If so, you are familiar with soap refusing to rinse off. I just got a water softener and I found a solution. Epsom salt is magnesium sulfate. It's also beneficial on the skin. So I dissolved some in hot water and filled a half-pint spray bottle. After showering off the soap as best I could, I sprayed some of the epsom salt solution on my hand and the soap was instantly gone. Here's what I did to make it simple: I put about 3 or 4 tablespoons of epsom salt in a pint plastic bottle and filled it with hot water. This is my stock solution. Then I got a half pint spray bottle because you won't need more than that, and I poured about 2 teaspoons into the spray bottle from my concentrated stock solution bottle. Then I filled the spray bottle with hot water (you won't want to spray cold water on you) and took it into the shower with me. Spray it on after showering and the soap washes right off. There you have it. Problem solved. Try it! It works great and I find my method isn't much bother. My stock solution has lasted a couple of months.
It's not really soap that you feel. It is just hydrated skin that is slippery clean, and a wee bit of sodium bicarbonate. Soft water leaves you cleaner than hard water but it feels strange.
I'm a chemist. It's the soap. Soap (sodium stearate) ionizes in water and when there are no calcium or magnesium ions present in the water to bond with the stearate ion, the stearate ion binds with the amino acid in skin and sticks. It does that anyway but in hard water the calcium ions are able to "overpower" it, bond with it in place of the amino acid, tear it away from the amino acid, and wash it away. The stearate, when bonded with skin amino acid, is only one molecule thick, and that is enough for it to feel slippery. Water softener companies have been promoting the idea that there's really no soap remaining and it's just clean skin you feel that is "naturally slippery". They promote this BS as a sales pitch. Their sales go down when people think soft water leaves soap on the skin, which is exactly what it does. But the epsom salt works. I was able to figure out that epsom salt might work becasue I'm familiar with the chemistry involved. And it works.
Here's several dozen links that say otherwise. https://www.google.com/search?sourc....2.41l918.0.0.1.15421...........0.0S8kAbPmCuI
You folks be cray cray. I have lived in areas that had both and the only difference was the hard water places left a metallic taste in my mouth. If you feel soapy, use less soap.
I know about them and more. The chemistry isn't there. Your third link in the list - http://chemistry.about.com/od/howthingsworkfaqs/a/softwaterrinse.htm Exactly as I also said. Notice that most of the rest of the links are those of water solutions/softener companies. They have a vested interest that I explained.
Usually a metallic taste is due to iron in the water. Did you have iron in your water? When many people report that water softened by a mechanical/chemical softener leave skin feeling slippery, it isn't very smart to say they're "cray cray."
Fairly sure it had everything in it. You need less soap with soft water because you are not having to scrub the hard water gunk off you. They are cray cray because they are using too much soap and then blaming the water.
You don't understand the chemistry involved. You need less soap with soft water because much of the soap is lost in hard water as the calcium ions bind to the stearate ions and take them away in the water stream. It's not about scrubbing "gunk" off you. It's about ions and valences. And it's the same ionization explanation as I gave that is responsible for the soap remaining stuck to your skin in soft water. Why do people want to argue everything?
Sorry, I don't know all the claimed benefits of epsom salt, but I'm sure you could Google it. That is what I would do.
We just got it because scale was destroying coffeemakers, dishwashers, and leaving scale on all the sinks, showers, and toilets with the removal requiring chipping it off. Never had hard water, huh?
Yes, epsom salt will help with dry skin, also sore muscles and tired feet. When you get through soaking your tired muscles and sore feet water your plants, they will love it. Check it out here.. http://www.epsomsaltcouncil.org
