Culligan Mark 89 question. Brine not filling with enough water..

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Murphy625

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HI all,
This is my first post.

I have a Culligan Mark 89 and I recently swapped out the brine tank with a newer one. The old one was dirty and the bottom screen broken and cracked up pretty good.
The new tank was cleaned, the valve was taken apart and cleaned and checked.

I am experiencing air pockets in my water lines after the unit recharges. One thing I noticed is that the brine tank isn't filling with enough water so the unit is probably sucking air at some point.

Can someone tell me what mechanism controls the amount of water that goes back into the brine tank during recharge?
When the unit is sending water back to the tank, I do seem to have good pressure and flow.. (I can soak my dog from 10 feet away no problem)..

My tank is only filling with about 10 inches of water.. My brine dial is set to draw 7 lbs. The water never reaches the level I have the float set at.

thank!
 

Akpsdvan

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The only thing that you changed was the salt tank its self?
When you say the valve was taken apart, what valve are you talking about?

Did you put about 5 gallons of water into the salt tank with the new salt?

The culligna 89 does the rapid rinse and brine tank refill at the same time , some times the float will be used but on the lower salt settings often it is not.

Is the water getting on top of the salt table?
 

Murphy625

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valve = brine tank float valve.

The only thing I changed was the brine tank.. I used the newer valve that came with that brine tank too.. Identical in every way I could see.

Yes, I put probably about 15 gallons of water in there.. Filled the tank half way or about where the old one always filled itself to.

Is the water on top of the salt table? Huh? It only fills the tank with about 10 inches of water.. If the tank has lots of salt in it, there might be 12 inches of water or something like that.. Whether the water level is above the salt level or not depends on how much salt is in there at the time.

What controls the volume of water going to the brine tank?
 

Akpsdvan

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The white plastic plate that is at the bottom of the tank that has what could be called cups to hold it off the bottom of the tank.
Thought that you said "The old one was dirty and the bottom screen broken and cracked up pretty good. " Now was that the white flat part or the 3" or 4" tube that goes top to bottom?

For your system it is time and the .45gpm control in the top of the float assembly.
The time part is on the valve control in the wheel, and if you have the 7lbs setting then there is a time factor rapid rinse.
The rule of thumb is 3 lbs per 1 gallon of water, so most likely there is 3 gallons of water in the tank.
Now if your tank is 18" across for the 3 gallons there would be 9-10 inches of water....

Back to basic math........
 
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Murphy625

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Hi Akpsdvan,
Thank you for your time and effort in helping me resolve this.
The only damage was to the bottom screen thingy that keeps the salt off the bottom.. It looked to me as if the previous owner bought one of those 12 inch solid blocks of salt and just dropped it in there... when it slammed on the bottom plate, it cracked it up.. The white tube that protects the float valve was in fine shape.
If you're thinking something might have gotten sucked into the brine line, then you are correct in that it did happen in the past and was corrected by taking the little connector off the softener valve body and pulling the stone out of the orifice that's in there. Its all working fine now except that it doesn't refill the brine tank with enough water and that seems to cause the unit to suck air when there's no more brine to suck up.
Any ideas?
 

Akpsdvan

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It is filling to the level needed for your 7lbs of salt.
If there is air getting into the system , then either one of the white nuts is not tight enough or that the float assembly at the bottom is incorrect if it was taken apart...
You replaced the broken salt table with a new one ..... so now the water is not getting displaced like it was before........
 
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