John Finch

Review of East Midlands SHA

After two weeks with our first water softener, we ...

After two weeks with our first water softener, we are very pleased. First the company: pre-sales advice was great. The sales manager answered all my questions, assessed my requirements and offered two alternative products for our situation. We chose a AQ8 metered unit because it was a long-standing, proven design, and would fit under our undermounted sink. Delivery was prompt and free, and our installer found all needed accessories. After-sales support by both phone and email answered a few minor questions. It might have been better to publish a user-oriented manual in addition to the supplied booklet which dealt mostly with installation. Cannot fault EMWC yet, their product and support have been better than expected - many softener companies do not do well on these counts.

Secondly, water softening itself: if you live in a hard water area, do it! You will be amazed at life without limescale. Manufacturers should do more to dispel the myths about these units: first, the water coming out of the tap does not taste salty, in fact I prefer the taste without the London minerals. So we did not bother to split off a drinking water tap directly from the main, or install a filter - it just wasn't worth it. Second, our unit does not affect our combi-boiler delivered shower pressure at all! Even our installer was sceptical, having had customers complain about reduced water pressure in the past, but technology must have moved on - or the EMWC product is simply better.

The company included a free water hardness testing kit, which was pretty easy to use to test the hardness (ours was 330 ppm!). You enter this figure on the screen of the controller unit during installation, and it seems to know how much to soften the water. This is a metered unit, so it detects how much water has gone through it and then regenerates at 2am about once a week. This process does not seem to make much noise at all. We bought 30kg of salt with the unit, but don't really know yet how long it will last; supposedly 3 -4 months. Adding salt is very easy, you open the small door at the front and just shovel or pour it in. My guess is we will have to do this about once a month, but cannot tell yet. The regeneration takes about 30 minutes and makes practically no noise, just a squishing sound as the water passes through the unit. During normal use, it makes no noise at all.

Our kitchen installer connected the unit, and he didn't grumble at all so it cannot have been that hard. It fits perfectly under the under-mounted sink with room to spare. You run a regeneration manually at first, just press a button on the front of the control panel. If you forget to add salt, it just won't soften your water - it will not damage the unit I don't think. I will just top up the salt as I think of it.

Overall, I am very pleased with EMWC and their product. They have been doing this for a long time, and it shows. If you have hard water, take a leap and forget about replacing kettles, spending hours cleaning your shower, and watching your appliances get crusted with lime scale. At this price point, it's a no-brainer and we should have done it years ago.