How Does Water Quality Affect Your Appliances?

Unnecessarily replacing or repairing common household appliances such as your washing machine or dishwasher can take its toll on your finances. The worst part is that aside from regular maintenance, there is something you may have overlooked – Your water quality. Believe it or not, your water quality can have a negative affect on your appliances, this is why residential water treatment systems are so important.

How Does Water Quality Affect Your Appliances?

Your household plumbing system is connected to the vast majority of your appliances as well as your faucets. It’s connected to your washing machine, your refrigerators water dispenser, and you often use your household water in your coffee makers and steamers. If the water running through your plumbing is hard water, you may need water softeners to help remove the excess minerals and metals in your water.

Minerals and metals in the water are responsible for limescale build-up – this build-up can cause major problems with your plumbing pipes. If your plumbing pipes are susceptible to mineral build-up, imagine what it is doing to your household appliances.

Over time, your appliances take extra wear and tear due to the minerals in the water and eventually they will need to be replaced. Hardwater can take years off the estimated lifespan of your appliances. If you ensure that your household water undergoes the right water treatment process, you won’t need to worry about limescale build-up in your plumbing or in your household appliances that use water.

Energy Saving Appliances

Energy saving appliances can be expensive, but the overall savings you get with lower monthly utility bills does add up. If your energy efficient appliances are using hard water, you can be sure that they’re not working as efficiently as they’re meant to. This means that not only are you not saving money on your monthly utility bill but you’re also going to need to replace your appliance a lot sooner than you think.

• Hard Water and Your Washing Machine

  Not only does mineral build-up in your washing machine add to the wear and tear of the appliance, hard water makes it more difficult to remove tough stains from clothing. You will use more laundry detergent to get your clothes clean and the hard water also damages the fabric of your clothes.

• Hard Water and Your Dishes

  Similar to your washing machine, it takes longer to clean dishes when hard water is used. Mineral rich water can also leave permanent marks across the surface of your glassware. Over time, the minerals in the water will clog your dishwasher’s mechanism and contribute to its reduced lifespan.

• Hard Water and Your Water Heater

  When your water heater utilizes hard water instead of soft water, it uses more energy – meaning you end up paying more for your monthly utility bills.

Hard Water and Your Body

Considering what hard water does to your household appliances, imagine what it can do to your body. Many homes in the US make use of refrigerators with built in water dispensers. It’s fantastic that you constantly have access to cold water whenever you feel like it. The problem is that if your refrigerator is using untreated hard water. Studies have shown that water that is too mineral rich can have an adverse effect on your health. Hard water can also clog up your shower heads and exacerbate any skin irritations or conditions you may have.

If you want to have your residential water system tested as well as ensure that you have a proper water treatment system in place, look no further than the team at Art Plumbing, Air Conditioning & Electric. For more information about residential water treatment solutions call us at 1-800-475-1504!