Appliance with water softening facility

摘要

An electric steam iron, tea making machine of coffee making machine contains a supply of water softening agent which is contacted by tap water issuing from a container whereby the volume of the supply of softening agent increases when its water softening capacity is reduced or exhausted. A monitoring device generates signals when the supply of softening agent expands to indicate that a fresh supply must be inserted into the appliance. The supply can be confined in a bellows, and the monitoring device can be designed to generate visible signals in response to detected expansion of the bellows as a result of a reduction or exhaustion of the water softening capacity of the confined supply of softening agent.