who has the best water softening system

[ron p 500]

i want opinions and advice on water softening systems.

mobile type to add to my rig.

[the_GUNN_man 14]

I use a Fleck water softener. I mount the softener on my rig and leave the brine tank back at the shop. I just run my lines to it when I need to recharge. Very easy. You have to be careful what kind of head is on the softener. I have an open trailer so I have a manual head on mine. The up side is I don't have to worry about protecting it. The downside is that I have to wait while it goes through it's cycles. That can be an hour. Usually during it's 50 minute cycle I go grab something to eat. You can get the automatic heads but they are electronic. They can get sensitive to the elements. If you are running an enclosed trailer then they might be ok. If I get caught in the rain one day and am driving down the road doing 55 mph then it can cause problems. I am switching to a enclosed trailer this fall and will be switching to an electronic head.

[Mike Williamson 198]

I was thinking of going with the Sears brand softener. They have a smaller one that is under $300.00. I like that the brine tank and softener are all together in one unit. The other upside for me is that I have had them for years at home and thus know how to fix just about anything that can go wrong with them, other than the electronics.

Any comments?

[ron p 500]

Idid'nt think that size and type could do more then 50 gal per day?

[the_GUNN_man 14]

Mine cost $800 and I got a really good deal. Mine is more commercial then residential. I think it can handle up to 10 gpm. Why would you want your brine tank and your softener together on the rig? That is just taking up extra room and adding extra weight. The brine tank can weigh an extra 200 to 300 lbs. My brine tank can hold 250 lbs. of salt plus the water that is in there. I can run 3000 gallons through my softener before I have to recharge it. Half of that if it is well water. Mostly city water in my area though. If I ran my machine (5.5 gpm) non stop, I would need to recharge my softener after 9 hours. So I will never have to recharge in the middle of the day. I just recharge it when it is close. Salt doesn't cost much so I will recharge it when it is only half way sometimes. So even if I recharge when it is half spent then I am only losing maybe $2 at the most, if that. I can go 4.5 hours non stop for well water. So you figure I can pretty much handle any job.

[Mike Williamson 198]

ron:

The one I have at home handles all the water we run through it for several days before it needs to recyle. Not sure how many gallons that is though. Then again, the amount of water that can pass through it before it needs to recyle is dependant upon how hard the water is. If it is already pretty soft water, the resin bed won't fill up nearly as fast as it will if you're filtering out all kinds of crud. Much of the washing I'll be doing will be using city water which is not nearly as hard as mine at home. I'm curious now about how many gpm I can run through it with city water. I'll have to see if I can find out.

[paul-uk 500]

what is the procedure for washing a car whith di water..i know it is not supposed to leave spots...does that mean you don't have wipe them clean.

i have just stumbled across a place that has to make its own di water for the product it makes ,it has less than one ppm metal in it.

and he could sell it for about £70 a ton (1,000 ltrs) is this cheap,

can i do it on my own??????? $$$$$$$$$$$$

cheers paul.

[paul-uk 500]

no car washers about ??

[the_GUNN_man 14]

I wash cars. I use soft water to wash and rinse. I have one guy go behind me squeegeeing the cars and towel drying them. I soap up the cars and use a high psi rinse. I have thought about doing the DI rinse but here would be the problem. The cost of a DI water will run you about 10 cents a gallon. That is the figure you get when you figure the cost of the charged tank divided by the number of gallons you will get out of it. I use about 12 gallons per car. If I used all DI water it would cost me $1.20 per car. I have thought about washing with my soft water and rinsing with it then having another guy come behind me with another wand and do a light rinse with DI water so he doesn't have to wipe down the cars. That would speed things up. The car lots around here pay between $2.50 and $4.00 a car. I don't see how guys make money off a $1 a car. When I wash cars the guy behind me wiping them down actually wipes off dirt that I can't get off with my wand. I don't see how people not wiping them down are getting then totally clean. I wish there was a way I could eliminate the having to wipe the cars down. I am going to try a DI tank soon and see what difference it would make. But if you were going to try and save money and only use the DI water for a light final rinse then you would have to have two machines and a second tank for the DI water. We can wash 25 cars an hour. We have only been doing it for a month so I am sure things will speed up. I can wash probably 40 cars an hour but ever so often I have to stop and help my guy get caught up. If I had a second guy drying we could go fast. I bet we could get up to 50 cars an hour. I said 40 before because I do have to stop for certain things like rolling out hose, adding more hose on, etc. If I had it where I could go non stop I am sure I could do 50 an hour. I can't hire the second drying guy right now because I don't have enough car lots to justify it.

[paul-uk 500]

there was a thread awhile back about car washing....not sure which board it was on but there was 3 doing it 1 p\w and the other 2 of them drying with the guy p\washing jumping on at the end of the row,then all moving to the next row.....i am sure they used no soap just di water......they were doing 300 a day i think.

they did'nt do any detailing all the cars just had dust on from being on show....might be worth trying to find the thread steve since your actualy doing it now.

cheers paul.

[One Armed Bandit 14]

I have a pura tech water softner that I got at a steal of a deal. I am not telling the price because it was way to good of a deal but if you are interested in buying one I can give you the name and number. His name is Justin he owns Hannah Solutions out of Akron, Ohio his number is 330-352-8421. The system he sells is an all enclosed system ths is maybe 3 feet wide by 4 feet tall with the brine and salt tank all together. This is a great benefit seeing how i can regenerate on the job site if needed depending upon if youre washer has a generator built into it or not. Plus this thing is all computerized all you have to do is plug it in and hit the regen button and bam your good to go. Another great benifit of this system is the regeneration time is only 40 minutes and that is for the highest salt setting you can have which is 9 lbs. of salt. So no more lugging around a spare salt regen tank. The money this thing has saved me in gas alone is worth buying it all together, I rarely ever have to use hot water, cold soft water is better then hot hard water in my personel opinion. The less i have to flip the switch to turn my burner on the happier i am. Does anybody else have dollar signs flashing in there eyes