How hard is the water in Parke County, IN?
16.4 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Parke County, IN is 281 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 16.4 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 679 samples at 36 sites between 1990 and 2004, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 15.1 and 18.8 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 16.4 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 2.5 to 25.7 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Parke County was 43 mg/L and the hardest 440 mg/L, a 10-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 18.8 gpg and the bottom quarter below 15.1 gpg. So even here some sites draw water soft enough to need nothing at all.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 359 lb of salt a year (9 bags of 40 lb, about $65), 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 $165 a year.
Sizing at 16.4 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 984 | 24,000 | 120 lb |
| 2 | 1,968 | 24,000 | 239 lb |
| 4 | 3,936 | 32,000 | 479 lb |
| 6 | 5,904 | 48,000 | 718 lb |
Parke County against the rest of Indiana
Among the 91 Indiana counties with data, Parke County is number 51 of 91 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 74% of counties.
Softest in Indiana: Brown County at 3.8 gpg. Hardest: Warrick County at 40.3 gpg. Closest to Parke County: Putnam County (16.3), St. Joseph County (16.2), Decatur County (16.6).