Hi everyone,

I got some similar questions as another gentleman from this forum about the water filter selection after the whole house water softening system.

I would like to kindly ask for your expert advice about the setting that I find myself in. I want to install a water filter system under the pantry sink and use that (particularly) for my espresso machine. I have a La Marzocco Strada EP 1 Group, and want to plump in with the inlet water directly with the machine, to make/experiment different coffees for pressure profiling, pre-infusion at my home. I am located in City of Vaughan (Toronto area), Canada, the water in my area is OK, PH is ~7.0; the drinking water hardness is currently measured at 125 milligrams per litre or 7.26 grains per gallon per city water testing report.

Currently, I have Premier Model AF-40K Water Softening System installed at my basement, to create the softening water for the whole house, and I add Costco's SIFTO Crystal Plus Salt-20KG package every month regularly. I tested my kitchen tap water with the TDS of 150-160 PPM yesterday.

I have no idea about the other water quality numbers after my house's softening system, i.e. LM required water criteria T.D.S., Total hardness, Total iron (Fe+2/Fe+3), Free Chlorine (Cl2), Total Chlorine (Cl2), pH, Alkalinity, Chloride (Cl-). I don't see scale deposits on the bathroom walls or kitchen sink, however if I boil the water for tea, my stainless steel kettle will be white in couple of days.

Same here, after all of the readings, I intend to install a BWT Bestprotect or Bestmax filter in between the softening water and the LM Strada machine under the pantry sink area, and hope that this solution will keep the water in the LM's required parameters to avoid corrosion and scale for the machine, my priority is to protect the machine, the taste is second.
In this case, I have the following questions:

Can I connect the BWT filter from the centra softening water main line, does the two overlap the filter jeopardize the water quality for the espresso machine, especially for avoiding corrosion and scale? i.e. water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine

Should I weir a separated water line from the main water meter directly to the pantry sink, connect with BWT filter, and machine? i.e. water meter---BWT filter---machine

Which BWT filter can be used based on above mentioned two scenario, Bestmax, Bestprotet?

Which water test I should conduct, and which water testing kit you could recommend, other than TDS testing kit, according to LM's water criteria?

Thank you so much for your kind help!

Hvyebn wrote:however if I boil the water for tea, my stainless steel kettle will be white in couple of days.

Even with softened water if you boil away water in a kettle til almost dry you can end up with dry white residue inside. If you heat water to boiling and empty and rinse it every time after use you would not expect hard scale to accumulate inside if you are using softened water.

Be aware that in some houses only the hot water line goes through the softener and the cold water at the tap is not softened, so make sure that's not the case here. To test it yourself you need to buy a total hardness ot GH test kit. The best for testing that a softener is effectively dropping the hardness to very low levels would be the Hach HA71 . But you could also get away with using a simple inexpensive API fishcare GH test kit used by aquarium people. A TDS meter is no help here - it reads about the same before and after conventional softening.

Hvyebn wrote:Can I connect the BWT filter from the centra softening water main line, does the two overlap the filter jeopardize the water quality for the espresso machine, especially for avoiding corrosion and scale? i.e. water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine

If your softener is working properly that would be wasted effort and expense. The BWT bestprotect is a conventional softener like your whole house softener, and the BWT premium is a decarbonizer, but without hardness minerals (calcium or magnesium) it will have no effect.

Hvyebn wrote:Should I weir a separated water line from the main water meter directly to the pantry sink, connect with BWT filter, and machine? i.e. water meter---BWT filter---machine
Which BWT filter can be used based on above mentioned two scenario, Bestmax, Bestprotet?

That's a tough question without knowing more about your water. You could try a friendly call to your water authority to get numbers for 1) hardness, 2) alkalinity, and 3) chloride ion. If the chloride ion is high (as in above 30 mg/L) then you may want to consider an RO system.

Hi Pat,
Thank you for the answers on my questions. I will use the API fishcare GH test kit to test my softening water, I will also contact Hath Canada to ask for the price of the testing kit, hope it is not very expensive.

" Even with softened water if you boil away water in a kettle til almost dry you can end up with dry white residue inside. If you heat water to boiling and empty and rinse it every time after use you would not expect hard scale to accumulate inside if you are using softened water.

Be aware that in some houses only the hot water line goes through the softener and the cold water at the tap is not softened, so make sure that's not the case here."

I normally boil the water to 93 C degree for tea, but not till almost dry, and rinse the kettle after the boiling, but I still see slight scale (white) in the kettle after several days boiling water. My house softening system only connect with cold water, not connect to the hot water tank. My questions are:

Does this means that my softening water is not really softened, effectively? Given the TDS digital test result is 150 PPM, and city water reports at 125 PPM.

If your softener is working properly that would be wasted effort and expense. The BWT bestprotect is a conventional softener like your whole house softener, and the BWT premium is a decarbonizer, but without hardness minerals (calcium or magnesium) it will have no effect.

Scenario 1, water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine: I always thought that the North American house's centra softening system can only soften the water to certain point low, but can not reduce the TDS for espresso machine required level, so I decide to add BWT Bestprotect/Bestmax to further reduce the TDS level.

In this case, do you mean that Bestprotect will not further reduce the hardness in my situation? Can Bestmax further reduce the hardness after the house softener, does the house softener conflict with Bestmax/Bestprotect chemistry reaction wise? If I connect them like this, water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine. Have you see other people set up the water filter with centra softening water line? I just want to make sure that the setup is logical and functional assuming both house softener and BWT are able to working together effectively, not conflict each other, as the softener exchange the calcium with Sodium, but not sure if the sodium is good for coffee machine or not.

That's a tough question without knowing more about your water. You could try a friendly call to your water authority to get numbers for 1) hardness, 2) alkalinity, and 3) chloride ion. If the chloride ion is high (as in above 30 mg/L) then you may want to consider an RO system.

Scenario 2, water meter---BWT filter---machine: I will call the city authority to get water quality numbers, and let you know. In general, I have heard that the water in my area are good , and not very hard. Do you mean that you will need 1) hardness, 2) alkalinity, and 3) chloride ion, and maybe 4) Chlorine numbers to possibly give the recommendation on selection of Bestmax, Bestprotect, and Bestmax Premium? So far, I only find the drinking water hardness @125 milligrams per litre, and Combined Chlorine (3.02mg/L - 4.94mg/L) from City water quality report.

I understand that I will better need 1) hardness, 2) alkalinity, and 3) chloride information to decide on the filters, I will report back shortly.

Thank you for the advice!

Hvyebn wrote:I will use the API fishcare GH test kit to test my softening water

That will work. Normally that kit uses a 5 ml sample, and each drop of titrant corresponds to 17.8 ppm as CaCO3. Find a larger vial or shotglass and use a 10 ml sample, then each drop corresponds to 8.9 ppm as CaCO3.

Hvyebn wrote:Does this means that my softening water is not really softened, effectively? Given the TDS digital test result is 150 PPM, and city water reports at 125 PPM.

You can't use conductivity meter TDS to gauge softness in this situation. Your softener is replacing each calcium or magnesium with two sodium ions, and the softened water's conductivity goes up slightly. The GH test will tell you how it's working. A properly working conventional softener should reduce 20 gpg (342 ppm as CaCO3) water way down to less than 1 gpg (17.1 ppm). (https://wcponline.com/2016/03/15/the-so ... softeners/)

Hvyebn wrote:Scenario 1, water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine: I always thought that the North American house's centra softening system can only soften the water to certain point low, but can not reduce the TDS for espresso machine required level, so I decide to add BWT Bestprotect/Bestmax to further reduce the TDS level.

When working right, whole house softeners drop the hardness very low, as mentioned above. Without hardness minerals the BWT filter, whether a decarbonizer (bestmax) or conventional (bestprotect) has no appreciable effect.

Hvyebn wrote:In this case, do you mean that Bestprotect will not further reduce the hardness in my situation? Can Bestmax further reduce the hardness after the house softener, does the house softener conflict with Bestmax/Bestprotect chemistry reaction wise? If I connect them like this, water meter---Softened water---BWT filter---machine. Have you see other people set up the water filter with centra softening water line? I just want to make sure that the setup is logical and functional assuming both house softener and BWT are able to working together effectively, not conflict each other, as the softener exchange the calcium with Sodium, but not sure if the sodium is good for coffee machine or not.

If your softener is failing to reduce hardness to low levels, then yes, the bastprotect or the bestmax will reduce it further. It will not conflict or do any harm. The sodium will not harm the machine, Very high sodium might affect the taste but that should not be the case here. Even if you exchange all 7 grains per gallon of hardness with sodium, you only get 28 mg/L of sodium ion added to your water.

Hvyebn wrote:Scenario 2, water meter---BWT filter---machine: I will call the city authority to get water quality numbers, and let you know. In general, I have heard that the water in my area are good , and not very hard. Do you mean that you will need 1) hardness, 2) alkalinity, and 3) chloride ion, and maybe 4) Chlorine numbers to possibly give the recommendation on selection of Bestmax, Bestprotect, and Bestmax Premium? So far, I only find the drinking water hardness @125 milligrams per litre, and Combined Chlorine (3.02mg/L - 4.94mg/L) from City water quality report.

You can generally assume that the chlorine, or sometimes chloramine is there in any city water, and you take care of that with charcoal or carbon block filtration. The hardness and alkalinity are needed tell you about limescale risk. If you have calcium numbers you can use that instead of total hardness to get a better prediction about limescale. Alkalinity helps to decide about corrosion risk and can help in deciding between decarbonizer (Bestmax) or conventional softener (Bestprotect) and setting the bypass on a decarbonizing filter. And finally, chloride is needed to decide about chloride corrosion risk, and if that's high you generally go to remineralized RO, or to bottled or recipe water.

Hi Pat,
Thank you so very much for the guidance, it is very helpful to me. I will follow your guidance (10ml sample) to test my softened tap water at home tomorrow, I ordered API kit and Hach total hardness testing kit from Amazon. Besides, which calcium test kit would you recommend to test the tap water?

If your softener is failing to reduce hardness to low levels, then yes, the bestprotect or the bestmax will reduce it further. It will not conflict or do any harm. The sodium will not harm the machine, Very high sodium might affect the taste but that should not be the case here. Even if you exchange all 7 grains per gallon of hardness with sodium, you only get 28 mg/L of sodium ion added to your water.

You can generally assume that the chlorine, or sometimes chloramine is there in any city water, and you take care of that with charcoal or carbon block filtration. The hardness and alkalinity are needed tell you about limescale risk. If you have calcium numbers you can use that instead of total hardness to get a better prediction about limescale. Alkalinity helps to decide about corrosion risk and can help in deciding between decarbonizer (Bestmax) or conventional softener (Bestprotect) and setting the bypass on a decarbonizing filter. And finally, chloride is needed to decide about chloride corrosion risk, and if that's high you generally go to remineralized RO, or to bottled or recipe water.

For the Scenario 1 and 2, in case the softener failed to reduce the hardness, the two scenarios become to one, in my case: water meter---BWT filter---machine, I have called City and received the following water quality parameters as the following:

T.D.S.: 166 mg/L
Total hardness: 127 mg/L
Total iron (Fe+2/Fe+3): 0.242 mg/L
Free Chlorine (Cl2): 0.20 mg/L
Total Chlorine (Cl2): 2.0 mg/L
pH: 7.8
Alkalinity: 88.8 mg/L
Chloride (Cl-): 25.7 mg/L
Calcium: 32.8 mg/L
Sodium: 20.8 mg/L
Magnesium: 8.5 mg/L

I did not get the Chloramine number as they do not have that information at the moment. Based on these information, to avoid the scale and corrosion of the machine, what BWT water filter would you recommend? I am open to any BWT filters which works better in my situation? Or any other filter system/brand could you recommend other than BWT in case BWT could not fulfill my water requirement?

Thank you so much!
Bob

Hvyebn wrote:Besides, which calcium test kit would you recommend to test the tap water?

I wold not bother with a calcium kit for the tap water. You know from the report that the calcium as ion is 32.8 mg/L, which is a calcium hardness of 82 mg/L as CaCO3. For typical treated water from this tap you can measure the total hardness and assume that your calcium hardness is 70% of the total hardness. Perhaps in the case of the Bestmax premium, which decreases the calcium more than the magnesium, it might be interesting to measure calcium out of that filter. . Hach sells a titration kit that does total and calcium hardness. Red Sea has a more affordable calcium test kit.

Hvyebn wrote:I did not get the Chloramine number as they do not have that information at the moment. Based on these information, to avoid the scale and corrosion of the machine, what BWT water filter would you recommend? I am open to any BWT filters which works better in my situation? Or any other filter system/brand could you recommend other than BWT in case BWT could not fulfill my water requirement?

Your water appears to have chlorine rather than chloramine disinfectant.

As to what filter to recommend, that's iffy. If it were me, I would go with a conventional softener like the bestprotect. It would give you water with the same alkalinity that you have from the tap, 89 mg/L, and hardly any hardness minerals. You won't see scale because the hardness is so low. The alkalinity is high, but not high enough to detract from flavor in an espresso brew. And having that high alkalinity should help mitigate the corrosion risk from that borderline high chloride.

Some people are convinced that you need hardness minerals for tasty extractions. If you're in that camp you might prefer using a decarbonizer like the Bestmax. It would reduce both hardness and alkalinity, and you could dial in the bypass so that your hardness was about 55 mg/L and your alkalinity about 40 mg/L. It would not drop scale, but would acidify the water slightly. That and the low alkalinity increases your chloride risk.

The Cadillac solution here would be to spend a couple grand on a high end RO system with a precision blending valve. You would keep the blend adjusted to around 80 ppm TDS, which would give you reasonable hardness and alkalinity and would cut your chloride in half.

Your water appears to have chlorine rather than chloramine disinfectant.

As to what filter to recommend, that's iffy. If it were me, I would go with a conventional softener like the bestprotect. It would give you water with the same alkalinity that you have from the tap, 89 mg/L, and hardly any hardness minerals. You won't see scale because the hardness is so low. The alkalinity is high, but not high enough to detract from flavor in an espresso brew. And having that high alkalinity should help mitigate the corrosion risk from that borderline high chloride.

Some people are convinced that you need hardness minerals for tasty extractions. If you're in that camp you might prefer using a decarbonizer like the Bestmax. It would reduce both hardness and alkalinity, and you could dial in the bypass so that your hardness was about 55 mg/L and your alkalinity about 40 mg/L. It would not drop scale, but would acidify the water slightly. That and the low alkalinity increases your chloride risk.

The Cadillac solution here would be to spend a couple grand on a high end RO system with a precision blending valve. You would keep the blend adjusted to around 80 ppm TDS, which would give you reasonable hardness and alkalinity and would cut your chloride in half.

That will work. Normally that kit uses a 5 ml sample, and each drop of titrant corresponds to 17.8 ppm as CaCO3. Find a larger vial or shotglass and use a 10 ml sample, then each drop corresponds to 8.9 ppm as CaCO3.

When working right, whole house softeners drop the hardness very low, as mentioned above. Without hardness minerals the BWT filter, whether a decarbonizer (bestmax) or conventional (bestprotect) has no appreciable effect.

Hi Pat,
Thank you for your suggestion from the previous post, it is very very helpful. The Cadillac solution of RO system is way high for my current budget, I would think to get it if the water quality is very bad in my area.
I have finally tested my house tap water based on your API test strip guidance, the tap water is from my house centra softening system. I used API testing Kit, Hach 5-in-1 Water Quality Test Strips, BWT Water Hardnesss Test Kit (dGH/dKH), La Marzocco water testing kit. The results from all these testing kits are more and less in the same parameter range as the following:

Water meter---Centra Softening system---Tap water testing number:
Total hardness(GH): 115.7-124.6 mg/L
Carbonate Hardness (KH): 97.9-106.8 mg/L
Total iron (Fe+2/Fe+3): 0.0 mg/L
Free Chlorine (Cl2): 0.0 mg/L
Total Chlorine (Cl2): 0.5-1.0 mg/L
pH: 7.5-7.6
Alkalinity: 80~90 PPM
Chloride (Cl-): 25 PPM

Restated city tap water report number:
T.D.S.: 166 mg/L
Total hardness: 127 mg/L
Total iron (Fe+2/Fe+3): 0.242 mg/L
Free Chlorine (Cl2): 0.20 mg/L
Total Chlorine (Cl2): 2.0 mg/L
pH: 7.8
Alkalinity: 88.8 mg/L
Chloride (Cl-): 25.7 mg/L
Calcium: 32.8 mg/L
Sodium: 20.8 mg/L
Magnesium: 8.5 mg/L

Based on the softened water testing results, and city water quality result, it looks like that my house softening system seems not functioned effectively, the total hardness of the softened water is about same ( 115.7-124.6 V.S. 127 mg/L). For this reasons, if I would like to wire the water filter in this way, water meter---Softening system water---BWT filter---machine, what would you suggest for the BWT water filter, BWT Bestprotect, Bestmax, and Bestmax Premium? In this way, I can protect the machine boiler against scaling and corrosion.

Would you recommend Everpure water filter? If so, which Everpure filter would you recommend? I recently found this Everpure filter available in Canada, I could not find any before.

Many thanks for your help!

Best,
Bob

Hvyebn wrote:Based on the softened water testing results, and city water quality result, it looks like that my house softening system seems not functioned effectively, the total hardness of the softened water is about same ( 115.7-124.6 V.S. 127 mg/L). For this reasons, if I would like to wire the water filter in this way, water meter---Softening system water---BWT filter---machine, what would you suggest for the BWT water filter, BWT Bestprotect, Bestmax, and Bestmax Premium? In this way, I can protect the machine boiler against scaling and corrosion.

Your softener is clearly not working, so I'd recommend having that serviced. Make sure that someone hasn't switched over a manual bypass valve, and double check that it treats cold as well as hot water lines. If that's not it then it may be a stuck internal bypass valve that fails to open at the end of the recharge cycle. When that happens it will recharge periodically and use up your salt, but it won't soften because the water is bypassing the resin when it shouldn't.

You could add a decarbonizer or a softener in front of the machine to take care of what your softener isn't doing. It would be belt and suspenders if you get your softener working. My choice for that would be a conventional sodium ion exchange softener because of your below 100 alkalinity and your 25 mg/L chloride ion. A conventional softener will not reduce your alkalinity and it will not acidify your water. The BWT product for that is the Bestprotect.

The Bestmax products are decarbonizing filters - - use a WAC resin that exchanges hydrogen ions for hardness minerals, and reduces both hardness and alkalinity, and acidifies the water slightly. Most decarbonizing filters have an adjustable bypass head that lets you dial them in according to the hardness and alkalinity of your water.

Hvyebn wrote:Would you recommend Everpure water filter? If so, which Everpure filter would you recommend? I recently found this Everpure filter available in Canada, I could not find any before.

Pentair/Everpure is an excellent company with an amazing number of products, and their product literature does not make it easy to find the right filter for a given need. They have a conventional softener, the 7SO, which is a 2000 grain conventional sodium ion exchange softener. It's just a softener so it's usually paired with a filter to handle particulates, chlorine, taste and odor in a twin series manifold.

The Everpure ES06, ESO7, and Claris Ultra systems are all decarbonizing filters.

Other options for conventional softening include generic 10" drop-in filter systems like the one sold at CCS, and the Homeland HCWS like the one sold at Clive. The latter is a single cartridge with charcoal and particulates filtration in addition to a 1700 grain conventional softener.