Filters for washing machines and their types - what is better to choose

The washing machine of automatic type is not a piece of furniture, but an assistant in household chores.

Such a construction is rather expensive, and the future owner wishes to give it all necessary conditions for it to serve him for a long time.

One of the main points of longevity is to provide the washing machine with high-quality and clean water.

Discover the causes

Where does the dirt come from?

As many already know that in Russian cities plumbing is not in very good condition, so the water from this system, coming into the machine, contains a certain amount of rust and dirt.

Getting into your machine these impurities:

• It can break your solenoid valve, your exhaust valve.as well as the drain pump. It occurs due to the fact that these impurities impose on the above parts of your machine and can violate their performance, thereby reducing the service life of one or another element.
• Clogging the filter. Mechanical particles get into all layers of the filter and clog it, thereby reducing the inlet pressure.
• Can affect washing quality. A large amount of detergent (powder or conditioner) is needed to ensure that your clothes come out of the machine clean.
  Very dangerous for the machine and an increased concentration of hardness salts.
  During the washing process, these particles settle on the heating element, the seal and the drum.
  As soon as you notice such a sediment, clean it immediately, otherwise it threatens you with the breakdown of all units of the construction.
• It can reduce the efficiency of the cross-sectional areaand also the flow capacity of the piping, thereby creating blockages that will increase the load on the pumping device.
• May impair the heat output of the heating elements.That significantly reduces the efficiency of the washing machine and increases the consumption of electrical energy.
  As a result of overheating can break the heating element.
• Increase the development of corrosionThe heating element can be damaged by overheating, which promotes rapid wear of the elements and reduces their service life.
• Reduce the elasticity of seals (rubber gaskets). Reduce the elasticity of (rubber) seals which can cause leaks.

Accessories for water treatment

To get rid of mechanical particles (impurities) is only possible by pre-treating the water before it enters the washing machine.

In order to reduce the level of hardness and protect the machine from scaling gently, use special chemicals during the washing process or prepare the water in advance - soften.

To solve such problems it is necessary to put special purifying filters on the water inlet.

Coarse filters.

In order to reduce the amount of impurities, the water should be treated with coarse filters.

One such strainer is installed at the inlet to the washing machine, but, unfortunately, the size of the cells of this device, which pass impurities of the mechanical type, are designed only for large particles, which means that small particles pass unhindered.

Manufacturers design filters for the conditions of clean and high-quality water. But as a result of a high concentration of impurities, such a filter clogs very quickly.

In such cases, you need additional external coarse filters.

Main filter

The best option is a mainline filter.

Why is the filter called a main filter? Because it serves the main pipeline of cold water at the point of entry to the apartment. It cleans the water from all kinds of contaminants before it enters the apartment.

The best solution to the above problems is to buy strainers with a mesh size of 50 to 500 micrometers.

Such filtration is considered good for household needs.

If you need to purify your water even more (i.e. get water even cleaner than it is and still be of good quality), you should resort to a booster water filtration.

In such a variant, the filter includes sorption filter parts with activated carbon and parts that use other similar principles of action.

When installing the main filter, the incoming water does not need to be additionally pretreated.

If this main filter is not installed at the inlet to your home, then for cleaning from mechanical particles such a filter is mounted in front of the machine.

The dimensions will be slightly smaller, and the required size of the cells will be chosen according to the recommendation of the manufacturer.

In such cases, the structure is installed on the branch of the water supply system, to which the hose (filler) is directly connected.

Liquid softeners

In order to prevent large scale formation during the process of heating water in the washing machine, special filters-softeners are installed on the inlet of the structure.

Important! The cost of this special filter-softener is small, but the installation of such a device will require you a lot of time and some money. To install this filter must change the distribution of pipes, because it is placed in a break in the pipeline.

Basically, such a filter is installed by the results of chemical examination, precisely in the case when the answer is the following: "increased rigidity".

Let us be frank, these special filters-softeners do not reduce the hardness of the incoming water in the washing structure.

Water softening is the removal of a variety of dissolved salts of hardness, especially calcite (calcium carbonate).

Filters purify water by means of special equipment and special biological and chemical treatment processes.

Household filters cannot do this job. They only reduce the occurrence of limescale in the machine.

Magnetic and chemical treatments are used to soften the water to make it less hard.

Polyphosphate-based washing machine filters

The chemical method of treatment performs a polyphosphate filter. Such a filter is made in the form of a transparent container filled with sodium polyphosphate crystals.

When the water passes through this filter, the crystals inside dissolve little by little.

When sodium polyphosphate enters the water, it binds carbonates (the base of hardness salts) and blocks their way to the heating element and other parts of the washing machine (this also includes the dishwasher).

As a result, scale formation on the heating element and other elements of the machine is reduced.

The user should control the level of filling of the filter container with sodium polyphosphate crystals and when they are low enough refill them.

Polyphosphate filters do not completely treat the water coming into the machine, because this substance, which is in the filter (crystals), makes the water unfit for use.

Important! Sodium polyphosphate is an inorganic fertilizer which, when released into rivers or lakes, causes algae to grow dramatically.

So basically, on an industrial scale, this method of scale control is not used.

Such special filters, as a rule, are installed in front of the washing structure.

The filter is cut into the water supply (in the branch), to which the washing assistant's fill hose is connected.

Tip! When buying a washing machine in his apartment, some buyers are immediately looking at the future installation of filters, softeners, and filters for rough treatment.

For this purpose, specially on the water pipe with a special valve, to which the filler hose is connected, are mounted two bulbs for replacement cartridges.

In the process of installation, such an addition is not particularly costly, but will save you the need to change the wiring, if the results of the examination is not in a very good position (water analysis).

Magnetic purifiers

The work of the magnetic filter is based on the effect of the phase transition of the substance under the influence of a magnetic field.

At the moment of treatment with hard water calcite (calcium carbonate), whose concentration in the salt of hardness exceeds the content of all other substances, when exposed to a magnetic field and the flow of hard water, does not change the chemical composition, but it turns into aragonite (another structural form).

The flat structure of calcium carbonate is characterized by a large adhesion area. In the end, it is because of this that the substance precipitates on the walls of the washing machine and on the heating elements.

The aragonite structure does not have such an even surface.

Aragonite also forms spatial structures in the centers of crystallization, which do not sit on the walls of the machine and the heating element, but on the ionic and molecular levels affect other deposits.

In this case, limescale, which has already settled on the machine walls, is destroyed, and its particles also getting into water, have already lost their property to sit on the walls again.

In this case, the water after treatment by a magnetic field, is able to clean the walls of the washing machine from other various sediments.

This filter for the washing machine, as well as previous do not soften the water, but contribute to a kind of barrier from limescale and other sediments in the application of chemical or mechanical cleaning of the washing structure.

The effectiveness of such filters so far has been confirmed only by the results of scientific laboratories.

Disadvantages

The use of magnetic filters is a controversial issue because of their disadvantages:

• Used magnets in filter can not create a high voltage magnetic field, and a weak one will not give a good effect.
  The only way that works is to purchase rare-earth magnets, but their price is quite high.
• The effect is lost at high water temperature.
  Also, the degree of effectiveness varies depending on the pressure of the water flow.
  In this case, the simplest and more practical option - electromagnetic filters, which provide a high voltage magnetic field through pulsed action.
  However, such devices are only used on an industrial scale, they have not yet been introduced at the household level.

Advantages

The advantages of such special filters for installation in the washing machine:

• Simple installation process.
  It is not necessary to change the wiring, as well as installed on the supply pipe.
  Manufacturers have designed split-case magnetic filters that are placed on the washing machine's fill hose.
• Durability. Even if it takes a long time to use this filter, the strength of the magnetic field still changes very slowly, and the impact can remain the same for about ten years or even more.
• Magnetic filter does not need any cleaning and maintenance.
• Reasonable cost.