WOW $8000. And that doesn't include an RO or anything else. I normally measure ferrous iron at three times and combine with hardness to get compensated hardness (CH). Too high is better than not high enough. At 19 gpg CH that is not a big deal and a great many softeners can handle that without too much trouble. Of course, some will perform better than others. Some will be a higher price and others will cost more in operating costs. But your water is not a difficult or challenging project. Eventhough you get 19 gpm flow from the well, there are few times when that much is need to operate a softener in normally residential situations. In fact, a flow restrction would be needed as not to cause the resins to piston during backwash. As far as trying to sell a 'sulfur problem' where there is none, says something about your local sales methods. If you are not experiencing now, then don't worry till then. You can get a top-of-the-line water softener for far less than what you are being quoted. I see no need to get special iron treatment unless your iron is ferric, colloidal, bacterial or organic. A quality softener will take care of it. You mentioned a dual tank system. What are your thoughts here? Hang it there, and let us know what your concerns are and maybe we can help you select proper equipment. Andy Christensen, CWS-II

If you have a weeping system around the perimeter of your house it is 'supposed' to drain to the storm drain system and not the sewage drain system. Only way to check that is to scope it and make sure nothing else attaches to the sewer drain from outside the house. If the weepers are correctly not attached to the sewage line then you can install the backflow preventer where you plan it. If your town is small and does not have a storm drain system then you would install the backflow preventer outside, past the connection point where the weeper connects. You don't want a backup filling your weepers with water or sewage. Basically the backflow preventer needs to be the closest thing to the city sewage to work properly. Also you need to have access to the preventer in case it needs service. It is basically like a cleanout access.

Wow! This opened my eyes! I have allergies to almost all metals (which change from decade to decade). The only thing I can wear is my sterling silver wedding ring (probably cause I've been wearing it for almost 40 years!) It kinda makes me wonder if different cook wear has contributed to the change in my asthma/allergies this year that I have never had before? I got some 3rd degree burns last year and found out that the main medication they use contained silver and they weren't able to use it! Hmmmmmm something to look into! Nancy

I was going to suggest going off grid electric, but given the power demands for the hobbies, that is a lot of panels. Still, I'd do the calculations. Is that a good wind area? If you can do it, you might flip David's suggestion of one utility around. Going back at least a decade, there are plenty of people out there that got disgusted with the cost of brining in electricity and went off grid instead. If you have nat gat, genset manufacturers have finally come around to making DC gensets for that application. (You really need a generator to equalize batteries by my understanding. That may well be, however, for flooded cell batteries only.) How come 3 ph is not a better way than single? You'd get 50% more power adding a third conductor of the same size. If you can get the POCO to give you 3 ph open delta, you can have 3 ph and 240V. That said,as Mike pointed out, with the cost of VFDs so low, what's the point? I was shocked when I looked at costs online a few months back. Note that you have to be careful about how the utility bills other than residential 124/240 too. The local utilities commission regulates that and some make sure that commercial and industrial users pay more by charging lots more/kWh for anything 3 phase. If you build efficiently, your costs other than the shop, hobby and domestic hot water can be be nil. Tankless and recirc seems like a weird match to me. You have a system that provides hot water on demand so you have no standby losses, then you connect it to a system with standby losses. Is the recirc going to be on a timer or controlled with occupancy sensors? If I have gas and need a new water heater, I'd buy a Westinghouse WGR060NG076 or larger tank and never look back. That goes especially with hard water unless you plan to install a water softener. Have you done the well research yet or maybe drilled already? I'd go with induction for your cooking hobs if you want easy clean-up. There is nothing easier. If you are not sure about it, buy a plug-in unit and see if you like it. You may save a lot of AC costs in addition to the straight savings at the cooktop. Ideally, I'd like one resistance hob for simmering. They suffer from the same drawbacks of the duty-cycle controlled power output as thermostatic resistance heating devices. I don't know if inverter powered induction is theoretically possible or practical as it is for microwave ovens, but it might work well if it is.