How hard is the water in Hancock County, IL?
15.5 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Hancock County, IL is 265 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 15.5 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 22 samples at 7 sites between 1990 and 2003, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 9.3 and 15.6 gpg. That spread crosses a decision line, so some homes here land on a different answer. A $10 test strip on your own tap settles it. Confidence in the county figure: medium (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 15.5 gpg a softener pays its way here. Before you buy, check the quoted unit's grain capacity against the sizing table below, and ask whether it regenerates on demand, which uses less salt than a timer. Call your utility for its own report if you are on city water. Because Hancock County straddles a decision line, check your own tap with a $10 test strip before you spend anything.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 6.0 to 20.7 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Hancock County was 102.5 mg/L and the hardest 355 mg/L, a 3-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 15.6 gpg and the bottom quarter below 9.3 gpg.
Wells 20.7 gpg, rivers and lakes 13.3 gpg
4 groundwater samples from 1 wells put the median at 355 mg/L. 18 surface samples from 6 sites put it at 227 mg/L. In Hancock County the wells come out 7.4 gpg harder. Groundwater sits in contact with rock for years and picks up calcium and magnesium as it goes, so wells usually read harder. A utility here that draws from the river can deliver noticeably different water from a private well next door.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 338 lb of salt a year (9 bags of 40 lb, about $61), 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 $161 a year.
Sizing at 15.5 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 930 | 24,000 | 113 lb |
| 2 | 1,860 | 24,000 | 226 lb |
| 4 | 3,720 | 32,000 | 453 lb |
| 6 | 5,580 | 40,000 | 679 lb |
Hancock County against the rest of Illinois
Among the 102 Illinois counties with data, Hancock County is number 63 of 102 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 71% of counties.
Softest in Illinois: Pope County at 4.3 gpg. Hardest: Cook County at 34.8 gpg. Closest to Hancock County: Will County (15.4), Grundy County (15.6), Brown County (15.2).