If you are on a private well around Helotes, Boerne, Bulverde or Bandera County, you are drawing from the Trinity aquifer and no SAWS figure applies to your house. Your water is whatever your own ground gives you, and it can carry iron, sulphur and bacteria that city water never does. That changes both what well water treatment your house needs and the order it has to go in.
Sediment first, then iron and hydrogen sulphide, then softening, then disinfection. Put a softener ahead of untreated iron and it will foul and destroy the resin bed. That is the single most expensive mistake made on well installations, and it is usually made by someone who sized the equipment without reading a laboratory result.
What Hill Country well water actually carries
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Hardness, often higher than the city figure
Anyone quoting you the San Antonio number is quoting the wrong water. Wells in this ground routinely test differently, and the softener has to be sized to your reading.
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Iron
Orange staining in the toilet bowl, the shower and the laundry, and a metallic taste. It has to be oxidised out before the water reaches a softener.
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Hydrogen sulphide
The rotten-egg smell, usually worse on the hot side. Oxidation or a dedicated filter deals with it. A softener does not.
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Sediment and fine sand
Straight from the formation or from a pump drawing low. It blocks aerators, jams fill valves and shortens everything downstream of it.
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Bacteria
A well is not disinfected by a utility, so this is on you. Ultraviolet disinfection is the usual answer and it goes last, after the water is already clear.
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Pressure and flow from the pump itself
Treatment equipment adds resistance. A system sized without accounting for the pump and the pressure tank gives you clean water and disappointing showers.
The four stages, in the order they have to go
Not every well needs all four. The analysis decides which stages come out of the specification, and dropping one you do not need is the cheapest change we can make to a quote. What cannot change is the sequence of the ones you keep.
| Stage | What it handles | Why it sits here |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Sediment | Sand, silt, formation fines | Protects every piece of equipment behind it, and it is the cheapest thing to replace. |
| 2. Iron and sulphide | Staining, metallic taste, rotten-egg smell | Must come out before the softener, or the resin bed is destroyed. |
| 3. Softening | Hardness: scale and spotting | Only works properly on water that is already clear of iron. |
| 4. Ultraviolet | Bacteria | Goes last, because UV only disinfects water that is already clear enough to pass light. |
Ultraviolet disinfection, and what it does not do
UV is the standard answer to bacteria on a private well. It uses no chemicals, changes nothing about the taste, and needs no contact tank. What it needs is clear water: turbidity and iron block the light and a lamp shining through cloudy water is not disinfecting it. That is the whole reason it sits at the end of the train rather than the start.
It is also the one stage with a service interval you cannot skip. The lamp loses output long before it stops glowing, so an annual lamp change is the job, not a repair you do when something looks wrong. Chlorination is the alternative where flow rates or water quality make UV impractical.
What drives the price
A well water system covers more ground than a city install, so a single published figure would be meaningless. These are what actually move it. You get the full number, and the annual running cost separately, before anything is ordered.
| Factor | Why it moves the price |
|---|---|
| How many stages the analysis calls for | A well needing only softening is a fraction of one needing iron removal and UV as well. |
| Iron concentration | Low iron can go on a filter. High iron needs oxidation, which is a larger installation. |
| Flow rate the house needs | Equipment is sized to peak demand. Undersizing shows up as poor shower pressure. |
| Where the pressure tank sits | A well house with room and a drain is straightforward. A cramped utility closet is not. |
| Drain and power at the equipment | Backwashing stages need a drain, UV needs a receptacle. Adding either is separate work. |
| Laboratory analysis | A real lab panel costs more than a strip and is the only basis we will specify from. |
How we approach well water treatment
- Laboratory analysis first. Hardness, iron, manganese, hydrogen sulphide, pH, turbidity and a bacteriological result.
- We read the pump and pressure tank as part of the job, because treatment equipment has to live within the flow they can deliver.
- We specify stages in treatment order and tell you which ones your water does not call for.
- Installation with bypass valves on every stage, so any one of them can be serviced without taking the house off water.
If you have an existing system that was fitted in the wrong order, we will say so and tell you what it would take to re-sequence it. Sometimes that is a smaller job than people expect, because the equipment is fine and only the plumbing around it is wrong.
Servicing an existing well water system
| Situation | The usual call |
|---|---|
| Staining came back after the softener was serviced | Iron reaching the resin. Re-sequencing, not new equipment |
| Pressure dropped across the whole house | Blocked sediment stage. Cartridge or media change. |
| Smell returned on the hot side only | Sulphide plus the anode rod in the water heater. Often solved at the heater. |
| UV lamp is past its service interval | Annual lamp change. Routine service |
| Softener resin fouled by years of untreated iron | The bed does not recover. Replacement, plus iron removal ahead of it |
- Have the well tested after any change to the pump, the casing or the surrounding ground
- Change the UV lamp annually whether or not it is still lit
- Keep sediment cartridges on a schedule rather than waiting for pressure to fall
- Retest bacteriologically at least once a year
- Keep bypass valves on every stage so one failure does not take the house off water
Work is carried out by licensed plumbers under our Responsible Master Plumber, license RMP-43333, issued by the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners. You can verify that license yourself.
What Hill Country homeowners say
Reviews pulled live from our Google Business Profile, not retyped here.
Frequently asked questions
Does the San Antonio hardness figure apply to my well?
No. SAWS figures describe city supply. On a private well you are drawing from the Trinity aquifer and your reading is your own. Anyone quoting the city number for your house is quoting the wrong water.
Why does a test strip not count?
A strip gives you a rough hardness reading and nothing else. It will not tell you iron, manganese, sulphide, pH, turbidity or whether there is bacteria present, and those decide both the equipment and the order it goes in.
Can I just put in a softener?
Only if the analysis says hardness is the whole problem. If there is iron in the water, a softener on its own will foul and you will be replacing the resin bed early.
Does UV change the taste of the water?
No. It adds nothing and removes nothing chemically. It deals with bacteria and leaves everything else exactly as it was.
How often does a UV lamp need changing?
Annually, as a rule, and it is not optional. Output falls off well before the lamp stops visibly glowing, so a lamp that still looks fine may have stopped disinfecting.
What about the rotten-egg smell in only the hot water?
That usually points at the reaction between sulphide and the anode rod inside the water heater rather than at the well itself. It is worth checking the heater before specifying treatment for the whole house.
Do you handle well water outside San Antonio proper?
Yes. Helotes, Boerne, Bulverde, Schertz, Somerset, Stone Oak and the surrounding Hill Country, which is where most of the well water work is.
Can you fix a system that was installed in the wrong order?
Usually. Often the equipment itself is sound and only the pipework sequence is wrong, which is a smaller job than replacing it.
Do I need a permit for well water treatment equipment?
It depends on the jurisdiction and on what the installation involves, particularly where a drain connection is added. We handle the permit where one is required.
A well deserves a laboratory result, not a doorstep guess.
We analyse what your ground is actually giving you, specify the stages in the order they have to go, and give you the number in writing before anything is ordered.
Silverback Plumbing & Drain provides licensed plumbing and drain service for homes and businesses throughout the San Antonio area. From emergency repairs to routine maintenance, we diagnose the problem, explain the fix, and get it done right the first time.
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Copyright © 2026 Silverback Plumbing and Drain
Mark Vargas, Responsible Master Plumber #43333 Licensed through the Texas Board of Plumbing Examiners P.O. Box 4200, Austin, Texas 78765 (800-845-6584)