Water treatment cannot be termed as a substitute for well-constructed and designed water supply. Treatment of properly designed and constructed water supply serves a greater purpose as all people from the society get filtered water. However, water filter used in homes only serve their services to the single family. There is no individual water technique that purifies the water fully. It depend on the level of contamination of water. Water softeners and water filters serve different purposes in cleansing of water. Water softeners remove the unwanted minerals from the water whereas water filter remove the dirt and bacteria present in the water. However, both water filter and water softener treat water in their own ways. The use of whole house water softener ensures supply of filtered water in the entire house.

Difference between softeners and filter

Water filter and water softener both comes under the wings of water treatment devices. However, these water purification systems differ in various aspects of cleansing of water. The purpose of water filter is to provide clean water that is free of any kind of contaminants. However, the purpose of water softeners is to remove the hardening minerals from the water. Water filter traps the dirt and bacterial contaminants in the cartridge or it directly eliminates them from water. Whereas, water softener removes the unwanted minerals like calcium and magnesium from the water.

Different types of water hardness

• Temporary hardness: Temporary hardness is one which can be removed using certain tricks like boiling of water or adding of lime. These hardness are removable hardness thus, it does not cause any major damage. Temporary hardness is caused because of the combination of calcium and bicarbonate. Boiling of water helps to promote formation of carbonate. The carbonates precipitates the calcium carbonate from the water. This process brings down the level of hardness of water.
• Permanent hardness: Permanent hardness is one which cannot be removed. This type of hardness causes serious damages to water appliances and other equipment. Calcium and magnesium minerals are the root cause of this type of hardness. These minerals become more soluble as soon as the temperature rises. Permanent hardness can be reduced with the support of hard water filter. Hard water filter reduces the deposits and makes cleaning of water easier.

Troubles caused because of hard water

• Hard water is the root cause for the formation of scaling. Scaling is the precipitation of minerals that forms a rock solid deposit which can be removed easily.
• Scaling in pipes can cause blockage of pipe which eventually reduces the life of the pipes and faucets.
• Hard water can also form a coating in the utensils like tea or coffee pot. Clogging can damage the water heaters and render them useless.
• Hard water requires more amount of soaps and detergents for cleaning of clothes as the efficiency of soaps and detergent gets reduced when it comes in contact with the hard water.
• It also causes formation of unsightly spots on the bathtubs, sinks, silverware, etc.