softner or filter needed?

My drilled well water tested .41 ppm for iron and 40 ppm (2.3 gr/gal) for hardness. My only concern is staining fixtures and clothes. Do you think i need one, and any advice on softener and/or filter? Does a sand filter work on iron?

A sand filter may work, I am not sure about the area that you are in, I know where I am at for the most part as there are still things that come up that are a puzzle even after 20 years..

A softener most likely will work, but your water temp is different that what I deal with, here the average temp is 35F... yours is another question.

A properly sized softener should do the trick. Have your local water fitration company come out and size it for you or you can find a ton of sites online that will give you that information. Water conditions alone are not enough for us to do that here without somee further information.

A BIRM (Best Iron Removal Media) filter will remove the iron. There is no salt needed or any other regeneranet for the system. That means very limited maintenance required.

A sand filter will not remove ferrous/dissolved iron, only ferric/oxidized iron/rust particles. Sand would only work IF you oxidized the ferrous iron first (into ferric iron particulate matter [sediment]) and then sand would filter them out.

To use BIRM, you must meet some requirements like no H2S gas etc..