Although new to this forum, my wife and I have been practicing the retirement life in our class A for nearly three years now. As we travel about we find more well water than treated city water and the iron and odor is sometimes unbearable (to say nothing of the hard water issues). We use an inline filter plus a four inch built in filter, neither of which do much for the iron and nothing for the hardness. There are plenty of systems claiming to be the cure all for water woes but do they really work? Are they a hassle? Are chemicals readily available? Is there a good reliable all-in-one system? We would like to hear about the good systems, the bad systems, and anything in between.

Thanks

Dan DeRenzy
Illinois

I use a "whole house filter". The one that came with the motorhome broke. I have tried to buy the part to fix it, but no one had has one, so I went to Home Depot and bought a new one.

Home Depot has under the counter filters that have charcoal as well as the paper cartridges.

Not wishing to be one of those "me too-ers", but me too.

We use a single-cartridge whole house filter. I bought it, along with the fittings to convert it from pipe to hose threads, at some big box store seven years ago when we started fulltiming.

I find that the cartridges that filter down to five microns or less and that have activated charcoal do an excellent job in most locations. They remove the taste of chlorine and other contaminants very well. Some folks don't believe you should remove the chlorine from water before letting it into your RV, though. They are afraid of stuff growing in the pipes and tanks. To deal with that, I add bleach to the water occasionally, let it sit in the tank, then pump it all out.

These cartridges last anywhere from a month to six months before the flow slows down or we can start tasting the off flavors in the local water again.

In areas with hard water, though, no filtration (other than reverse osmosis) will help. I have met a number of folks with portable water softeners from Camping World. They have all been happy with them. We simply buy water from those 25 cent machines when we are in those areas. We use the local water for everything but drinking, coffee, and tea. We go through around a gallon a day of the bottled stuff.

In Mexico we do the same, except we usually have purified water delivered in five gallon jugs. After you pay three or four dollars for the first jug, they charge between 60 cents and $1.70 for five gallons.

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Dave Rudisill

Thanks for the responses on the filters. We are definitely going to purchase one.

We recently purchased and On The Go portable water softener and have been very favorably impressed with it. We use it when we are on well water and also use a disposable in line filter all of the time. It recharges with a small round can of household salt ($.44) and will last for two to four weeks with daily usage. It stores easily in the basement without taking up a lot of room. Just a word of caution if you get one do not lay it down after you start using it or you will have a mess to clean up.

Hello Dewwood and welcome aboard!
Am interested in your "On the Go" water softener! I have rural roots and when visiting, we have a real challenge with the well water: iron stains and 'bloody' smelling showers. Yikes!
1. Where did you purchase... and if I may so bold... what should I expect to pay?
2. Can I just attach in-line at the freshwater hook-up?

Our 'whole-house' water filter has somehow become fused together, and I'm concerned I'll break it trying to unscrew to replace the filter.

Currently just use inline filters from Wal-Mart, etc., however they are quickly overwelmed when we visit my beloved family.

Thanks again for joining into the chatter! Looking forward to hearing back from you.
Cheers!