How hard is the water in Bradley County, TN?
8.8 grains per gallon
A softener is worth it here.
The median hardness measured in Bradley County, TN is 151 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 8.8 gpg. That is hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 318 samples at 54 sites between 1990 and 2017, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 7.8 and 10.3 gpg. The whole middle of that range gives the same answer, so a test of your own tap is unlikely to change it. Confidence in the county figure: high (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 8.8 gpg a softener is worth getting, mainly to protect the water heater and cut soap use. Get at least two quotes, ask each installer what grain capacity they are fitting, and check it against the sizing table below.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 1.1 to 15.2 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Bradley County was 19 mg/L and the hardest 260 mg/L, a 14-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 10.3 gpg and the bottom quarter below 7.8 gpg. So even here some sites draw water soft enough to need nothing at all.
Wells 8.6 gpg, rivers and lakes 8.8 gpg
4 groundwater samples from 4 wells put the median at 147.5 mg/L. 314 surface samples from 50 sites put it at 150.5 mg/L. In Bradley County the rivers and lakes come out 0.2 gpg harder. Here the surface water reads harder than the wells, which often points to streams fed by limestone springs or irrigation return flow. The two sources are close, so the county figure should hold whichever one your tap is on.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 192 lb of salt a year (5 bags of 40 lb, about $35), and roughly 2,346 gallons of regeneration water. Installed, most units run $1,000 to $4,500; spread over 15 years with salt, that is about $135 a year.
Sizing at 8.8 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 528 | 24,000 | 64 lb |
| 2 | 1,056 | 24,000 | 128 lb |
| 4 | 2,112 | 24,000 | 257 lb |
| 6 | 3,168 | 24,000 | 385 lb |
Bradley County against the rest of Tennessee
Among the 95 Tennessee counties with data, Bradley County is number 31 of 95 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 46% of counties.
Softest in Tennessee: Fayette County at 0.5 gpg. Hardest: Fentress County at 42.9 gpg. Closest to Bradley County: Putnam County (8.8), Dickson County (8.9), Blount County (8.7).