dark specs in water

[Stephen Walker]

I bought my house 3 years ago. It has well water. 600ish ppm with 4ppm iron. The water softener resin hadn't been taken care of. I ran regen mix through the brine tank and noticed tiny black specs only from hot water. Flushed hot water tank but still noticed the specs until a few months later when the water quality returned to how it was when I first bought the house.

This week I removed the old resin. Replaced it with c100e. Rebuilt the head with new screen mesh, balls, and dark red injector. Emptied the brine tank and cleaned it. Water is noticeably better and taste like bottled water now. BUT... Hot water produces tiny black specs. Could this be scaling breaking down? Time to flush the hot water heat and pex plumbing with distilled vinegar?

 

[Reach4]

Did you clean the brine tank?

There are some flex connector lines that are woven stainless steel over rubber. The rubber decomposes, making black stuff, which may seem a bit oily when you rub the black particles. These connectors can be to and from the water heater.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Bannerman]

Since the issue is only apparent in the hot water, any debris that entered the WH prior to replacing the softening resin and cleaning the brine tank, will mostly continue to be present within the WH.

Assuming a lab test had been performed to identify the 600 ppm hardness and 4 ppm iron levels, post the complete lab report for review as the black particles could be caused by manganese or other water conditions.

In addition to the likelihood hardness scale within the WH becoming dissolved back into the softer water, and the possibly of supply line breakdown, there is a further possibility of the WH's anode rod breaking down and depositing particles into the hot water. Perhaps removing, inspecting and possibly replacing the anode rod might be a good place to begin before flushing the WH tank.

Suggest obtaining a Hach 5B Total Hardness test kit. The 5B is the most recommended kit, which will permit you to easily and accurately test hardness in not only the raw water supplied from the well, but also the soft water from the WH, to compare hardness within the soft water directly exiting the softener. This will assist to identify how much if any hardness rise is being caused by dissolved scale from within the WH.

4 ppm iron is significant enough to require removal by other, more efficient methods prior to a water softener.

 

[Stephen Walker]

I am shopping for a new rod as it hasn't been replaced since I bought the house and not sure if it was ever changed. I also though tit might have been from when I had to use unfiltered water to clean the brine and other tank. The company that installed the softener did the test and there was a complete 900ish dollar test done when I bought the house. I sit on natural limestone aquafer. I don't have the test results handy tho. I do know the water softener was setup with everything in mind and it did last 19 years with minimal maintenance. I have added on a 50 micron spin down filter and have a 3 stage whole house filter I plan on adding an iron filter to for now. It is a 20x4.5 ispring system. I just haven't used it yet as I thought it would clog up way to fast to be cost effective.

I do have plans on getting a birm tank or the other one that treats 10ppm iron, 20ppm mag and calcium but the water company said it would be over kill. But with the whole house 3-stage iron filter I could lower the hardness setting by 12 as the 20x4.5 treats up to 3ppm. I am eyeing 1.5 cubic foot iron filters.

Waiting on the company that produces this rod, Model #1027500, to email me back. Want to make sure it fits before buying. On the brine tank. the salt at the bottom was black. I didn't check it much further than that besides to make sure the float valve was still working.

 

[Bannerman]

the whole house 3-stage iron filter I could lower the hardness setting by 12 as the 20x4.5 treats up to 3ppm.

Most iron in well water, is in a ferrous state, that is, the iron is fully dissolved in the water and therefore cannot be simply filtered out using a cartridge filter.

There are various methods to remove iron, including oxidation using air, chlorine, ozone or hydrogen peroxide. Oxidation will convert the ferrous iron into a ferric state, so the resulting solid particles (rust) maybe permitted to precipitate out or be filtered out using a sediment filter(s).

Other iron reduction methods utilize media such as Katalox Light, to catalyze iron, manganese and hydrogen sulphide (cause of rotten egg odor), to convert each to a ferric state, permitting the remaining media to filter out the resulting solids, and the backwashing controller will periodically flush the solids out to drain. Depending on water conditions as indicated in a lab test report, sometimes an additional oxidant such as chlorine or ozone will be utilized in conjunction with media, to supplement the oxidation that is to occur in the media.

As most iron reduction will be most effective when water pH is 7.0 or higher, an acid neutralizer will often be required when water pH is lower than 6.9.

Each 1 ppm of ferric iron or manganese that is removed utilizing a softener, will deplete the softener's capacity by an equivalent hardness value of 5 grains per gallon (85 ppm), so I'm not clear on why you think your softener's hardness setting may be reduced by 12 gpg if 3 ppm iron is removed prior to the softener.

 

[Mswlogo]

If the water heater has no rod there might be a reason for it. hydrogen sulfide.

 

[Stephen Walker]

The water softener company is the one that said the 4 hardness setting per 1ppm of iron in my water. That is how they determined the hardness setting. So they said for every 1ppm of iron removed before the softener I could decrease their setting by 4. My current hardness setting is 48. Capacity is 24. 12 for salt.

btw, I am an idiot lol. My bypass valve before any filtrations was slightly open. Problem solved. edit: I had to use unfiltered water during cleaning of the system and thought the valve was completely closed.