How hard is your water?

[NZDavid]

I'm new to all this and I'm still choosing razors so not sure if this subject has been discussed -- I did a search but may have missed it, in which case AIA (apologies in advance) for repeating the question.

Water. Seems to me it makes a huge difference to how much soap will lather. Soft water, fine. Hard water, not so good. Same applies for shampoos. I live in a hard water area. We have beautiful pure drinking water straight out of the tap, no chlorine, no fluoride, lots of minerals -- but it's harder to whip up a lather.

Any way to soften up your water? Any chemists here?

 

[highball]

Try mixing your lather with urine. Just kidding..If you boil your water and let it set, the minerals will settle to the bottom of the pan. Then take the water on top and use that.

 

[bearbear]

*insert sexual innuendo here*

 

[dpm802]

You're right, clean water does make a big difference.

I have a Britta filter installed on my kitchen faucet, I draw a cup of hot water from there and take it to the bathroom to make my lather. I use the leftover water to give my brush a final rinse after I'm done shaving.

 

[Tone deaf]

My water is so hard it beats me up and then keeps telling me to get up off the floor.

 

[miner]

Try mixing your lather with urine.

Or you could just sprinkle some salt in the water, (salt in the pee does the same job) then boil it.

OR catch the rain water from your gutters. In NZ you'll have the sweetest rainwater in the world!!

Or move to somewhere that has soft water

Cheers

 

[curtis909]

hard enough to make give me a ten count like a Tyson left hook

 

[Thebigspendur]

There are all kind of hoaky solutions to ameliorate the hardness but in the end the only way is to remove the minerals. That means getting a water softener or some tap mounted unit but they don't last very long. Better to just buy a gallon of water at the store. it will last a long time for shaving.

 

[Jonnyfive]

I live in an area that is known for having extremely hard water.

One thing you can try is going to the local supermarket and buy a jug of distilled water.

 

[tam.audio]

When I moved into my new house, further from the cities, I found that I needed to buy a water softener. I could not for the life of me get any good lather for the first month without one. My skin was also taking a beating from hard water. Once I installed a softner everything was back to normal. If you're concerned about softening your kitchen sink water don't, softeners are installed to serve everything but the kitchen sink.

 

[RazorDingo]

When you look at the total costs involved with living with hard water: increased use of detergents, increased energy costs, the failure of boilers, radiators, etc. due to scale build-up, etc. etc. - then professional installation of a water-softening system makes sense. On an on-going basis the only costs associated with a water softener are purchase of salt pellets, and a small amount of electricity.

Yes - if the only concern you have relates to building shaving lather - then temporary fixes like buying distiled water, etc. may make some sense.

A professional water softening installation will save you money in the long run. It will increase the comfort and standard of living of everyone living in your house. It will increase the re-sale value of the house.

The one place you DON'T want softened water to go is the kitchen faucet, or any outlet used for drinking or cooking water.

 

[NZDavid]

My water is so hard it beats me up and then keeps telling me to get up off the floor.

ROFL. NZ rainwater and drinking water (in Christchurch anyway) is delightful, really.

Salt sounds like the easiest solution. Or distilling (like dad used to do for car radiators.) Our plumbing survives OK, so I don't think expensive water softening solutions would be economic.

But water's going to be a huge environmental issue. In many cities, you can't even drink the tap water -- and access to any clean water is problematic. One reason I feel new houses should have rainwater tanks and graywater recycling...

But I digress. This is a really lively forum. I'm enjoying it.

 

[ravkesef]

Our water, here in Cheshire, CT, is quite hard, and the stuff that comes out of the tap has so much chlorine in it that it smells like a swimming pool.
My solutions:

For the drinking water, a filter. We use Moen, Britta and Pur, etc., work equally well. The result: water that tastes good, and as a result, we drink more of it, and don't have to shell out on plastic bottles of drinking water. Also makes a profound difference in the way tea and coffee brew up. Try it--make a cup of tea with ordinary tap water and one cup with Britta water. Never mind the taste--you can even see the difference.

As for the rest of the house, we have a water softener installed, and what a difference that makes. Any shaving soap I have will produce tons of high quality lather in no time at all. While not quite the same, you can produce similar results with distilled water. However, since I shave in the shower, having a water softener installed is truly wonderful.

BTW, a water softener is one of those things that pays for itself, but the payoff time is somewhat lengthy. Here's how: you'll use less soap, less shampoo, less laundry detergent, etc., and your appliances will last longer because they don't get all crudded up with minerals. Also, installing a water softener will actually remove the deposits from your washing machine, dishwasher, etc.

 

[NZDavid]

Hmm, interesting. I actually have to do some research on bathrooms for my newspaper section, so I'll check out the options.

 

[Thebigspendur]

Also, many people who have water quality problems immediately assume they have hard water problems when in fact they don't. There are many issues you can have. Too much iron, chlorine, hydrogen sulphide, and much more. You need to test for hard water which is simple to do.

 

[Doc4]

Living in northern Canada, our water tends to harden up in about late October, and stays that way until about April. I just grow a beard.









(On a more serious note, I have hard water from a well, and have taken to lathering with bottled water.)

 

[Lynchmeister]

I suffered through hard water for 5 years in my apartment. By the time I moved into my house last month (complete with new water softener), I could not believe the difference! After 2 1/2 years with you fine folks, I now know what good lather is...not to mention the fact that my razor and brush rinse clean as a whistle. Lovin' it!

 

[no_pants_cat]

Check this thread, FrankPoole has done most of the work for you:

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php?t=89641

 

[Shannon H]

Well, at least to me. I make homemade soap and often shave with it, and softwater is definitely better. The resin bed the softener passes the water through is filled with beads of a certain polarity. I think hard water tends to be negative, and the beads reverse the polarity of the ions in the water. It doesn't remove the minerals, or in our case in MN, the iron, but it does make the water less prone to grab on to all of soap (which is a kind of double ended molecule that attracts water of one end and dirt on the other) and join it up with the minerals and spirit it off down the drain. Instead, the soap can linger longer on your skin. It takes a bit more water to remove the soap because of the changes in polarity, but it is worth it.

As a side note for those who might not think it worth while to soften water, many cases of eczema and scratchy scalp can be ameliorated by soft water.

Also, you can "soften" your water to some degree with borax, which is a sodium something-or-other. Some soaps have a bit of it for those folks in hardwater zones. I've never used it in hardwater, but am heading to MO to visit the fam, and am taking a mix of borax and epsom to soften my shave. (their water has huge amounts of lime)

Furthermore, the reason so many shave soaps are made with coconut oil is that it will lather in almost any water condition, including sea water. This is unfortunate for those of us who like tallow, but great for most water conditions.

Peace

Shannon

 

[Confilo]

My water is so hard it beats me up and then keeps telling me to get up off the floor.

Mine water is so hard that I don't need to freeze it to make ice cubes