Trying to determine the most efficient salt dose for my extremely hard water...

[Dwassner]

54 gpg hardness + (1.0 ppm iron x 5) = 59 gpg compensated hardness
150 avg. gallons per day x 59 gpg = 8,850 grains per day

This is where I get confused:
10 lbs salt dose x 2.0 cu. ft. system = 20 lbs of salt
20 lbs total salt dose / 3 lbs of salt per gallon = 6.66 gallons
.25 gpm injector = 4 min. per gallon (the sticker says BLFC .25, DLFC 4, Injector 0)
4 min. per gallon x 6.66 gallons = 26.64 minutes

Should I set my brine fill time to 27 minutes???


***my tank is 12 x 54. Is my system size 2.0 cu/ft or 2.5 cu/ft?
***how do i determine if i should something different than 10 lbs salt dose per cu/ft?
***within my 7000SXT is the option to change the capacity. I don't know what to set this to

thank you!!
DW

 

[Reach4]

You need to raise your H (hardness) to compensate for iron and high hardness. Have you looked into that aspect?

But in answer to your question,
Revised based on number from https://terrylove.com/forums/index.php?threads/help-for-programming-fleck-5810.82673/#post-595983
BLFC = 0.25
cubic ft resin = 2
Alternative C and BF pairs:
lb/cuft ; C= ; BF= ; grains/pound of salt

6.000 ; 42.0 ; 16 ; 4670
6.375 ; 43.3 ; 17 ; 4528
6.750 ; 44.5 ; 18 ; 4393
7.125 ; 45.6 ; 19 ; 4267
7.500 ; 46.6 ; 20 ; 4147
7.875 ; 47.6 ; 21 ; 4033
8.250 ; 48.6 ; 22 ; 3925
8.625 ; 49.5 ; 23 ; 3823
9.000 ; 50.3 ; 24 ; 3726
9.375 ; 51.1 ; 25 ; 3634
9.750 ; 51.9 ; 26 ; 3546
10.125 ; 52.6 ; 27 ; 3463
10.500 ; 53.3 ; 28 ; 3383
10.875 ; 53.9 ; 29 ; 3306
11.250 ; 54.6 ; 30 ; 3234

For reduced salt usage and good hardness treatment, maybe 18 to 23 minutes would be good.

Set your C, and raise your H to compensate. H=76 should do it. You could try less, but watch for hardness leakage after you use much water.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Bannerman]

When setting Brine Fill, always round up - 27 minutes.

With 20 lbs per regeneration cycle, that will be appropriate for a capacity setting of 52K grains. Those settings are not particularly efficient at only 2,600 grains per lb of salt.

The link below is to a chart which indicates the usual capacity settings and salt amounts for various size softeners. Follow the left column down to 2 ft3 and scan across to view each Capacity setting appropriate for your softener. The salt amounts at the top of each column is indicated as lbs per ft3. The Hardness Removal Efficiency and other info is shown at the bottom of each column.

8 lbs/ft3 to regenerate 48K grains is the most common recommendation.

https://terrylove.com/forums/index.php?attachments/resin-chart-jpg.53316/

As Reach4 specified, your hardness setting will need to be increased due to high hardness compensation.

 

[Dwassner]

OK. Starting to get it.

what is the math behind raising hardness for high hardness? Does each grain count x2 above a certain level of hardness?

 

[Bannerman]

See post #6
https://terrylove.com/forums/index.php?threads/diagnosing-water-softener-issue.86902/

 

[Dwassner]

OK. GOT IT!

When I crunch the numbers on this, I am getting just under 5 days between regenerations at a 6 lbs dose.

I obviously want the highest quality water possible, which motivates me to do a much higher dose. However, I have read in several places that if there is iron being removed, then you want to regenerate no less than 2 or 3 days. Is this true?

If it is true, then to get to that kind of regeneration rate I would need to run a very low salt dose.

I guess a wasteful alternative would be running an 8 or 10 lbs dose and do a forced regeneration every 3 days

 

[Bannerman]

Iron normally reduces the efficiency you can obtain. If a 3-day regeneration frequency was needed, then the salt amount would often be programmed for 8 lbs/ft3, but the DO setting would then be set to 3 days, thereby ensuring regeneration with enough salt to clean away iron every 3-days even as there may be unused capacity remaining.

Your iron quantity is the usual threshold where an alternate iron removal method would be recommended, but with 54 gpg actual hardness, you may wish to still consider removing the iron before the softener. Hardness removal alone is a substantial load for the softener resin.

One thing not mentioned is pH. When pH is low, the acidic water will assist to remove iron accumulation from the resin.

 

[Dwassner]

Got it. Per my other threads, I have a Katalox AIO before the softener and although I am having issues with it removing sulfur, I have not tested recently to see if it is removing the iron. If it is, then that changes things a lot for the softener.

Thank you for all the input on this post and my other ones. I really appreciate it!

 

[Reach4]

Pick a C and H. If the water starts turning hard too soon, post what the display said when it first started getting hard.

Post the current H and C, and reserve numbers. I can suggest a revised H based on what you have observed.

If you pick a number, and never detect hardness leakage, you could try reducing C a bit.

Since you have the AIO, and it presumably removes a fair amount of iron, you could back off from my suggested H=76 number.

Have you cleaned your AIO injector and screen yet? How long has that been in service?

 

[Dwassner]

I have not cleaned the AIO parts yet. It has been in service for just over a year.

I have actually also never cleaned the softener either. It continues to run fine but I do expect to have to clean it soon or replace the media. At my hardness and iron levels, after 8 years of service I would have expected to have to do it sooner.

The reason for my original post above is because although the softener has been running fine for this long, I know that it has been wasting salt because I have never fully understood how to set it up, but this thread has helped a lot with that!