How hard is the water in LaGrange County, IN?

14.8 grains per gallon

A softener will pay its way here.

The median hardness measured in LaGrange County, IN is 253 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 14.8 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 5 samples at 2 sites between 2000 and 2000, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.

How much it varies here

Half the sites came in between 14.6 and 14.9 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: low (how it is measured).

What to do next

At 14.8 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.

More on sizing a softener for your household.

From 14.5 to 15.0 gpg

The softest single sample on record in LaGrange County was 248 mg/L and the hardest 257 mg/L, a 1-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 14.9 gpg and the bottom quarter below 14.6 gpg.

What a softener would cost to run

For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 322 lb of salt a year (9 bags of 40 lb, about $58), 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 $158 a year.

Sizing at 14.8 gpg

LaGrange County against the rest of Indiana

Among the 91 Indiana counties with data, LaGrange County is number 62 of 91 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 68% of counties.

Softest in Indiana: Brown County at 3.8 gpg. Hardest: Warrick County at 40.3 gpg. Closest to LaGrange County: Greene County (15.1), Knox County (15.2), Sullivan County (15.2).