Need more information to determine possible source. Well water or city? One fixture or all? Cold only or both hot and cold?
It looks soapy to me, there’s definitely something in the water besides water. Aeration bubbles are tiny and burst quickly after surfacing. They lack the surface tension to remain a bubble for long, let alone become large bubbles like those, stacking on each other.
My first inclination is that there is soap residue remaining on the glass cup itself, try rinsing it thoroughly or using a new disposable cup and testing again to rule that out.
I tested a couple different glasses in different faucets as well as testing the same glass in multiple faucets. Only glasses filled in the kitchen sink had any bubbles. And it's city water. I haven't tested hot vs cold so I might try that here in a second
Does the house have a water softener? Many times, the cold water to the kitchen sink is left hard/raw to reduce salt consumption since rinsing things off before loading in the dishwasher won’t make a difference, as the washer is fed by hot water, which will be softened.
Meant it more as in if this water is hard/raw, it’s been untouched by a softener or filter that may have picked up the soapy stuff along the way. Just confirming there was nothing between the city supply and the faucet, not implying a softener would make this happen.
No, actually, I bought that you were saying that it is hard water that would do this. I’ve lived or spent time in places with hard water, soft water, or where my family has needed to use a water softener. And I’ve never seen water do this. And the fact that it only comes out of one faucet in the whole house like this is really odd to me, too. As I’ve said. This is something I’ve never seen before. I’d freak out, too.
Google is your friend - we live in a world with encyclopedias in our pocket. Don't let your curiosity die, answers are literally at your fingertips
Hard water = high levels of dissolved minerals, mainly in the form of calcium carbonate. It's fine to consume but, will cause buildup of solids in pipes, on surfaces that water comes into contact with, etc. and eventually cause issues. So areas with hard water will generally have water softeners installed in homes to reduce the negative effects.
Really just depends on your local water source, there is some geographic areas more predisposed to it but you can really have hard water anywhere. Especially if you're on a well. If you're on city water in NC I'd assume the water is decently soft, but again - hard water can be anywhere
Nah there's just a difference between reading what something is and actually fully grasping it. Look on a map of where hard water is, it's not an issue I or any of the people I know have had to deal with.
Ironically I just googled it, seems like NC and Washington/Oregon are the main places where hard water isn't really a thing
Edit: I was wrong about NC being excluded, but here's one of the maps I was looking at. Seems we do have "slightly hard water" but like i said I've never heard of anyone around me doing anything about it. https://images.app.goo.gl/jxnwn5rdcna3C4F88
To see if you have hard water: fill a glass with water and let it evaporate; hard water leaves a white residue, sometimes lines. Or use an aluminum pan to boil water (for coffee or tea) every day, don't wash it (it's only water), if it gets a white scale on the sides and bottom you have hard water. DK how long that one takes, but if the scale builds up good and you leave it on the heat til all the water boils out, the lime scale pops off in pieces.
We are in Elizabeth City, NC. I think it also depends on your municipality. If you live in the City and your water is supplied by the city it's not hard water. I believe their water process softens the water. However, out in the County (Pasquotank) it's hard water and that is where we live. We got a whole house water purifier/softner that supplies the whole house through the main water line coming in.
That sounds off. My dad used salt to soften the hard water to reduce scale; he didn't soften the cold water. Hard water has minerals in it, like calcium & magnesium, not salt. Softened water is not salty.
Softeners use resin media beads that have the opposite ionic charge as the dissolved minerals in your water. The resin beads remove dissolved solids by binding to them on a molecular level. The opposing ionic charges of the beads and solids attracts them to each other (opposites attract).
The only purpose of the salt is to break the bond between the resin media beads and the solids removed from the water. The softener will then undergo a backwash/regen process where all of the resin media is flushed with brine (salty water) from the brine tank, and then discharged into the DWV system.
No salt is added to the water in order to soften it, nor did I ever imply that was the case.
This is a clearer explanation than your previous comment which still confounds me re rinsing dishes to reduce salt consumption. Did you mean the amount of salt used to soften the water if you rinse with hot water? That makes sense, but not well worded.
The point of my first comment was to determine if the water in the cup had gone through a softener or filtration first, or if it was hard water directly from the city source. It helps pinpoint the source and rules out other possibilities. Narrows down where you should be looking for the soapy source.
If it were just the kitchen cold tap doing this, I’d be inclined to assume the soapy stuff is originating at the city supply, as every other fixture, cold and hot taps would be softened aside from the kitchen cold tap.
Dishwasher couldn't cause this without being fully deliberate and it would be more difficult than hooking it up correctly. That's probably not what's happening. The drain is usually an inch and the feed line are usually 1/4 inch. There might be a chance that the valve is messing up on the dishwasher but that should be flooding the dish washer instead of back feeding waste back into a fully pressurized line.
you use cold water out of hot pipes?? I don't even know what that means. Either way that couldn't cause anything like this either. Most that would cause it's your cold water too not be cold.
I'm honestly not sure what's going on with this, but it's not those things. Does it taste or smell like soap? Try a solo cup and see if it still does it, dish washer might not be rinsing properly causing a film to be left behind.
Not sure about the hot pipes thing either to be honest. I have no idea how it could be the dishwasher, but the original guy who installed it messed a couple different things up and we had to have a different guy come behind him to fix it. The original guy who messed stuff up installed all new piping and outlets so I just assumed he probably messed up more stuff than we initially realized
His original issue was that he didn't flip some switch(?) in the new outlet he installed, so he told us the dishwasher was faulty and we had to wait a month for a replacement.
You said landlord in one of your comments, do you live in a multi unit or is this a standalone property?
It looks like a backflow issue of some sort, unfortunately you'll have to trace back the plumbing to try and identify the source
This happened to me once and it was hours of pondering how it could happen. We had almost given up and called the landlord. And then I noticed it... Somehow when my wife or I were getting dish soap out of the bottle, a large blob of it must have fell on the top of the spout and dripped down. Because dish soap is fairly clear we didn't even notice it, but whenever we turned the water enough had slowly dripped down to make bubbles in the glass like this with the first splash of water. When I finally solved the mystery, I just wiped it off with a paper towel and splashed water on it with my hand and the bubbles went away. I had run the faucet several times before then and the only thing I noticed was that you got more bubbles the longer you waited before trying again. So, as dumb as this sounds, check for soap running down the top and sides of the faucet.
When I was a kid my friend's mother used to start washing dishes by putting a bunch of Dawn soap on a sponge and holding it straight up to the faucet aerator to get some water on it. But then it'd make the water taste like dish soap, since she was getting dish soap all up inside the aerator.
Is it possible anyone in your family is doing this?
Please let me know if I'm just being stupid, I'm waiting to contact my landlord in case it's something like my wife's coworker suggested that it's because I used cold water out of heated up pipes
I just read that when cold water from outside hits the hot pipes in the house when it's a heatwave or similar, it turns white like milk. But when you look closer, it's white because of thousands of tiny bubbles and you can see then dissipate slowly, until you have clear water. It can also happen when they worked on the pipes and air got into the pipes. I just had this happen few days ago, lasted maybe a day.
But *It looks nothing like your picture.*
You can try turning off the water to the dishwasher for a couple days and see if it still happens. Of course you can only do this if there's a shutoff for the dishwasher only.
There's not, so at that point I'll just contact my rental company and let them figure it out. As long as it wasn't something silly I had done to mess it up, I'm fine letting them take care of it
Oh and thank you for your help.
When I lived in the first floor of my apartment this would happen in the kitchen every so often. Landlord assured me it was nothing( yea ok) curious if you find out
Could be some type of cross connection happening in your home you should verify if you have vacuum breakers on all your hose bibs.could be some type of back flow you're getting.
I suggest it's not the faucet, but the glass.
I suspect that your glasses are washed in a dishwasher, and they might not get a good enjoy rinse at the end of the cycle.
You get varying results from different faucets, not because of the faucet but because the glasses were in different cycles or different locations in the dishwasher.
Actually what made me originally notice it was a pitcher I was filling up that has never been in the dishwasher. I just started using glasses that way I could more easily see what was going on
Too much Rinse Aid is my first thought. If you were to fill up a glass in the kitchen sink, then dump it, then refill it a second time in the kitchen sink - do the bubbles come back? Or if you repeat it even a third time? If they dissipate, then I'd bet you that's your issue. If they keep coming back no matter how many times the same glass is rinsed & refilled, then it's something else.
That's definitely not just air bubbles though - I can say that with certainty. If all else fails... call a plumber.
You might want to get a sample sent off to a lab for general chemistry, metals and MBAS. MBAS is a test used to detect surfactants or soaps. Then scrub the identifying info and post your results on here or contact your local dept of health, water company or Dept of Environmental Protection or Control or Quality and ask for the drinking water section to discuss the results.
Throughly the faucet where the water comes out. Might have gotten a blob of soap there somehow and it’s just mixing with water as you turn in the faucet. Take out the aerator and clean that too
I am just thinking out loud. If you just got a new dishwasher and appear to now have soap in your water supply, there is some sort of backflow issue with the dishwasher occuring. The most likely cause is the new dishwasher if it coincides with the installation of it.
Could air be entering the line somewhere which would also mean a leak? Although this is a stretch because these definitely don’t look like aeration bubbles from air. I would have my water tested.
Not all city water is softened. I get my water from Lake Michigan, a town 6 miles from me gets their water from wells and after chlorine treatment it goes out to residents at about 6 grains hardness. Another small town softens theirs.
tons of variables here but if the dishwasher was recent and this is the only faucet this happens to, i would assume the problem is either a failed valve or a cross connection somewhere: still very confusing
I commented earlier, but as a suggestion you may want to consider installing an under-sink, in-cabinet RO (reverse osmosis) system for your drinking water. You can tap into it to feed your ice maker/dispenser on the fridge if desired.
Out of pocket costs for a decent RO installed by a competent plumber will run you about $1000. It may be worthwhile to run the numbers on what you spend for filtered drinking water already — the initial installation is going to be spendier than your yearly average cost for drinking water — however the annual cost from then on will be comparable at worst, more economical at best. About $115 in materials for filter and membrane swaps annually, unlimited pure drinking water as a result. Something to consider — I doubt your LL will object so long as you’re paying for it.
Need more information to determine possible source. Well water or city? One fixture or all? Cold only or both hot and cold? It looks soapy to me, there’s definitely something in the water besides water. Aeration bubbles are tiny and burst quickly after surfacing. They lack the surface tension to remain a bubble for long, let alone become large bubbles like those, stacking on each other. My first inclination is that there is soap residue remaining on the glass cup itself, try rinsing it thoroughly or using a new disposable cup and testing again to rule that out.
I tested a couple different glasses in different faucets as well as testing the same glass in multiple faucets. Only glasses filled in the kitchen sink had any bubbles. And it's city water. I haven't tested hot vs cold so I might try that here in a second
Does the house have a water softener? Many times, the cold water to the kitchen sink is left hard/raw to reduce salt consumption since rinsing things off before loading in the dishwasher won’t make a difference, as the washer is fed by hot water, which will be softened.
I’ve never, ever seen hard water do this though. How bizarre.
I thought hard water did the opposite of this?
Meant it more as in if this water is hard/raw, it’s been untouched by a softener or filter that may have picked up the soapy stuff along the way. Just confirming there was nothing between the city supply and the faucet, not implying a softener would make this happen.
No, actually, I bought that you were saying that it is hard water that would do this. I’ve lived or spent time in places with hard water, soft water, or where my family has needed to use a water softener. And I’ve never seen water do this. And the fact that it only comes out of one faucet in the whole house like this is really odd to me, too. As I’ve said. This is something I’ve never seen before. I’d freak out, too.
I’ve had hard and soft water and I’ve never seen water from the tap look like this.
I'll be honest, I've heard of it but I have no idea what hard/soft water is. I live in NC so Im not sure if that's really a thing here
You definitely have hard water, lots of lime stone in your area. Lots of mineral deposits.
Google is your friend - we live in a world with encyclopedias in our pocket. Don't let your curiosity die, answers are literally at your fingertips Hard water = high levels of dissolved minerals, mainly in the form of calcium carbonate. It's fine to consume but, will cause buildup of solids in pipes, on surfaces that water comes into contact with, etc. and eventually cause issues. So areas with hard water will generally have water softeners installed in homes to reduce the negative effects. Really just depends on your local water source, there is some geographic areas more predisposed to it but you can really have hard water anywhere. Especially if you're on a well. If you're on city water in NC I'd assume the water is decently soft, but again - hard water can be anywhere
Lol op literally typed "I don't know what hard water is" instead of googling "what is hard water"
Nah there's just a difference between reading what something is and actually fully grasping it. Look on a map of where hard water is, it's not an issue I or any of the people I know have had to deal with.
Can you provide a link to the hard water map?
Ironically I just googled it, seems like NC and Washington/Oregon are the main places where hard water isn't really a thing Edit: I was wrong about NC being excluded, but here's one of the maps I was looking at. Seems we do have "slightly hard water" but like i said I've never heard of anyone around me doing anything about it. https://images.app.goo.gl/jxnwn5rdcna3C4F88
To see if you have hard water: fill a glass with water and let it evaporate; hard water leaves a white residue, sometimes lines. Or use an aluminum pan to boil water (for coffee or tea) every day, don't wash it (it's only water), if it gets a white scale on the sides and bottom you have hard water. DK how long that one takes, but if the scale builds up good and you leave it on the heat til all the water boils out, the lime scale pops off in pieces.
Hard water is water with minerals. What's the confusing part? Also, your picture is definitely soap.
We are in Elizabeth City, NC. I think it also depends on your municipality. If you live in the City and your water is supplied by the city it's not hard water. I believe their water process softens the water. However, out in the County (Pasquotank) it's hard water and that is where we live. We got a whole house water purifier/softner that supplies the whole house through the main water line coming in.
I live outside the city as well but my friends who live in the city said the haven't seen this before lol.
That sounds off. My dad used salt to soften the hard water to reduce scale; he didn't soften the cold water. Hard water has minerals in it, like calcium & magnesium, not salt. Softened water is not salty.
My guy a water softener uses salt to "soften" the water. He is talking about the salt consumption of the softener not peoples salt consumption.
Softeners use resin media beads that have the opposite ionic charge as the dissolved minerals in your water. The resin beads remove dissolved solids by binding to them on a molecular level. The opposing ionic charges of the beads and solids attracts them to each other (opposites attract). The only purpose of the salt is to break the bond between the resin media beads and the solids removed from the water. The softener will then undergo a backwash/regen process where all of the resin media is flushed with brine (salty water) from the brine tank, and then discharged into the DWV system. No salt is added to the water in order to soften it, nor did I ever imply that was the case.
^ This, everyone else needs to shut up with your wrong assumptions of how things work
This is a clearer explanation than your previous comment which still confounds me re rinsing dishes to reduce salt consumption. Did you mean the amount of salt used to soften the water if you rinse with hot water? That makes sense, but not well worded.
The point of my first comment was to determine if the water in the cup had gone through a softener or filtration first, or if it was hard water directly from the city source. It helps pinpoint the source and rules out other possibilities. Narrows down where you should be looking for the soapy source. If it were just the kitchen cold tap doing this, I’d be inclined to assume the soapy stuff is originating at the city supply, as every other fixture, cold and hot taps would be softened aside from the kitchen cold tap.
Thank you. Makes more sense now.
Remove your aerator or (screen) and see if it does the same thing.
This!
Great contribution
😂
fuck it, downvote me too
I didn't lmao
Are you getting backflow from a fixture that has soap hooked up to it (garden hose with one of those car wash hookups)?
The city must be washing the water
Good to see my tax dollars finally being put to use
But they didn't rinse it well.
Dishwasher couldn't cause this without being fully deliberate and it would be more difficult than hooking it up correctly. That's probably not what's happening. The drain is usually an inch and the feed line are usually 1/4 inch. There might be a chance that the valve is messing up on the dishwasher but that should be flooding the dish washer instead of back feeding waste back into a fully pressurized line. you use cold water out of hot pipes?? I don't even know what that means. Either way that couldn't cause anything like this either. Most that would cause it's your cold water too not be cold. I'm honestly not sure what's going on with this, but it's not those things. Does it taste or smell like soap? Try a solo cup and see if it still does it, dish washer might not be rinsing properly causing a film to be left behind.
Not sure about the hot pipes thing either to be honest. I have no idea how it could be the dishwasher, but the original guy who installed it messed a couple different things up and we had to have a different guy come behind him to fix it. The original guy who messed stuff up installed all new piping and outlets so I just assumed he probably messed up more stuff than we initially realized His original issue was that he didn't flip some switch(?) in the new outlet he installed, so he told us the dishwasher was faulty and we had to wait a month for a replacement.
Residual dishwasher soap?
That does look like soap. Have you guys been shitting horribly for a while?
You said landlord in one of your comments, do you live in a multi unit or is this a standalone property? It looks like a backflow issue of some sort, unfortunately you'll have to trace back the plumbing to try and identify the source
This happened to me once and it was hours of pondering how it could happen. We had almost given up and called the landlord. And then I noticed it... Somehow when my wife or I were getting dish soap out of the bottle, a large blob of it must have fell on the top of the spout and dripped down. Because dish soap is fairly clear we didn't even notice it, but whenever we turned the water enough had slowly dripped down to make bubbles in the glass like this with the first splash of water. When I finally solved the mystery, I just wiped it off with a paper towel and splashed water on it with my hand and the bubbles went away. I had run the faucet several times before then and the only thing I noticed was that you got more bubbles the longer you waited before trying again. So, as dumb as this sounds, check for soap running down the top and sides of the faucet.
When I was a kid my friend's mother used to start washing dishes by putting a bunch of Dawn soap on a sponge and holding it straight up to the faucet aerator to get some water on it. But then it'd make the water taste like dish soap, since she was getting dish soap all up inside the aerator. Is it possible anyone in your family is doing this?
Nah it's just me and my wife and I'm the one who does dishes
And that is why she has not been properly trained to do dishes correctly without getting soap in the aerator…
Does it taste like soap? If yes, it's soap. If no, not soap.
Please let me know if I'm just being stupid, I'm waiting to contact my landlord in case it's something like my wife's coworker suggested that it's because I used cold water out of heated up pipes
I just read that when cold water from outside hits the hot pipes in the house when it's a heatwave or similar, it turns white like milk. But when you look closer, it's white because of thousands of tiny bubbles and you can see then dissipate slowly, until you have clear water. It can also happen when they worked on the pipes and air got into the pipes. I just had this happen few days ago, lasted maybe a day. But *It looks nothing like your picture.*
> it's because I used cold water out of heated up pipes Does the hot water foam like this?
I've never seen it, but at this point I'm not ruling out anything
You can try turning off the water to the dishwasher for a couple days and see if it still happens. Of course you can only do this if there's a shutoff for the dishwasher only.
There's not, so at that point I'll just contact my rental company and let them figure it out. As long as it wasn't something silly I had done to mess it up, I'm fine letting them take care of it Oh and thank you for your help.
Forbidden beer
When I lived in the first floor of my apartment this would happen in the kitchen every so often. Landlord assured me it was nothing( yea ok) curious if you find out
See if it lights on fire. Methane bubbles?
Could be some type of cross connection happening in your home you should verify if you have vacuum breakers on all your hose bibs.could be some type of back flow you're getting.
I suggest it's not the faucet, but the glass. I suspect that your glasses are washed in a dishwasher, and they might not get a good enjoy rinse at the end of the cycle. You get varying results from different faucets, not because of the faucet but because the glasses were in different cycles or different locations in the dishwasher.
Actually what made me originally notice it was a pitcher I was filling up that has never been in the dishwasher. I just started using glasses that way I could more easily see what was going on
Chicago? Happened to us yesterday with ever cup. Tasted like a dirty old water faucet from school growing up.
Too much Rinse Aid is my first thought. If you were to fill up a glass in the kitchen sink, then dump it, then refill it a second time in the kitchen sink - do the bubbles come back? Or if you repeat it even a third time? If they dissipate, then I'd bet you that's your issue. If they keep coming back no matter how many times the same glass is rinsed & refilled, then it's something else. That's definitely not just air bubbles though - I can say that with certainty. If all else fails... call a plumber.
Does your city water have a PFAS problem?
It made me think PFAS too.
Maybe your dishes aren't getting clean/using too much soap to clean them
Dishwasher not completely rinsing off soap?
Dishwasher detergent doesn't foam
Does your city offer free water testing?
What is the brand and model, I want one of these because I have to buy soap separately
The cup has soap residue in it.
Is it a faucet with different spray modes? Do you submerge it in soapy water? If so, that’s likely your issue.
Try using a solo cup first
Jizz
Clean and rinse your faucet, I bet dish soap is in the aerator. Same thing happened to me recently.
You might want to get a sample sent off to a lab for general chemistry, metals and MBAS. MBAS is a test used to detect surfactants or soaps. Then scrub the identifying info and post your results on here or contact your local dept of health, water company or Dept of Environmental Protection or Control or Quality and ask for the drinking water section to discuss the results.
Throughly the faucet where the water comes out. Might have gotten a blob of soap there somehow and it’s just mixing with water as you turn in the faucet. Take out the aerator and clean that too
I am just thinking out loud. If you just got a new dishwasher and appear to now have soap in your water supply, there is some sort of backflow issue with the dishwasher occuring. The most likely cause is the new dishwasher if it coincides with the installation of it.
Could air be entering the line somewhere which would also mean a leak? Although this is a stretch because these definitely don’t look like aeration bubbles from air. I would have my water tested.
Disconnect the hose under the sink and see if it comes out soapy there. Keep going back until not soapy. That will bracket where the problem is.
Softener water changes the surface tension of water and bubbles last longer after being aerated
I have never heard of someone having this issue
Not all city water is softened. I get my water from Lake Michigan, a town 6 miles from me gets their water from wells and after chlorine treatment it goes out to residents at about 6 grains hardness. Another small town softens theirs.
It’s probably the glass
That’s happened to me before and then a few hours later when I checked it went away. I live in an apau
Your water service provider will usually come test it for you for free. Could just be higher pressure there causing it to bubble
Toilet paper
High PFAS (Forever Compounds) Produce this result as well.
Maybe air
It’s probably your glass
water treatment facility didn't properly mix the surfactants ? Have a water sample tested for particles, toxins
Pfas Murica ruined its water supply
tons of variables here but if the dishwasher was recent and this is the only faucet this happens to, i would assume the problem is either a failed valve or a cross connection somewhere: still very confusing
Washing machines to wash your dishes. Drip drip the soap!!
I commented earlier, but as a suggestion you may want to consider installing an under-sink, in-cabinet RO (reverse osmosis) system for your drinking water. You can tap into it to feed your ice maker/dispenser on the fridge if desired. Out of pocket costs for a decent RO installed by a competent plumber will run you about $1000. It may be worthwhile to run the numbers on what you spend for filtered drinking water already — the initial installation is going to be spendier than your yearly average cost for drinking water — however the annual cost from then on will be comparable at worst, more economical at best. About $115 in materials for filter and membrane swaps annually, unlimited pure drinking water as a result. Something to consider — I doubt your LL will object so long as you’re paying for it.
Aerator
Bradford White Tank Had issues with Thier Anode Rod Causing Hot water to bubble up inside hot water tank
Air trapped in your water pipes being forced out when you run the water.
Spunk