Over the past few months, I noticed that our tap water was starting to smell.  I can't even describe the smell other than being unpleasant.   Some homes have the problem of their water smelling like sulphur (I.e., "rotten eggs"), but ours wasn't quite that bad... yet.   I ran some water from the spigot right where the water enters the house and that water did have a little bit of a sulphur smell. 

Being a do-it-yourself kind of guy, I headed online to try and figure-out what the issue was and how to resolve it.  Knowing the water smelled at the spigot coming into the house eliminated the water heater as being the problem.  I had replaced a heating element in our electric water heater a few months ago, so I thought that I might have introduced some bacteria to the water tank, but that was apparently not the case.

The first course of action recommended to me by several people online was to have the water tested for bacteria.  I found-out the City of Jackson, just east of where I live, will perform this test if I stopped by their city hall and got a bottle for the test.   They suggested I take a sample from my basement spigot in the morning and get the bottle to them as soon as possible because the water test isn't valid if the water is 24 or more hours old.  In addition, to get the sample, it was recommended that I use bleach on the spigot to kill any germs, then use a torch to further disinfect the spigot, followed by running the water for a few minutes to make sure that the water sample test actually tested the well water and not some build-up of bacteria on the spigot.

If it turned-out to be a bacteria problem, most web site's recommended "shocking" the well.   I.e., dumping chlorine bleach into the well to kill the bacteria.   Aside form sounding like a lot of work, one issue I had with this is that it's been well below freezing for weeks and although I want the smell to go away, I also don't want to freeze-up my pipes or create an ice-slick in my yard.

So, I decided to call Hanson's Soft Water in Menomonee Falls to come-out and determine if I even needed to test my well for bacteria.  I'm glad I made the call, because I was definitely on the wrong track as to why my water smelled!

After about 10 seconds of looking at the iron filter in my basement, the service man showed me what the problem was.   Under the cover of the iron filter control unit is a wheel with little pegs in it that determine when the iron filter will cycle.   The problem was that all the pegs were pushed "in" which meant the iron filter had never run since we moved into the house!

Apparently the sulphur smell that many experience with their water is the result of iron in their water and the iron filter should eliminate that smell.   It's my guess that because we have a water softener, our tap water didn't smell like sulphur because it was being treated by the softener. 

Although I'm now $100 poorer for the house call, I'm glad I called Hanson's Soft Water because I might've otherwise spent all sorts of money and time on water tests and shocking my well, only to not resolve the problem.   Now that I know what the issue was, it makes sense as to why I noticed the inside of my dishwasher was starting to turn yellow and my white close never seemed to be very white.