tap water testing

[debrab1954]

hi i am new at this so i hope someone can help me i just received my nutrafin kh/gh test kit and i wanted to test my tap water i have well water and a water softener system that uses salt pellets with the gh test i had to add 3 drops to get the color on the chart and the kh test i had to add 30 drops my ph is 7.0 i dont really know what the gh/kh reading means i want to start a planted tank and have fish do you think my soften well water is ok to use i have read somewhere that water softners are not good for plants is this true i dont have a way to bypass my water softner system thanks

[orthikon]

It should say somewhere on the test regarding the degree of hardness.

On my test kit the degree of hardness is how many drops it would take to change color. eg: 12 drops = 12 dH. Look at that site below for more detail.

http://faq.thekrib.com/begin-chem.html

That should help you. I haven't had much experience on that myself since I'm a newbie but that site has a wealth of info.