Re:
We are here in Tarrant County and our well is a shallow well at about 250-300 feet. There is lot of iron in this area so we have been using a pretty extensive filtration setup (air pump, oxidation tank, two huge tanks for filtering the iron, and then a water softener for the house only). Before we ever moved in, the irrigation guy turned on our irrigation without making sure the filtration was working properly, which caused a mess of course. They got it fixed and cleaned up but ever since I’ve not been thrilled about being on the well just because of the potential of there being a problem.
We’re in the county and the water supplier here is supposed to be reasonable. I’ve checked bills with people who own similar size lots and it seems that even if we use the city water for everything then we will have reasonable bills for that and I won’t have to mess with our well or filtration again. We’ll probably leave our softener hooked up in case we do want to use it, but that is why I was asking about how things should be plumbed in our garage. We water about 1 acre (we’re on 2.5 acres). My friend who waters with the city water said he runes his irrigation 7 days a week and his last bill was $150. He waters about .75 acres.
Part of my irritation with the well and filtration has been that we still get some minor staining on our property, on the concrete. The filtration people have told me it is due to the hardness and all of the leftover minerals in our water (that isn’t softened). Inside, things have been fine but one irritation I have had is that our hot water when you fill up a tub all the way begins to get slightly discolored. We do have electric water heaters, which the filtration people told me is not a good combination with a well system (even if filtered) but I have also wondered if it is also our softener. So when we have the plumbers switch us over to city water, I am going to have them flush out our heaters and also replace the anode rods and I will leave the softener bypassed the first month we are on city water.
We have septic so we do not have sewer.
Bob, what effects could city water have on our water heaters (2 electric 40 gallon AO Smith water heaters with a recirculation pump)?
We’ve paid so the city will be extending the line to our lot this upcoming week, beginning Monday, and they will be setting a meter. It’s a distance of 320 feet plus boring, so I’ve been told it should take them a week or less. So my plan was to have the plumber out the following week.
My thinking was to use the city water for everything, to just leave the softener inline (but bypassed) to see what the water is like without it and to see what our hot water is like without it, to cap off the well line and to turn off all of the power to the well etc.
I figured I should leave all of our filtration equipt. in the garage then, in case we ever sell the house, and then someone wants to re-hook the well back up.
Thank you for the help and all of the great responses.