Water Softener Bypass with highly alkaline water?

[Gadjobrinus]

Not sure where to put it, but as I'm looking at retaining my "original" water content, I'm hoping this is a quick one. Only time I've been around a water softener was when I was a kid growing up - my job to refill the salt.

We recently moved. I'd had the city's hard water (around 300 ppm Alk as CaCO3) dialed in well with the use of strong HCl. The new place has a water softener. I'd prefer to keep working with city supply. Naive question, I know, but there's a button on the softener, a bypass. I presume that allows the city supply into the house plumbing, while the button is activated? If so, any suggestions on how long to let the tap run to bring in the hard water and bleed off the soft water?

Thanks.

 

[mongoose33]

Two minutes, perhaps. Depends on the flow, of course. Go 5 minutes to be sure.

When we built our house, we had one line off the incoming water line that leads to the cold water side of the kitchen sink, so we had non-softened water. That's where I get my non-softened water.

 

[Gadjobrinus]

Two minutes, perhaps. Depends on the flow, of course. Go 5 minutes to be sure.

When we built our house, we had one line off the incoming water line that leads to the cold water side of the kitchen sink, so we had non-softened water. That's where I get my non-softened water.

OK great, thanks Mongoose. Pretty bummed when I first saw sparkling glasses in our DW, lol.

Much appreciated!

 

[ajdelange]

300 ppm alkalinity = 6 mEq/L. Neutralizing that with HCl is going to put about 6 mEq/L Cl- ions into the water. That's 210 mg/L chloride plus whatever is already in the water. You are OK with that?

 

[Gadjobrinus]

300 ppm alkalinity = 6 mEq/L. Neutralizing that with HCl is going to put about 6 mEq/L Cl- ions into the water. That's 210 mg/L chloride plus whatever is already in the water. You are OK with that?

Hey AJ. Very low source water Cl (12 ppm), and as I do like traditional British ales to an extraordinary degree, I'm going with Murphy for now. I've not brewed since moving, but the stuff was guzzled down by a lot of neighbors who helped me get going, so yep, that counts for a lot with me. I've always brewed with hard water, but then I've brewed almost 95% ales, likely. When I've gone to German lagers, pilsners and such (20+ years ago, on a farm with extremely mineralized water), I did build from DI.

Trust me, your water primer is not lost on me, and we'll see. Many thanks.