Does boiling hard water make it soft.. even just a bit?

Question

for washing, skin/hair.. want to see if soft water is better

Answer 1

Boiling "hard" water (mineral-rich) and collecting the condensate (the vapors) requires special glassware.  This is often called a "distillation apparatus".  If you boil water in a pot, then let it cool, whatever water remains in the pot still has those dissolved minerals that makes it "hard".

You can pass the water through various filters to remove some minerals (demineralizing filter, aka de-ionizing filter) such as "Brita" or "Pur", but these only remove some materials.  You can purchase in almost any supermarket "Distilled" water.  This is water that was distilled and is free of many minerals and other water-hardening ions.  Expect to pay anywhere from 79 cents to up to $2/gallon.  79 to 99 cents is reasonable.  "Spring" water is not necessarily "soft".

Answer 2

The short answer is "sort of".  I'm not sure you want to get into a lot of chemistry with this, but hard water is "hard" because it contains some dissolved metals like calcium and magnesium, along with the carbonate ion.  When heated, calcium carbonate will precipitate out of the hard water as a white crust and the resulting water will have a little less calcium and carbonate ions.  So from that standpoint boiling hard water will "soften" it a bit, but you'll have to deal with the solid that was deposited.

Answer 3

When people say that the water is "hard", that means that there are minerals in the water that give it undesirable properties like an odd taste.  to soften water it needs to be treated, most easily achieved by purchasing a water softener which uses salts and osmosis to remove the unwanted minerals from the water leaving it in a more pure form.  if you were to go with the boiling route, you would have to distill and collect the evaporated water separately, not just simply bring the water to a boil and let it cool.

Answer 4

Boiling the water will remove hardness as long as the solid CaCO3 that precipitates

Temporary hardness, caused by hydrogen carbonate (or bicarbonate) ions, can be removed by boiling. For example, calcium hydrogen carbonate, often present in temporary hard water, is boiled in a kettle to remove the hardness. In the process, a scale forms on the inside of the kettle in a process known as "furring". This scale is composed of calcium carbonate.

Ca(HCO3)2 → CaCO3 + CO2 + H2O

MORE METHODS TO MAKE IT SOFT ARE

Hardness can also be reduced with a lime-soda ash treatment

The addition of sodium carbonate also softens permanently hard water containing calcium sulfate, as the calcium ions form calcium carbonate which precipitates out and sodium sulfate is formed which is soluble. The calcium carbonate that is formed sinks to the bottom. Sodium sulfate has no effect on the hardness of water.

Na2CO3 + CaSO4 → Na2SO4 + CaCO3

The most economical way to soften household water is with an ion exchange water softener. This unit uses sodium chloride (table salt) to recharge beads made of the ion exchange resins that exchange hardness mineral ions for sodium ions. Artificial or natural zeolites can also be used

i think my answer is best. because i spent one hour at your question.. what you think???