanageable?  It is like straw!

Scarecrow Hair Lady, New Milford, CT

Dear  Scarecrow Hair Lady:

Hard water has dissolved minerals in it.  The most common minerals causing hard water are calcium and magnesium.  When the water industry says "hard water", what we are really saying is water with dissolved ROCK in it.

The dissolved rock gets on your hair and coats it.  As the dampness dries from your hair, it actually leaves the dissolved rock behind.  It is no longer dissolved because the solvent (water) has evaporated and left the rock behind.  If you can imagine that each of your hairs will now be coated with rock, you can understand why it gets so hard and unmanageable.

This is why soft water can be such a life style improvement for your home since it removes this dissolved rock so that it can't coat your hair.

www.cleanwaterman.com

Friday, February 8, 2013

The Best Way To Fill A Well

As we get our blizzard today (Nemo or Charlotte, there seems to be a disagreement), it is good to realize that for those in areas where snow occurs, snow is great for wells.  We are going to benefit for the rest of this year from what is happening today.  Snow is the best way to fill aquifers and therefore, wells.

When snow melts, it usually does so very slowly.  The slow dripping of the water enters and soaks below the soil more effectively than heavy rain, which runs off to streams and rivers instead of soaking in.  The years where New England states have the worst droughts are years where there is little snow in winter followed by little rain in summer.

So, what you see on the ground today will still be in your well or in your town's reservoirs for many months to come.

Sunday, January 13, 2013

What Happened To American Business?

What has happened to American business in the last hundred years?  There was a time when an American would work for Mr. Automobile Maker, and after a few years, said American decided he didn't like Mr. Auto Maker or didn't enjoy working for  Mr. Auto Maker or thought the cars that  Mr. Auto Maker built were crap, so what would said American do?  He would tell  Mr. Auto Maker to go bleep off and then go and start his own automobile manufacturing company.  He would try his hand at building cars and see if his ideas would pan out.  Nothing was guaranteed, but with hard work, there would be a possibility of making it big.

The fact that this doesn't happen anymore is not unique to automakers, but let me ask another question about the auto industry.  It seems to be a bad place to put your money as an investor although so many people need to buy a car.  I don't believe that the unions or management are totally to blame for this problem.  So what is the problem?  The biggest factor here is that companies who really stink at the automobile business are propped up by grants and loans and kept in business.  I am sorry, but if you can't make a profit, it is either an unprofitable industry you are in or you just are incapable of running a business, so sell out or close down.  The need for cars won't go away, and when you close down, other little companies will pop up around the country to build cars.  Yes, there are foreign automakers, but there will always be a demand for American automobiles and new companies will form.  Innovations will be made and automobiles will be improved much more quickly than if a company who can't stay in business without propping stays in business.

So, there are not as many brave innovative industrialists as there once were, but here is another problem.  A hundred years ago, when an American owned ABC light bulb company, what ABC light bulb company did was make light bulbs and engineer ways to make them better and less expensive.  The founder of ABC light bulb company started in his basement or garage and knew all the aspects of his business, and when he went to the factory his fledgling company moved into after several years, he knew if he kept at making better and better light bulbs, it would be the ticket to prosperity, not only for himself, but for his employees and suppliers too.

Now, American companies are run by graduates of ------- School Of Business where it appears they are taught that the goal of business is NOT to build a better cheaper whatever they are making, but to push paper around and downsize and send American jobs overseas so that said ------- School Of Business graduates can make obscene bonuses and stock options off of the companies they are destroying from within like parasites.  These CEOs are nothing similar to industrialists of old who could do any job along the assembly line on through the sales path to the final destination of the product, they are paper pushers making up BS to make it look like the companies they run are getting healthier and healthier so that people will buy more stock in the companies and make stock prices go up.  So the real goal today is a high stock price and not a better, stronger, faster, less expensive American made product.

So what does this have to do with the water business?  There is a gigantic name in my industry.  This company actually built the water treatment industry even more so than Henry Ford built the automobile industry.  You all know the name, but I will not mention it here.  This company has been sold so many times in the last twenty years that it is hard to count.  Fifty years ago, no one could compete with this company if they decided to open a branch in the same area.  But they have been bought, pillaged, and sold, bought, pillaged, and sold until they are only a shell of what they once were.  I service well built products that they made thirty years ago that are still working, but the new stuff they make doesn't hold up as well.  It is sad to see this happen to a once admirable company.  The water industry is not an easy industry, but it can be very rewarding financially and satisfying for the ego because you are helping people.  So on the outside looking in it makes no sense that the company is faltering until you realize that the capital has been sucked out of the company and downsizing and overseas outsourcing have decimated the ability to bounce back.

So I propose a new era here in America.  A new industrialist era.  A closing of the capitalist era and a return to the time when Americans would put as much effort as their employees toward producing a great product or service.  There are pockets of companies here and there that are industry driven and not Wall Street driven, and this attitude needs to increase while the paper pushers need to lose their jobs.  It is time for brave Americans to stand up and own their companies and decide to never sell out to Vampire Capitalists ever again.  ------- School Of Business graduates have destroyed our government and destroyed our businesses, but we can revolt in this way; we can start our own businesses and work our tails off to close down the Vampire Capitalists and their undeserved easy money machine.  Who is with me?

Angie's List Super Service Award 2012, Water Softeners.

I am pretty proud of this and want to share it.  My company received the 2012 Angie's List Super Service Award for Water Softeners, for achieving and maintaining a superior service rating throughout 2012.  Less than five percent of companies on Angie's List receive this award.



www.cleanwaterman.com 

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Softener, Not A Softener. Misleading Advertising In Water Treatment. Salt free water softeners.

Let us begin with a definition of what a water softener is:

  • A water softener is a type of water filter designed to REMOVE certain minerals from hard water.
  • Household water softeners use a salt type of regenerant, either sodium chloride or potassium chloride, as a way to recharge the ion exchange process of removing  hard minerals.
The dissolved minerals we associate with causing water hardness are calcium and magnesium.  Secondary minerals that a water softener will remove are dissolved iron and manganese, while tertiary dissolved minerals include radium and barium.  If these minerals are not being removed by your water treatment, then your water treatment is not a water softener.

There are many companies, especially on the internet, selling "Salt Free Water Softeners".  These companies are lying.  Without some type of salt, these filters are incapable of softening.  You should not buy these devices from companies that are lying to you.  There are, however, many companies that market their products under the name of "Salt Free Water Conditioners".  This name is more accurate and less deceiving because conditioning is a more broad term.

A water softener is one type of water conditioner.  Water softening resin is a type of media used for ion exchange.  In the category of products that are supposed to help customers deal with hard water without using a salt regenerant are filters that use another type of media, one that causes Template Induced Crystallization.  The idea here is that calcium crystals temporarily attach to the resin bead and allow more crystals to attach to create a larger, less dissolved calcium or magnesium crystal that are less likely to stick to surfaces.  The manufacturers I have spoken to about these products say that the technology can be as much as 60% as effective as a water softener.  I have had some success using these products, but I never market them as softeners, and since I am a local dealer, I offer them only to people who agree that if it doesn't work, it will be traded out for a water softener at no additional cost, and this is the only way I would recommend you ever purchase these products.  This pretty much takes internet marketing companies out of the picture because how are they going to come to your home and remove the Template Induced Crystallization system and replace it with a softener at no additional cost? .  Also, my sales of these units has been very limited due to the fact that iron destroys them and my territory has a very pervasive iron problem.

The next products being marketed as salt free water softeners usually fall into some type of magnetic or electromagnetic  treatment system.  All I can say here is that these are not even plumbed into the water system and usually consist of magnets bolted around the pipe or wires wrapped around the pipe.  There have been some studies supporting efficacy of these units in closed loop water cooling towers, but what I have seen after twenty years in water treatment causes me to suggest that if you truly want to try this route, make sure you have a 100 percent money back guarantee  from a reputable company.  Of course, again, no reputable company will be marketing these as softeners.  They will only use the term conditioner.  I do not sell these systems.

So to recap, non salt water conditioners may work for you, and if you want to try them, make sure you get some type of guarantee that won't leave you stuck with something that doesn't work.

www.cleanwaterman.com