Yellow water, worse after softener regen

[dtbingle]

Hi, all, longtime lurker, first time poster.

Our house is on a community well and we just have a copper stub coming into the house. The water is tested every year and very good as far as unsafe chemicals + bacteria, but the water is pretty hard and has a low amount of iron. For the past 2 years, we've had the "old setup" below. This "old setup" had clear water, the only problem was having to frequently change out the 2.5" x 10" cartridge filter.

To reduce filter changing maintenance, we switched to a whirlpool central water filtration unit with auto-cleaning and installed it with a mesh screen spindown prefilter. During this time, we also switched from using potassium chloride to Morton's rust remover salt (green bag). A few months later, we're now noticing yellow'ish water in the toilet that's darkest after the softener regenerates and clears up to a very light yellow after 20-30 gallons are flushed through the water lines.

My thought is that 1) the Rust Remover Salt dislodges built up iron in the softener and making its way past the whirlpool filter, or 2) the Whirlpool filter isn't filtering as it should. My first step was trying a round of Iron Out in the brine well to clean the softener and then switch to normal salt (Morton's yellow bag) instead of rust remover.

Does this sound reasonable? What else should I be looking at?

Old setup
Well water in -> Pleated Cartridge Filter -> Water Softener w/ Potassium Chloride -> House

New setup - (yellow water a few months after install + salt switch)
Well water in -> Spindown filter -> Water Softener w/ Rust Remover Salt -> Whirlpool Filtration Unit -> House

 

[Reach4]

My first step was trying a round of Iron Out in the brine well to clean the softener and then switch to normal salt (Morton's yellow bag) instead of rust remover.

Clean your injector in your 5600sxt from time to time too. Judge by looking as you clean how often you will want to do that. If your injector draws slowly, maybe the rinse doesn't rinse it all out.

Does this sound reasonable? What else should I be looking at?

I would do cleanout treatments with IO. So do that periodically. I don't know the appropriate period. Three months might be appropriate to some.

Rust remover salt is mostly salt with citric acid, but the MDS shows something else too. You can continue to use the salt you have been, or you could dose the other salt with citric acid or iron out mixed with the salt. Citric acid smells better. The IO mixed with the salt should rinse out when the brine rinses out. The brine tank area may smell like IO between regens.

 

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[dtbingle]

I would do cleanout treatments with IO. So do that periodically. I don't know the appropriate period. Three months might be appropriate to some.

Rust remover salt is mostly salt with citric acid, but the MDS shows something else too. You can continue to use the salt you have been, or you could dose the other salt with citric acid or iron out mixed with the salt. Citric acid smells better. The IO mixed with the salt should rinse out when the brine rinses out. The brine tank area may smell like IO between regens.

Thanks I'll start with an IO treatment and see what happens after that. Is Iron Out safe for all softeners? I see units like the GE unit recommend using Iron Out as a regular maintenance task, but see nothing in the manual for mine. My softener was purchased through AFWFilters online and the only info listed is "high capacity 8% cross linked resin (BR8)".

And just to confirm, no additional flushing/washing is required after adding the Iron Out and running 1 manual regen cycle? I plan to run the faucet @ the shortest pipe distance to flush it out afterwards, but no plans to wash the brine tank.

 

[Reach4]

If you add the IO to the brine tank by dissolving into hot/warm water, and pour that water into the brine tank then that will be a little more volume to be added. Because there is more volume than usual, there is less time for "slow rinse". Your idea of running a nearby faucet for a while after is a good one. Slow is good. Maybe run about 1 cup per minute for 60 minutes after the brine fill finishes. That is probably more than needed, if, in fact, an extra slow rinsing is needed at all. IO has a smell, and that is not all bad. If you have residual in your water, you or a younger nose could sniff that.

I suggest your look for old posts on this forum, using the search box above. Look for "iron out" , with the quotes, on treating a softener.

IO is not going to hurt the softener.

Some sprinkle IO in with the salt routinely.

I don't need to do that, because I have an iron+H2S filter. The H2S was my motivation, but many things that remove H2S also remove iron.

 

[Bannerman]

As it is a community well, it will be serving multiple homes. Is chlorine or chloramine not utilized?

 

[dtbingle]

Thanks, I'll do some more searches on Iron Out methods. Based on the varying Iron Out ratios used, delivering to well vs. directly into salt, frequency, rinse methods, etc, I'm under the assumption nothing is too critical if doing it one way or the other.

I'm not sure on the chlorine / chloramine - don't see this level anywhere on the annual tests.