Acid Water and PEX Tubing

Dear Clean Water Man:

As a follow up to a previous answer you gave to another writer, I was wondering about the need for neutral water in homes plumbed in PEX. Isn't PEX impervious to acidic water? My water is acidic and I don't want to pay to have it fixed since my home is plumbed in PEX.

Frugal, New Milford, CTDear Frugal:

Yes, PEX is impervious to acidic water. No, that does not mean you won't need to address acidic water.

While the majority of your plumbing is PEX, your water heater, fixtures, and appliances are still being attacked by acidity. There is an investment in those items far more significant than what a neutralizer will cost you. Even "Glass Lined" water heaters have some metallic areas that will contact the acidic water and be eaten away.

It is time to be truly frugal and fix the acidity before it damages your expensive fixtures and appliances.

Water problem in Connecticut? Call Ted Mullen, The Clean Water Man, at 203-417-9601.

See my website at www.cleanwaterman.com

Green Hair! What's the matter with my water?

Dear Clean Water Man:

I color my hair blond and it keeps turning green. My hair stylist says that there is something wrong with the water in my home . I am tired of going in to get special treatments to remove the green from my hair and I am wondering, what's the matter with my water?

Lady Liberty, Ridgefield, CT

Dear Lady Liberty:

It is interesting that you would sign yourself Lady Liberty, because your hair is covered with the same thing that gives the Statue of Liberty her green/blue hue, and that thing is oxidized copper. Now, the Statue of Liberty is clad with copper, but in its natural state, your hair is not. The copper in your hair is coming from the plumbing in your home and there are four major causes for the copper plumbing to deposit itself in your hair. Colored hair is the most susceptible due to the fact that it is pre-treated in order to accept color in the first place.

Three of the four causes are what can be termed aggressiveness in the water. The first type of aggressiveness is acidity. When we think of acidity, we think of vinegar or orange juice. Your water, if acidic, is nowhere near as acidic as vinegar or orange juice, but the inside of your copper pipe is exposed to an almost relentless flow of slightly acidic water. The acidity dissolves the copper pipe from the inside and the dissolved copper is carried until it deposits itself in your hair and now that it is exposed to air, it oxidizes and turns blue/green.

The next type of aggressiveness is oxidation, and it is usually caused by chlorinated community water. The chlorine or chloramine will oxidize the inside of the copper pipes and the oxidized molecules peel off and are carried with the water until it deposits in your hair where it is already blue/green even before it is exposed to air.

The next major cause is natural copper in your well. It will deposit in your hair and turn it blue/green.

The last major cause is improper grounding involving the plumbing. Most plumbing systems are grounded by the electrician who does the original electrical work in the home. Sometimes, a grounding clamp is removed for repairs and not replaced, or a phone, cable, electric fence, or other electric device is connected to the plumbing for a ground. Other times, there is a galvanic reaction between many different metals installed in the plumbing and they act in unison as a very low voltage battery. The stray current caused by these issues will suspend copper molecules which will eventually find their way to your hair, oxidize, and turn your hair blue/green.

An experienced water treatment technician can test your water and determine the cause for the greening. Since many women may not be able to convince their husbands to fix this since it is "only hair", husbands have to know that the green hair portends something much worse on its way, that is thinned out plumbing and broken pipes with flooding. Think of your hair as an alarm, telling you to get your water fixed before major damage is done.

 See my website at www.cleanwaterman.com or if you live in Connecticut call me at 203-417-9601 to set up your free water treatment consultation.

The year is 2009, not 1959! Don't put chemicals into your clients' water!!

Clean Water Man, Inc. 203-417-9601. Serving Connecticut.

I can't believe what my competitors are attempting to sell to clients. One of my new installations this week was for a customer who had several salespeople visit. Two salespeople proposed chemical injection systems that utilized highly caustic and dangerous chemicals. These chemicals were supposed to raise the pH of acidic water. While these systems will raise the pH of acidic water, they are almost always designed and installed improperly.

What should be used is a calcite neutralizer that uses natural crushed marble. The reasons many water treatment companies have given up on natural calcite neutralizers are:

• The company gets to sell expensive chemicals to the customer several times a year
• The company gets called for many lucrative service calls due to the finicky nature of chemical injection
• The company has had bad luck with natural methods since they have not learned about them
• The company uses cheap, low grade calcite and filters, and thinks substandard materials are representative of the natural technology, so they give up and move to chemical injection

I have seen the results of chemical injection gone awry, the worst being horrible skin burns caused by a major malfunction. It is heartbreaking to see a pretty woman get chemical burns all over her face and body from bathing after a poorly designed and maintained chemical system malfunctioned. I beg my fellow water treatment salespeople to give up on chemical injection and embrace natural and safe methods.

If you have one of these systems in your home, consider changing it out as soon as possible.

See my website at www.cleanwaterman.com

In Connecticut? Call Ted Mullen, The Clean Water Man, at 203-417-9601.

The Water Nerd

You can contact Ted about water issues in your home or business at water2000@sbcglobal.net
Clean Water Man, Inc. 203-417-9601

I have figured out how to be successful in life, and it is so simple that it should be taught in school. It is not enough to be excited about a field of endeavor. It is not enough to be educated and trained in a profession. What you need to truly succeed is to be willing to become a NERD in your chosen career. Be a proud nerd, be a passionate nerd, be a successful nerd!

I will tell you that I am THE water treatment nerd. Water treatment is what I think about all day. If you invite me to your house, I will talk to you about water quality and improving it until my throat is sore and your eyes glaze over. I am proud of my ability to help my clients in such an important matter.

If you want to be in MY profession, please be a water nerd like me. Water has so many variations that if you are not figuratively immersed in it, although you may be a great salesman or wrench turner, you are going to do great damage to my field of work. You will do fine with the average water problem but when that strange issue pops up, you are going sell and install entirely inappropriate equipment, and it not only makes you look bad, it makes it so much harder for me to sell the correct equipment to the customer and clean up YOUR mess.

These are things you should be thinking about when you are selling water equipment:
What is the customer's concern?
What does the water test say?
What is the size of the pipe?
What is the simplest, most environmentally friendly way to treat this problem?
Is there enough water flow and pressure to properly backwash the equipment I am recommending?
How can I make this a reasonable price for my potential customer?
Is there anything that this customer can truly benefit from buying from me?
Is there enough space to install the equipment so that it can actually be serviced?
Is my proposal actually going to improve the situation?
I would tell you the thousands of other things if I was training you.

These are things you should NOT be thinking about when you are selling water equipment:
Your boat.
Golf.
Softball.
Your Car.
Your next glass of scotch.
Your next 2 week vacation.
How much money you NEED to make on this job.
What extras you can add to pad the bill.

If you are in the water treatment field and you dwell most on the latter list, there may be hope for you. It is most likely the fault of the company you work for. You may email me with any questions you have as long as you are genuinely interested in becoming a water nerd

See my website at www.cleanwaterman.com

First Fluoride, Now This? Read this UPI article.

"Lithium in drinking water lowers suicide rate: study
Monday, May 04, 2009

LONDON, May 1 (UPI) -- Japanese researchers say low levels of lithium found naturally in some water systems may help prevent suicides.
A study at Oita University in Japan, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, found natural lithium levels ranging from 0.7 micrograms to 59 micrograms per liter in 18 communities in southern Japan, The (London) Daily Telegraph reported Friday.
Researchers found the suicide rate was significantly lower in communities whose water contained larger amounts of lithium.
High doses of the naturally occurring metal are used to treat bipolar and mood disorders.
The findings have led some researchers to call for further study to consider the public health benefits of adding lithium to drinking water supplies, the newspaper said."

This scares me. I spend a good part of each working day to help people remove contaminants from their water, and now I need to worry about another one the government may intentionally add. Currently, lithium is not listed on the EPA's primary and secondary contaminant list, and there have not been many tests on how to remove it from water. If our local water authorities decide to add this and other pharmaceuticals to our water, we need to protest.


See my website at www.cleanwaterman.com