How hard is the water in Montague County, TX?
37.5 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Montague County, TX is 642 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 37.5 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 5 samples at 5 sites between 1994 and 1994, drawn from groundwater wells, which is what most taps and private wells in the county draw on.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 24 and 47.6 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: medium (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 37.5 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.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 19.2 to 93.5 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Montague County was 328 mg/L and the hardest 1,600 mg/L, a 5-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 47.6 gpg and the bottom quarter below 24 gpg.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 48,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 819 lb of salt a year (21 bags of 40 lb, about $147), 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 $247 a year.
Sizing at 37.5 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2,250 | 24,000 | 274 lb |
| 2 | 4,500 | 32,000 | 548 lb |
| 4 | 9,000 | 64,000 | 1,095 lb |
| 6 | 13,500 | twin tank | 1,643 lb |
Montague County against the rest of Texas
Among the 217 Texas counties with data, Montague County is number 25 of 217 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 97% of counties.
Softest in Texas: Nacogdoches County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Ward County at 218.5 gpg. Closest to Montague County: Throckmorton County (37.2), Terry County (36.3), Armstrong County (38.8).