water filter: how to choose

[pat]

I am having a water softener fitted and I want to get a water filter fitted to the kitchen tap at the same time. I have decided on the softener but I am having trouble deciding which water filter to get.

I want the filter to improve taste (drinking water, tea, coffee). I have searched the web and this newsgroup, including the faq. I was hoping that I could choose on the basis of:

1=2E Taste improvement. 2=2E Flow rate. 3=2E Cheap and widely available replacement cartridges.

Unfortunately that information seems hard to find. Prices seem to vary widely. Screwfix offers them for =A318 to =A360 and I have seen them for =A3100 or more. Does anybody have any suggestions that might help me choose?

[John Stumbles]

All the carbon types will probably be more-or-less the same in respect of taste. If you're happy with water from a Brita-type jug filter but want he convenience of a tap then this is the type to go for. I use the Pureflo (not Pureflow - they're a different company) ones which are (or were) available from Wickes. They use a block of carbon rather than granules which they claim gives better filtering, and there's less plastic to throw away when you replace them. There are also rather bigger units which AIUI just allow you to filter more water from a given filter unit than the typical domestic types.

You'll get vastly better flow from even a cheap domestic type by ditching the easy-fit connector which screws into and pierces a tiny hole in a 15mm copper mains pipe. Instead arrange a proper plumbed connection (with an isolation valve for when you need to change the filter). (I found that the push-fit connectors on the filter cartridge aren't quite 10mm diameter so a speedfit 15mm x 10mm coupler doesn't make a nice watertight connection to the filter as I'd hoped. Instead I used a 10mm compression joint onto the filter.)

As for replacement cartridges the cheap domestic types with plastic pipe to and from the cartridge are more-or-less interchangeable so even if your original supplier goes out of business you'll probably still be able to get something else that fits.