Hard water is the most common problem found in the average home. Hard water is water that contains dissolved hardness minerals above 1 GPG*. The most common minerals causing hardness are calcium, manganese and magnesium.

For many uses, hard water won't affect you. For instance, to water your grass, to put out fires, float your sailboat, or wash the dirt from the sidewalks, water would have to be pretty hard to cause a problem.

But for having a shower or bath, washing dishes and clothes, shaving, washing your car, making coffee and many other uses of water, hard water is not as efficient or convenient as soft water. For instance:

• You use only 1/2 as much soap cleaning with soft water.
• Because hard water and soap combine to form "soap scum" that can't be easily rinsed off, they form a hard deposit on all surfaces when they dry, leaving a “bathtub ring” on ceramics appliances and dishes, as well as a whitish deposit on stainless steel and chrome surfaces.
• This soap scum can remain on your skin even after rinsing, clogging the pores of your skin and coating every hair on your body. This crud can serve as a home for bacteria, causing diaper rash, minor skin irritation and skin that continually itches.
• When hard water is heated, the hardness minerals are re-crystallized to form hardness scale. This scale can plug your pipes and hot water heater, causing premature failure, and costly replacement.
  

Although some companies sell distillers for treating drinking water, here at Arrowsmith Water Management, we disagree with that. The human body needs the trace minerals that are contained in healthy drinking water, and our filters are designed to remove only to the degree that the Canadian Drinking Water Guidelines recommend for aesthetic and health reasons.

Water treated with Reverse Osmosis systems differs from distilled water in that it leaves in some trace minerals that are important to our bodies, such as magnesium. Drinking purely distilled water can be dangerous to your health as it leaches minerals from your body as it passes through. Vegetables boiled in distilled water lose greater amounts of minerals than those boiled in undistilled water.  When distilled water passes through your pipes, it leaches out minerals from the metal, weakening it.

In simple terms, reverse osmosis is the process by which water molecules are forced through a semi-permeable membrane under pressure. Reverse osmosis systems provide filtered water everywhere, from homes and commercial applications like restaurants and hotels, to breweries and car washes, and even the space shuttle!

Household RO systems typically filter water using the following steps:

1. Raw tap water first flows through a sediment filter to remove dirt, rust and other solid objects.
2. The water then flows into a carbon filter that takes out 98% of the chlorine and organic chemicals.
3. The next stage is the reverse osmosis membrane which separates 70-99% of the dissolved contaminants from the water molecules. These removed impurities are rinsed down the drain producing the final product, “pure water”.
4. This water is stored in a reservoir tank typically located underneath the kitchen sink and is accessed with a separate faucet.
5. When you open the valve the water is filtered one last time with a carbon block “polishing filter” right before it reaches your glass.

Using a quality RO membrane as a strainer is typically much better than a faucet mounted filter alone. Under magnification the pores of a RO membrane are undetectable, while the pores of a pleated filter are easily seen. Reverse osmosis treatment generally removes a more diverse list of contaminants than other systems. RO can remove nitrates, sodium, and other dissolved inorganic and organic compounds.