Serving the Texas Hill Country & San Antonio since 1989
WQA-Certified  ·  Texas Class 3 Licensed  ·  Open 24/7
Areas Served  ›  Kerrville

Well water treatment and softeners in Kerrville, TX

Kerr County water comes off the Trinity aquifer and the upper Guadalupe, and a great many properties out here are on their own wells. We test, design and service treatment across the county.

Water softener installed for a Fredericksburg home in Gillespie County
Local water

Trinity aquifer water in the upper Guadalupe valley

Kerrville draws on Trinity aquifer groundwater and the Guadalupe river system. Both move through limestone country, and both deliver water carrying a substantial calcium and magnesium load. Hardness is the constant here whether you are on the city supply or your own well.

On a private well the picture is wider. Alongside hardness there is frequently iron, which stains fixtures and laundry, sometimes manganese, which stains darker, and often sulfur, which makes the hot water smell of rotten eggs. Sediment is common in older wells and quietly destroys valves.

Bacteria is the one you cannot detect. It needs a laboratory test, and it matters more in a river valley where flooding is part of the landscape.

Well water treatment system for a Canyon Lake property
What we do here

Services available in Kerrville

Well work is the bulk of what we do in Kerr County, but every service is available here.

Well water treatment tanks and pressure vessels

Well Water Treatment

Iron, sulfur, sediment, bacteria and pH, the pre-treatment a well needs.

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Water softener installed for a Fredericksburg home in Gillespie County

Well Water Filtration

Media, stages and sizing for iron, manganese, sulfur and sediment on a private well.

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Gaines softwater well water treatment

Well System Service

Annual service, media replacement, UV lamps and emergency repair for well systems.

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Taking over neglected systems

We service what somebody else installed, and left

A lot of our Kerrville work starts with a system nobody has touched in years, installed by a company that has since closed or moved on. Media exhausted, UV lamp long past its life, backwash settings drifted, resin fouled with iron.

None of that necessarily means starting again. Frequently the equipment is sound and the problem is settings, media or sizing. We will quote the repair before anyone mentions replacement, and we service every major brand whoever fitted it.

Gaines softwater well water treatment
Why Gaines

A local company, not a franchise van passing through

We have been testing and treating water in this part of Texas since 1989, and we answer the phone ourselves.

Serving Kerrville since 1989

Family-owned, locally operated, and still on the same phone number after thirty-six years.

WQA-licensed, Class 3 certified

Class 3 certified by the Texas Water Commission and licensed by the Water Quality Association.

Every major brand serviced

Rainsoft, Culligan, Rayne, Kinetico, Hague, Sears, General Electric and more, whoever installed it.

24/7 emergency repair

A failed system does not wait for business hours, and neither do we.

Free on-site testing

We test at your property, explain the numbers and put the recommendation in writing, at no charge.

Sized to your water

Capacity and stages chosen from your test result, not from a regional average or a catalogue page.

Nearby

We also serve these communities

If you are close to Kerrville and not listed, call anyway. We probably cover you.

Fredericksburg, TX

Gillespie County, where private wells are the norm.

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Boerne, TX

Kendall County, Trinity aquifer, fast-growing and hard.

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Texas Hill Country

The whole region, and how we cover it.

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Common questions

Water questions from Kerrville homeowners

Yes. Trinity aquifer and Guadalupe valley groundwater both move through limestone, and the Hill Country commonly runs 15 to 20+ grains per gallon. Private wells frequently test above the city figure.

Hydrogen sulfide, which is common in Hill Country wells and worse in hot water because heat drives it out of solution. It needs oxidation or specialist media, not a carbon filter.

Orange or brown is iron. Black or very dark brown is usually manganese. Both are common on Kerr County wells, and both will foul softener resin if they reach it untreated.

Yes. Surface water reaching a well casing is the main route bacteria gets in, and nothing about the taste or appearance of the water will tell you it has happened.

Yes. Kerr County is part of our regular service area, along with Ingram, Center Point, Comfort, Hunt and Mountain Home. Free on-site testing throughout.

Yes, and it is a large part of what we do out here. We repair and maintain every major brand regardless of who fitted it.

Water treatment in Kerrville and Kerr County, in short

Kerrville water is hard. The limestone that makes the Hill Country scenic also puts most Kerrville supplies between 15 and 25 grains per gallon, which is very hard on any published scale.

Kerr County has a great many private wells, and that is what shapes the work here. Kerrville well water frequently carries iron, sulfur or seasonal sediment on top of the hardness.

On Kerrville city water the job is usually simple. A softener sized to your measured hardness, and carbon filtration if the chlorine taste and smell bother you.

On a Kerrville well the sequence is what matters. Sediment first, then iron and sulfur, then softening. Softening ahead of iron removal ruins resin, and we are called out to that mistake regularly.

Properties along the Guadalupe and out toward Ingram and Hunt are often on wells with their own character, so we test each one rather than assuming the area behaves uniformly.

Distance matters out here. A failed system in Kerrville is not a next-week problem, which is why we run 24/7 emergency repair across Kerr County on any brand of equipment.

We have served Kerrville and the surrounding Hill Country since 1989, and we service systems we did not install as readily as our own.

Testing is free and carries no obligation. Plenty of Kerrville visits end with us confirming the water is fine and recommending nothing at all.

Kerrville supplyCommon issueWhat we usually fit
City waterHardness 15 to 25 gpgCorrectly sized ion-exchange softener
City waterChlorine taste and smellWhole-house carbon filtration
Private wellOrange staining from ironIron filter ahead of the softener
Private wellRotten egg smellAeration or catalytic carbon
Private wellCloudy after heavy rainSediment pre-filtration
Any supplyFlat drinking waterReverse osmosis at the kitchen tap

Common questions

How hard is Kerrville water? Typically 15 to 25 grains per gallon, which is very hard. The free test gives the exact figure for your property.

I am on Kerrville city water. Do I need a softener? Usually yes. Municipal treatment makes water safe, not soft, so hardness reaches the tap unchanged.

Do you cover Ingram and Hunt? Yes, along with Center Point and the surrounding Kerr County area.

Will you service another company system? Yes. We repair every major brand in Kerrville, including equipment we did not install.

Kerr County covers a lot of ground, and water varies across it. A property in town on the municipal supply has a very different starting point from one out toward Hunt drawing from its own well, so we treat every Kerrville address as its own case.

The Edwards and Trinity aquifers underlie most of the area. Water moving through that limestone picks up calcium and magnesium, which is precisely what hardness is, and it is why softening is the foundation of most Kerrville installations.

Iron is the most frequent complication on Kerrville wells. It stains basins, laundry and fixtures a rusty orange, and because it destroys softener resin it has to be removed upstream rather than downstream.

Hydrogen sulfide turns up less often but is unmistakable. It is the rotten egg smell, it is a dissolved gas, and no softener will touch it. Treating it properly means aeration or catalytic carbon sized to the gas level.

Sediment is seasonal along the river valleys. After heavy rain some wells pull fine grit for a few days, and a sediment stage at the front of the train protects everything behind it.

For anyone buying in Kerrville, the practical advice is the same as everywhere in the Hill Country. Test before you buy equipment, keep the results on file, and retest annually if you are on a private well.

Check any of this against the primary sources:

Free water test in Kerrville

Free on-site well testing across Kerrville, Ingram, Center Point, Hunt and the rest of Kerr County.