We had a 'no salt' water softerner that is, as described, an electrical unit. I measured the rust content before and after installation, and it most definitely reduce iron levels. We've since switched over to a NO Salt water softener; they are much larger and significantly more expensive, but work much better.

andrelaplume2, "I know Sears is junk. My Dad replaced his Sears unit twice in 15 years. Then again, he's out only $1000 over 15 years". The greatest falsehhood is that pre-built BOX store softeners are less expensive than the industry standard softeners. The Sears softeners around 40000 hardness capacity generally run a little under $500. For $466 you could have a Fleck 5600SE electronic on demand metered softener delivered to your home including shipping. You'd need to assemble it (takes less than 30 minutes) and install it. You can have a plumber assemble it and install it (you'd need a plumber to install the Sears softener also or DIY). A properly sized and setup Fleck based softener would be much more frugal with salt and cost less to operate over that 15 years than the Sears softener and that Fleck based softener would not have had to be replaced.

You would only need to change the hardness setting. At 30 gpg with 3 people in your home, assuming 60 gallons/person/day, you will have 5400 grains per day. The sweet spot between water efficiency and salt efficiency happens at 6 lb salt/cuft resin, regenerating about every 7 days. At that salt dosage, a 2 cuft softener has a capacity of 42,000. Now we take off 15% for a safety factor. We do this because we set up the softener to regen at a convenient time in the middle of the night and you want soft water right up until regen time. This places your regen every 6 - 8 days. At 12 gpg that same 2 cuft softener would regen every 16 days. Now, if you go with a 1.5 cuft softener, 12 gpg regens every 12 and 30 gpg regens every 5. While it is technically possible to size the softener smaller, you have a fairly large house with many bathrooms. When we try to choose the most appropriate softener size, we want to ensure that the softener is large enough to accommodate the use of several fixtures at once without negative impact on flow and without causing slugs of hard water during high-water-use times. For example: You don't want your shower to turn into a trickle if a toilet gets flushed in another bathroom. At the same time, we don't want to size the softener too large or you run the risk of channeling (where water runs through only a small portion of the softener rather than distributed across the resin bed). If it were my home, I would go with the 1.5 cuft softener if I only had to change the settings twice per year. If, however, hardness changes frequently and without notice, I would go with a 2.0 cuft softener and leave it set for 30 gpg.

I recieved an email back last night and here is what they said. I was able to get the Hardness and TDS results. I hope these addtional result will help you properly size the unit I need for my house. Thanks in advance. Look forward to your suggestions. Jim, The project was setup for the complete PWTA group of tests on the raw water and a test of the treated water (pH, Fe, Mn) was performed for free. This approach and this group of testing were established by some of NJÂs finest scientists at the NJDEP when the PWTA law was being formulated in 2001/2002. Additionally, this test group is the current state-of-the-art requirement for all South Jersey if you are selling a property with a well or have a new well put in. The testing is complex and certain tests are done with expensive laboratory instrumentation. The testing is done in a "certified" laboratory setting with substantial QA/QC checks to ensure accurate data. We have invested about $500,000 in our laboratory building and instrumentation, not top mention our technical staff, to perform this group of tests. Please understand you DID get your moneyÂs worth. Unfortunately, there are many tests that can be performed on water matrices in addition to the PWTA group and each test is a stand alone analytical method  we do not have a "magic box" in which we pour water that produces analytical results. I hope your understand this. We can always add additional testing on top of the PWTA group. We, unfortunately, need to charge extra for these tests. I did go back to your initial raw water sample and performed two (2) tests (no charge) that I think will help you: Hardness is 7 grains or 119 mg/L. (Hardness, often times is expressed in mg/L as CaCO3) TDS is 141 mg/L. I hope this helps. Take care, XXXX XXXXXXX Laboratory Director