Any suggestions? Looks like I'll be shifting soon to a hard water area of bengaluru and have bought washing machine last year. Don't want to damage that. plus the hair loss and skin issues. Suggest me something.
Measure the hardness first using a total hardness kit.
50 - 1000mg/l (steps of 50)
5 - 500mg/l (steps of 25)
The first one has a wider range whereas the second has smaller more precise steps but will require twice as many drops to measure in the final step.
With Cauvery water the second is good enough as this time of the year hardness approaches 200 and then drops to below 100 in the monsoons.
If you are NOT getting Cauvery water (likely since you said hard) then the hardness will be higher and may not drop much during the year. In which case you're better off with the first kit with the slightly larger steps.
TDS is not a measure of hardness and will be misleading. These kits use a titration method and are much more accurate.
Keep a bottle of Aquafina handy to rinse out the test tubes when taking samples.
Once you get a measurement so we know what degree of hardness then we can go into methods.
Previously i could see white powder like coating on my immersion water heater rod when i was not using alum. After using alum, no such white coating on the heater rod. It actually came out sparkling clean the first time. I think each bar is around 20 rupees. One bar a week should be enough to clean up the loft tank of 300-500 liters.
It might be interfering with scale formation. Those bars you use are for shaving and because they are 'finished' will cost more per weight. Look for unfinished alum from a traditional remedy store. They are sold as loose rocks and much cheaper. You can always break them into smaller sizes to target a desired weight.
Recently I was arguing about this with a cousin of mine in the US who thinks a little borax mixed in with detergent achieves the same effect with washing machines. I don't think it does but he swears by it. Maybe if the water is only slightly hard. The idea here is to inhibit scaling. It cannot descale or remove it once it has deposited. It's more economical to descale once every three months than to prevent scaling with each wash
For harder water a water conditioner like
Dcal that uses phosphates might be better. It just sits in your tank and slowly dissolves over time.
They call it a softener but it does not soften water as the above test kit will not detect any reduction. It is a water conditioner as the phosphates inhibit scaling.
How does your skin feel after using alum for bathing as there is no softening in the chemical sense. Still dry or what?
edit: forgot to add one thing. It burns the skin if you have cuts during shaving or you scratched your skin here or there accidentally. It dissolves completely in water and is quite safe. Whenever i shave, i can feel my chin or cheeks burn when i take a bath.
First, you should be shaving AFTER a bath and not before. The beard will be much softer and you won't be pressing on the razor as much and your skin will be less damaged as a result.
If it still burns then you need to improve your shaving technique or change out your blades more often. The test of how good your shave went is after a close 3 pass shave you should feel nothing when you rub the alum bar on your skin. Have discussed this over a decade ago in the wet shaving thread.
