Chlorine creates tastes and odors when there is only a small amount present and it is "dying off" since it only active for a short period of time. Water with good dose of Cl2 doesn't have taste/odor issues. Removing the Cl2 from the water will take away the ability of the water to withstand contamination from germs. If you are only having issues with strong odors it could be caused by chlorine dioxide. ClO2 is used by a lot of surface water systems as it is a very strong oxidizer and disinfectant. It does react with fumes from cleaning products, paint, wallpaper, carpet, vinyl shower curtains, hairspray, glues, etc,. We get a lot of calls about it especially when folks are remodeling bathrooms and kitchens.

Without knowing more, I can pretty much assure you there are filters and other devices to do to your water whatever is needed. I can also assure you that you can pay a LOT of money for devices to do things that you don't need done. You can also pay LOT of money for devices that do NOT do what you need done. I would certainly recommend a water test before before going further. Really not that big a deal. However, if you want a quick indication without specific knowledge, some people get one of those pure-water pitchers that let the water trickle through an activated charcoal stack. Then they compare the taste of that water with their tap water. Sometimes they live with it for a week or two to be certain of their opinions or those of their friends. If you choose to do that and that taste is OK with you, your taste problem can be solved by a suitable-volume activated charcoal stack, probably under the sink with an extension over to the frig. ice-maker. They certainly do make whole-house versions if you want. Pretty much the same idea but bigger and more expensive. And the activated charcoal stack in either will have to be changed out from time-to-time. Some say they're "maintenance free".....but they're not. You'll have to pay attention. These units will NOT help with deposits on appliances. That's different. You're talking mineral residue there...probably from just hard water. Charcoal stacks do not soften water. Different issue entirely....and covered ad nauseam in previous threads. Use the search function.

Yeah, you're right with the carbon block. The flow rates would not be suitable for POE - my mistake. I'm not surprised that you find customers that are worried by "bacteria". I think many people hear that word and get afraid - I said so earlier. The fact is the vast majority of kinds of bacteria are harmless to humans. But I'm sure lots of folks would be scared by seeing a petri dish full of them just the same. I'm sure lots of folks would be suprised how many things they consume and touch would also cause a petri dish to overload with bacteria. Our goal though should be accurate information. If someone's fears still prevent them from doing something that's their choice. We should distinguish between bacteria that is a hazard to people (pathogenic) and ones that aren't. Water, air, objects, and food are all full of bacteria and we need to understand the actual health risks. Trying to avoid all bacteria is impossible. Trying to reduce harmless bacteria is wasting money that could be spent on efforts that actually do provide a health benefit. The link below is very interesting. It is an article from Water Conditioning and Purification Magazine. The article is titled "Bacteria in Drinking Water - Public Health Implications" and is dated July 2002. It is a consensus review of material from a NSF International and World Health Organization (WHO) International Symposium. The article specifically talks about activated carbon and the growth of bacteria - among other things. It's fairly, uh er, dense, reading but if there's any hardy souls still reading this thread they might find it interesting. I encourage anyone to read the entire article, and, for that matter, peruse other material on the site. But, for those who want the executive summary, below are some choice parts. Oh, I have no association in any way with this publication or it's authors. I'll note this article talks about tests with POU devices, I'll be doing another post shortly with another reference that talks about POE and POU jointly. This article at least clearly shows that changing from POE to POU will not prevent drinking "bacteria". It talks about the health risks of this bacteria and I believe that POE and POU have largely the same health risks. POE carbon-based devices are not nearly as common as POU so I'm not surprised these large organizations don't focus as much attention on them. In the quotes of the article below, know that "HPC" is a measurement of naturally occurring bacteria. ************************** "Interestingly, HPC levels in foods haven't raised the same concern as in the drinking water industry. It's not unusual to find very high numbers (>50,000 cfu/gram or ml) of HPC bacteria in a wide variety of foods such as pasteurized milk, cheeses, meats, yogurts and fresh produce. HPC bacteria consumed with food is generally several orders of magnitude larger than those consumed in water. A million HPC bacteria have been documented on a single gram of leaf lettuce and carrot sticks.(1)" *********************** "Granular activated carbon (GAC), commonly used in the water treatment industry, is known to concentrate bacteria and their growth substrates. As water passes through the GAC, bacteria may also be released. Point-of-use (POU) treatment devices have been shown to reduce the level of waterborne gastrointestinal disease and remove known microbial pathogens. It's not uncommon, however, to note a significant increase in HPC bacteria post treatment, possibly several-fold higher than the influent water. Re-growth of bacteria in POU devices occurs frequently during periods of non-use." **************************** "In addition, HPC bacteria didn't survive well at low pH (i.e., conditions of the human stomach). In fact, only 1-2 percent of HPC bacteria were found to have possible virulence factors, but still weren't associated with human disease." ************************** "Several large epidemiological studies were conducted in an attempt to define the public health impact of HPC bacteria in drinking water. The first was conducted in the United States and showed that a large number of households using various GAC POU devices had high HPC levels but no demonstrated health effects.(5) Likewise, a recent study conducted in California attempting to correlate HPC in tap water to gastrointestinal illness provided no such evidence.(6)" **************************** "In summary, an overwhelming body of evidence from human feed studies, animal studies, epidemiological studies, risk assessment, and virulence data all confer there's no medical rationale to control HPC concentrations in drinking water. The general consensus at the HPC symposium was that such common bacteria in drinking water wasn't associated with a significant public health risk."

If you have galvanized piping it gradually becomes tuberculated inside with iron and other goodies over time. Jarring it around during rework could knock some of the crud loose and cause a low flow or stoppage. Do you have a well pump? It would be a coincidence but not impossible it is now developing insufficient head to reach the 2nd floor. Multiply the PSI X 27 and that will give a good approximation of the inches of head above the gauge that the pump can push water. When reworking piping I always remove downstream faucet aerateors (the filters you mentioned) then give the lines a few second full open purge to flush debris out. The tiny orifices and screens in aerators are a pain to get particles out of without compressed air.