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Spilt some irish tap water and when it dried left white mineral behind

2»

Comments

  • #32
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    The fact you require a water softner indicates that there's a predisposition to hard water in your area. It's most likely calcium or magnesium carbonate.

    Thanks, it is indeed hard water. Is magnesium what causes limescale?


  • #33
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    biko wrote: »
    Did you taste it OP?
    Was it salt?

    never tasted it but when I shower the water kinda feels like it did when I swam in salt pools in the Atacama desert so I am guessing that it might be salt and when I fill up the brine tank it is with salt pellets. But I thought it was a bit excessive that a small puddle of the stuff would leave behind such a lot of white salt-like mineral on the counter top.


  • #34
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    midnight city wrote: »
    It might also have been a floor cleaner that the water brought out of the floor and left on the surface when it evaporated off.

    isn't life too short to come into forums, think of "clever" lines and then write stuff like this? I can't see the enjoyment personally


  • #35
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    mud wrote: »
    Lime?

    well technically softened water should be lime-free shouldn't it?


  • #36
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    Losty Dublin wrote: »
    You'd need to drink around 7-800 litres of water a day to exceed your recommended sodium intake levels. Your bladder would explode before your heart at that rate of intake.

    and how do you know how much sodium is in the water in my home?


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  • #37
    ScumLord
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 28,787 ✭✭✭✭ScumLord


    armabelle wrote: »
    Thanks, it is indeed hard water. Is magnesium what causes limescale?
    I always figured lime scale is just lime. I don't think you can chemically remove lime from the water, just change it into something else that isn't as obvious.


  • #38
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    sibergoth wrote: »
    the stink of bleach off the water is what freaks me out.. i run everything through a brita filter and it seems to do the trick.. no more tea tasting like swimming pools...

    I also have a brita filter and run the hard water into the filter for drinking and making tea. Do those things seriously reduce limescale because I read that they don't even though they claim too.


  • #39
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    The flying mouse wrote: »
    Shouldn't mix cocaine with water, everyone knows this or should ...

    it actually looked like cocaine, but so does salt


  • #40
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    cbyrd wrote: »
    Could be limescale (calcium carbonate) same stuff that builds up in you kettle and pipes.
    I live in a hard water area and if you leave water in a glass for a day it'll leave a chalky scum on the glass.. yum, also the chlorine smell is muckscusting! I have a kangen filter for the drinking water but when the shower or bath is used the place smells like a swimming pool.
    but the softner is supposed to remove that


  • #41
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    Pinch Flat wrote: »
    It's the mind control drug that the CIA put in our water. Wouldn't touch it OP. Make sure you get bottled water.

    bottled is bad stuff, you know Tesco sells Ashbeck mineral water in 5 litres and it supposedly comes from the UK. Do you know how much they sell that for in Midlands where I live? 1.20 euro. Does someone else find this rather uncanny and a little bit against the basic economic principles of import export? To transport a big heavy bottle full of water and only charge 1.20 for it? Be afraid, be very afraid of bottled water.
    FYI, I did send them an email about it, never heard back.


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  • #42
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    jimmy blevins wrote: »
    Water softeners work by replacing the calcium with sodium ions.

    so are those sodium ions what got left over from the spill? is this same as salt?


  • #43
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    ScumLord wrote: »
    I always figured lime scale is just lime. I don't think you can chemically remove lime from the water, just change it into something else that isn't as obvious.

    The Brita filter jug claims to remove limescale. Is this BS?


  • #44
    railer201
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 968 ✭✭✭railer201


    armabelle wrote: »
    The Brita filter jug claims to remove limescale. Is this BS?

    It does remove limescale ok., not all but the vast majority of it.


  • #45
    railer201
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 968 ✭✭✭railer201


    ScumLord wrote: »
    I always figured lime scale is just lime. I don't think you can chemically remove lime from the water, just change it into something else that isn't as obvious.

    Its basically a salt in solution, but not the normal table salt we think of, but limestone in the same ground up form. It gets dragged up in solution from limestone aquifers which are underground reservoirs and passages in the limestone rock.


  • #46
    railer201
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 968 ✭✭✭railer201


    armabelle wrote: »
    so are those sodium ions what got left over from the spill? is this same as salt?

    From what I understand harmless quantities of sodium (salt) replace the calcium carbonate (limescale) in the tap water. This may be what you're looking at. Limescale is more of a light brown colour.


  • #47
    whoopsadoodles
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,058 ✭✭✭whoopsadoodles


    armabelle wrote: »
    bottled is bad stuff, you know Tesco sells Ashbeck mineral water in 5 litres and it supposedly comes from the UK. Do you know how much they sell that for in Midlands where I live? 1.20 euro. Does someone else find this rather uncanny and a little bit against the basic economic principles of import export? To transport a big heavy bottle full of water and only charge 1.20 for it? Be afraid, be very afraid of bottled water.
    FYI, I did send them an email about it, never heard back.

    F_200403_march02ed__217232a.jpg


  • #48
    sibergoth
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 478 ✭✭sibergoth


    armabelle wrote: »
    I also have a brita filter and run the hard water into the filter for drinking and making tea. Do those things seriously reduce limescale because I read that they don't even though they claim too.

    i don't think I live in a limescale area (kettle isn't full of white flakes) so not sure...

    but i wouldn't drink tap water without filtering it now. the change is very noticeable.

    Tap water from the tap tastes like sh1te.
    Filtered through the Brita and its just normal water.

    I buy a 12 pack of filters from amazon for about 30 odd euro.. lasts a whole year. how bad?


  • #49
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    jimmy blevins wrote: »
    Water softeners work by replacing the calcium with sodium ions.

    do you know about this stuff or did you copy and paste? I have a question if you don't mind that I can't find the answer to and yours might be the right brain to pick. If I put normal table salt (sodium chloride) into my brine tank it apparently has sodium that removes the magnesium and calcium from the hard water in my area and turns it into soft water. However, I have read that the sodium that ends up in your soft water is not actually sodium chloride but sodium bicarbonate which is where I get confused. Why, if I put table salt in the brine tank, does it leave sodium bicarbonate in my soft water?

    could someone smarter than me out there, please chime in on this one?


  • #50
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    pwurple wrote: »
    Do you know what water softening is?
    It's adding minerals to water to give it a taste. Calcium and magnesium etc. A quick google will enlighten you.

    ehm no


  • #51
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    gctest50 wrote: »
    It's salt more or less - the water softener removes calcium, magnesium etc and replaces it with sodium

    You'd need to get it tested - too much sodium in yer diet and you'll die prematurely

    Yes! I now realize that it is sodium. Sodium Bicarbonate in fact. But why does it become sodium bicarbonate if the salt I put in is Sodium chloride?


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  • #52
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    The fact you require a water softner indicates that there's a predisposition to hard water in your area. It's most likely calcium or magnesium carbonate.

    huh, but calcium and magnesium are what is removed by water softners


  • #53
    hot buttered scones
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,839 ✭✭✭hot buttered scones


    armabelle wrote: »
    Yes! I now realize that it is sodium. Sodium Bicarbonate in fact. But why does it become sodium bicarbonate if the salt I put in is Sodium chloride?

    Sodium Chloride in solution becomes sodium ions and chloride ions. I'm assuming the water softeners are ion exchange resins - I can't recall exactly how they work but the basics are that the calcium and magnesium ions in the water bond to the chloride ions and become calcium and magnesium chloride. The sodium bonds to the carbonate and becomes sodium carbonate. The calcium and magnesium chloride are retained by the ion exchange resin. 2 to 1 ratio of sodium to calcium I think. Removing all the ions gives you deionised water (pure H2O more or less) - which isn't very good for you afaik - it can cause you to loose vital salts from your body (possibly due to osmosis - may not be correct - again I can't remember the full facts here, ). All I know is that when I train hard I add salt tablets to my water or drink isotonic drinks to replace salts lost due to sweating (mostly sodium but some magnesium too). Lime in water isn't bad for you - but its is bad for your kettle, washing machine etc. and means you have to use more soap and detergents to get a lather. Years ago if I went to my Nan's out the country, if you poured glass of water from the tap it would come out cloudy and you'd have to leave to settle. It would go clear but was full of lime. A lot of my leaving cert chemistry has left me, but it was all covered there.


  • #54
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    hot buttered scones wrote: »
    Sodium Chloride in solution becomes sodium ions and chloride ions. I'm assuming the water softeners are ion exchange resins - I can't recall exactly how they work but the basics are that the calcium and magnesium ions in the water bond to the chloride ions and become calcium and magnesium chloride. The sodium bonds to the carbonate and becomes sodium carbonate. The calcium and magnesium chloride are retained by the ion exchange resin. 2 to 1 ratio of sodium to calcium I think. Removing all the ions gives you deionised water (pure H2O more or less) - which isn't very good for you afaik - it can cause you to loose vital salts from your body (possibly due to osmosis - may not be correct - again I can't remember the full facts here, ). All I know is that when I train hard I add salt tablets to my water or drink isotonic drinks to replace salts lost due to sweating (mostly sodium but some magnesium too). Lime in water isn't bad for you - but its is bad for your kettle, washing machine etc. and means you have to use more soap and detergents to get a lather. Years ago if I went to my Nan's out the country, if you poured glass of water from the tap it would come out cloudy and you'd have to leave to settle. It would go clear but was full of lime. A lot of my leaving cert chemistry has left me, but it was all covered there.

    Yes they are ion exchange. I was pretty sure that the sodium ions are what bond to the calcium and magnesium ions. Does this sound incorrect to you?

    Also, when you say "The sodium bonds to the carbonate and becomes sodium carbonate". Does all water have carbonate in it? I read that the minerals removed in this process are calcium and magnesium and never read anything about "carbonate" until now so if you could dig deep into those high chool textbooks for me....:D


  • #55
    armabelle
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,017 ✭✭✭armabelle


    I poured 1 - 2 cups of soft water from my tap into the black frying pan. I boiled the water to see how much of this white substance was left over. Does anybody else find this a bit strange?


  • #56
    jimmy blevins
    Closed Accounts Posts: 475 ✭✭jimmy blevins


    armabelle wrote: »
    do you know about this stuff or did you copy and paste? I have a question if you don't mind that I can't find the answer to and yours might be the right brain to pick. If I put normal table salt (sodium chloride) into my brine tank it apparently has sodium that removes the magnesium and calcium from the hard water in my area and turns it into soft water. However, I have read that the sodium that ends up in your soft water is not actually sodium chloride but sodium bicarbonate which is where I get confused. Why, if I put table salt in the brine tank, does it leave sodium bicarbonate in my soft water?

    could someone smarter than me out there, please chime in on this one?

    This article will probably explain it better than me : http://www.science.uwaterloo.ca/~cchieh/cact/applychem/waternatural.html.

    The process used in domestic softeners is ion exchange, rather than a chemical reactuon, which is determined by the charge and concentration of ions.


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