Brown water right after softener regeneration

[diitto]

I'm new to water softeners, if you couldn't already tell. Can someone say what steps occur in the regeneration cycle?? Especially for the Puronics if anyone is familiar with that one??? Ahd what exactly is the backwash??? Can I assume it's where water moves through in the reverse direction as a cleaning process and most importantly, goes down the sewer dump line???

Assuming this brown material is getting concentrated and held in the carbon filter media, what about the regernation process might suddenly make that material now be free to come into our house water in one signifcant slug. Is it being backwashed out of the carbon media but not effectively or efficiently dumped to the drain??? Such that it's sort of sitting in there now waiting to move into our home water when next the valve opens to receonnect the house to the softener? As I said we moved the "backwash time" from "normal" to "longer" but sadly the Puronics literature is scant to say the least. The plumber could only guess that doing so likely upper the backwash time from maybe 6 to maybe 10 minutes...

So the whole process in a short nutshell???

Oh, and one other thing. The salt I've used to this point is Diamond Crystal "Bright and Soft" (yellow bag) water softener salt pellets. The plumber suggested the other day I might want to switch to a version in a green bag called Diamond Crystal "Iron Fighter water softener salt pellets. I went to the Diamond Crystal website to read more about what this specific salt does with respect to iron,

https://www.diamondcrystalsalt.com/product/iron-fighter-water-softener-salt-pellets

They say this salt is intended to be used where iron content is high but they don't say what this salt has in it that helps a water softener remove iron??? Anybody have an idea how this stuff works???

We do get reddish stain (easily removable) in our toilets every now and then.. Is that likely iron???

thanks... bob

 

[diitto]

And one other question. When this plumber, Justing, was here the other day, he moves fast, busy man. I asked him a lot of questions but just couldn't get them all in. One thing I barely noticed when he got to the water softerner is he opened the salt holding tank and dumped in something. I think it was a powder but it could have been some liquid. He said something quick about what it was and I intended to ask about it later. But too many things to do at one time. What did he likely dump in??? Clearly some sort of cleaner or something??? What might this have been but more importantly, what you a homeowner be doing over the course of a year to maintain these systems. These guys want to come by once a year and do whatever for you and I'm not opposed to that, per se. But I just want to know what should and shouldn't be done. What might I do say a six months that might make sense to do to help maintain and clean such a system. Thoughts??? thanks... bob

 

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[Reach4]

They say this salt is intended to be used where iron content is high but they don't say what this salt has in it that helps a water softener remove iron??? Anybody have an idea how this stuff works???

Look up the MSDS sheet. That which is not salt is probably there to help fight iron. I know citric acid is an ingredient in the Mortons anti-iron pellets.

Search for references to "iron out" (with the quotes) in this forum for treatments a home owner can do.

What he added could be something like res care.

Ahd what exactly is the backwash??? Can I assume it's where water moves through in the reverse direction as a cleaning process and most importantly, goes down the sewer dump line???

Backwash washes out crud that might have accumulated by being mechanically caught. It also fluffs up the resin beads.

Then brine is slowly drawn through the resin to exchange calcium, magnesium manganese, and iron for sodium. Then a slow rinse rinses the salt away so that you don't taste salt. The brine tank gets refilled to get ready for next time. The fast rinse rinses more, and settles the beads. There are variations, but that is the primary thing. http://www.water-softeners-filters.com/how-water-softeners-work

We do get reddish stain (easily removable) in our toilets every now and then.. Is that likely iron???

Yes.

 

[diitto]

Hi, I'm the original poster of this thread. My Puronics Hydronex softener regen'd the last time on June 11th and it is set at 20 days between regens. Assuming it truly goes by those days (as it did the time before, May 22 to June 11th, exactly 20 days) I would have expected the softener to have regen'd 20 days after June 11th, which would have been yesterday, July 1. So first, it doesn't appear to have regen'd as the gallons available to soften usually goes to something like 3000 right after a regen and it's still at a lower value, like 1780. Can anyone tell me why it might not have regen'd yesterday???

And second, I've been wanting to do a second manual regen (did one over a year ago and didn't really know what to watch for or expect, kind of risky I guess) so today I chose to hold down the regen button for 3 seconds and away it went... First it started a 6 minute count down and I could hear the main tank running water and the display said FILL. I heard the water running from that 6 minute mark until it got down to 1:47 at which time I heard a valve close and the sound of water running stopped. It then continued it's countdown to zero.. Oh, and I did notice at this same time, for the first time ever, some visible water down in the brine tank. The salt is still sitting dry up at say the 50% full mark and the water I can see around the edges maybe at the 35% full mark...

Then after the FILL countdown went to zero, next the display changed to SOFTENING and set a timer at 2 hours. I am about to go out and watch it finish that countdown and perhaps I'll have more to say but my question is why does it say SOFTENING when it's supposed to be cleaning itself??? Why that word??? What is it doing??? The PURONICS literature if poor to say the least... Any thoughts??? thanks... bob

 

[Bannerman]

First it started a 6 minute count down and I could hear the main tank running water and the display said FILL.

It appears that your control valve is programmed to 'Fill' the brine tank at the beginning of the regeneration cycle. That is a common practice when using Potassium Chloride but should not be an issue when utilizing Sodium Chloride (ie: Salt).

Your controller is programmed to add a specific amount of water to the brine tank which will then dissolve the specific amount of salt (3 lbs per gallon) which corresponds to a specific amount of softening capacity to be regenerated. As time is required to dissolve the full amount of salt, a 2 hour delay is programmed before advancing to the remainder of the regen cycle. As there is nothing further to do while the salt is dissolving, the controller appears to continue to provide soft water to the home (ie: SOFTENING) until the remainder of the regeneration cycle is to continue.

Once the timer counts down to '0', the controller will advance to 'Back Wash' which is typically 10 minutes duration. During BW, water will flow through the resin bed in a reverse direction (bottom to top) to the drain, to loosen and redistribute the resin bed. This will flush away any sediment and debris that may have entered the top of the resin bed during normal service flow and will expand the spaces between the resin beads so the salt brine will more easily flow between the resin beads.

Following BW, is 'Brine'. Brine will be drawn from the brine tank until the brine tank is essentially empty of liquid. Once the brine tank is empty, an Air Check valve (= floating ball) in the brine tank will close to prevent air from being drawn-in. A slow water flow through the resin will continue to push brine down through the resin bed to slowly rinse all of the brine to drain. The total Brine cycle is typically 60 minutes whereas the Brine tank is normally empty of liquid within the first 15 minutes of that time.

Depending on the specific program chosen, your softener may 'Back Wash' again or it may advance to 'Rapid Rinse' to repack the resin beads tightly by flowing water down through the resin bed to the drain at a fast rate. Rapid Rinse is typically 10 minutes but maybe programmed to a shorter duration.

Regeneration will be complete so the controller will then reset the 'remaining capacity' (ie: 30,ooo grains) and advance to the normal Service setting which apparently is indicated as 'Softening' on your unit.

it doesn't appear to have regen'd as the gallons available to soften usually goes to something like 3000 right after a regen and it's still at a lower value, like 1780.

Either the unit had regenerated before you had expected or your water use is so low, you are not using the regenerated capacity within the 20 day over ride. Suggest increasing the over ride to 30 days and monitor to determine if regeneration occurs at less than 30 days or if not, check the amount of capacity remaining just prior to regeneration at 2am on the 31st day. As your chlorinated water will not contain iron, a 30 day over ride will be OK.

I heard the water running from that 6 minute mark until it got down to 1:47 at which time I heard a valve close and the sound of water running stopped.

This is somewhat concerning as water should refill the brine tank for the entire 'Fill" time. The program time maybe too long OR the safety float within the brine tank maybe too low to allow the full amount of water to enter the brine tank. Are you able to find any label indicating a number for 'BLFC' or 'Brine Fill rate'? That will be the fill rate for the brine tank in gpm. That number multiplied by the programmed Fill time, will establish the amount of water that is currently programmed to enter the brine tank.

While another poster had referred to your unit as a 1.5 cubic foot unit (48,000 grains total capacity), I see no specification on the Puronics web site to confirm the capacity for that model. Do you know the capacity otherwise you may need to measure the resin tank. Since some carbon and silver media is also contained, I expect it will have less softening resin than normally contained in whatever size tank it is.

 

[diitto]

Bannerman, thanks for all the help.. I took notes on all that went on for one complete manually initiated regeneration cycle.

Complete Regeneration Cycle consisted of:

- FILL cycle, counted down from 6 minutes and I heard water running from 6 minutes down to 1:47 when I heard a valve close and the sound of water flowing stopped. I looked in the brine tank and I could see water, not nearly to the top of the salt stack but I could see a level of water down some inches from the top of the salt stack.

- SOFTENING, counted down for 120 minutes (two hours). Good input on what you thought that was, just waiting for the salt to dissolve so with nothing better to do, it just goes on “softening” and yes that it was the display says when it’s do its normal softening thing.

- BACKWASH, counted down for 10 minutes and heard and could see water going down the drain in the garage wall to the sewer.

- BRINE, counted down for 60 minutes. I heard water sort of gently running down the drain where it was far more pronounced during the BACKWASH cycle. I watched and the water I could previously see in the brine tank disappeared during this BRINE cycle.

- BACKWASH 2, counted down for another 10 minutes of backwashing. And it did actually put up a flashing “2” next to this second BACKWASH.

- RINSE, counted down a 6 minute RINSE cycle. Again, more water running down the wall drain.

- FILL, then a final, somewhat confusing very few seconds with the screen saying fill with a 5 second counter not moving for a few moments but while some considerable valve activating noise was heard. Those “few moments” were some number (not many) seconds when finally that 5 second counter starting counting down to zero. Happened so quickly I can’t say that I actually heard any water running during this time.

But after that FILL deal, the screen then went back to normal, showing SOFTENING.

A few observations.

- The only way I know to see that a regen cycle has occurred is to note when the number of gallons of water available to be softened (what is normally on the display, either that or a clock, you control which shows by toggling the NEXT button) goes up to a larger value than it had been in the days before.

- I had noted a regen occurred on May 22nd. I saw brown water later that day. I next noted a regen occurred on June 11th. More brown water. And note that these two dates are precisely 20 days apart. That’s how the system is set, one of only three typical user settings one can see or change is “days to regen” and that is set at 20 on my unit.

- The person who installed and maintains this system came to my home to answer questions and do maintenance on June 16th. I know that he changed the HARDNESS setting (how hard the raw water is believed to be) from 10 gpg (171 ppm) to 12 gpg (205 ppm). At my request, in the “harder to get to” settings area which I now know how to access, he changed the BACKWASH time from NORMAL to LONGER. He thought LONGER = 10 and I’ve now confirmed that yes, that’s correct.

- But otherwise, he did not change any settings. So I was expecting the softener to do its next regen 20 days after June 11th which would have been 7/1. Didn’t happen. Any idea why it didn’t go precisely at 20 days as it has at least for the one previous cycle??? Can you say more about why you called the “day to regen” to be an override?? I would like to understand all that goes in to the unit deciding when to do a “regen”. It must NOT be just 20 days. Must be more to it than that????

- Since it didn’t appear to go right at 20 days, that’s why I decided to go ahead and do a forced regen on 7/2, what I’ve described above. I had been used to seeing the number of gallons available just before a regen get down somewhere in the 1500 - 1800 range and then after a regen to go up to about 3000. But just before my forced regen, the system was sitting at about 1750 gallons and after the regen it ONLY went to 2250 gallons. Any idea why so small an upward bump?? Because he changed the hardness from 10 to 12???

- And then about the brown water… After I did my manual regen, I came into the house and flushed toilets (1.3 gallons/flush). Flush 1 and 2, no obvious color. Flush 3 began to show a little. Flush 5 was the darkest but still not as dark as what I took and showed earlier (recall, we have now increased the backwash time from normal to longer. Longer is 10 minutes and he guessed that normal was 6. See picture of flush 5 attached and go back to an earlier post of mine to see darker water when the backwash was shorter. By flush 9, the water appeared clear again, at least to the eye. I forgot to grab a sample as was suggested before. I will do that the next time I see the brown water..

So the longer backwash helped but didn’t solve it all.

- Regarding my model number and specs, this is a Model “Puronics Hydronex 45B”. I will post this info first. Then I will attempt to scan (from my printed manual) and publish those specs here. Watch for that…

Thoughts on all that??? thanks… bob

 

[diitto]

And here is a scanned picture of the specs for the Puronics Hydronex 45B softener we have in our home. A little fuzzy but hopefully readable... thanks..

 

[Bannerman]

Ditto, Thank you for posting the unit's specifications.

Although the Brine Fill rate is not specified, it appears to be 1 GPM so the 6 minute Fill setting is likely intended to place 6 gallons in the brine tank so as to dissolve 18 lbs of salt. Your unit can be programmed to be more efficient and better suited for your specific requirements.

The Brine tank should never fill to the top with water but the quantity of liquid is to correspond to the amount of salt to be dissolved. Each gallon entering will dissolve 3 lbs of salt. By your description, there currently appears to be too much liquid entering so if you were to observe the safety float (probably inside a 3.5" tube running to the bottom of the brine tank), I expect you would see it raise, thereby shutting off the Fill flow prior to the programmed time setting. The Safety Float and Valve is not normally utilized to control brine fill flow but only used if there is a malfunction so as to prevent the brine tank from overflowing.

As the specs state a 10" X 54" media tank, that size tank is usually used for 1.5 cuft of softening media but as carbon & silver was also installed, the softening resin contained is reduced to 1.25 cuft. As 1 cuft of resin normally has 30K max softening capacity, your 1.25 cuft will have 37,500 grains max capacity.

A 10" diameter softener normally utilizes 2.5 GPM backwash flow rate but the specifications indicate your unit's max drain rate is only 1.7 GPM. As such, I expect the resin bed is not being fully cleaned resulting in your Brown water issue. An even longer BW setting (20 minutes?) maybe effective or the drain flow rate could be increased by replacing the restriction button (washer with a specific sized hole). Perhaps you will find that reprogramming to more efficient settings will further reduce the Brown issue.

Suggest reducing the unit's programmed capacity to 25,000 grains and also reduce the Fill setting from 6 minutes to 2.5 minutes. If fractional minutes are not programmable, then set 3 minutes.
By reducing the programmed capacity, the unit will regenerate more often and operate more efficiently. As 25K grains capacity can be restored with only 7.5 lbs of salt, that would require only 2.5 gallons entering the brine tank. That 2.5 gallons (or 3 if necessary) should remain well below the safety float, thereby permitting the Fill function to operate as intended.

You didn't specify but I suspect there are two persons in the home, each likely averaging 60 gallons water use per day. With 12 grains/gallon as the hardness setting, your daily softening consumption will then be calculated by the controller as 1,440 grains/day. With 25,000 grains of usable capacity, your unit should then require regeneration every 17 days (25,000 / 1440). Of course, if your consumption is higher or lower, then regeneration will occur accordingly.

Normally, with the appropriate settings, the over ride setting will not be utilized as the metered control will initiate regeneration based on the amount of actual water consumed. Regeneration should then occur when the capacity remaining is near 0. The over ride setting is intended to initiate a regeneration cycle if for some reason, the capacity hasn't been consumed within a reasonable time period, often due to the house occupants being away on vacation. As previously mentioned, you could set the over ride to 30 days without concern. It is usually not recommended to exceed 30 days between regeneration cycles.