Fleck 5600 12 day – how many gal used for brine rinse?

[rudhawk1]

I’m helping out my 91 yr old neighbor. Some idiot replaced her old system with a used 5600 which wasn’t working correctly (brine tank overflowed and the plumbing was a hack job). We told him not to come back.

Anyway, I don’t know how old the control is nor the age of the resin.

My concern is the amount of water in the brine tank; it’s about 16 inches from the top – this is WITHOUT salt. I ran it through a regeneration cycle and it sucked out all but 3 inches of the brine water and refilled to that same high level. By my calculations that would be about 12.3 gallons of water. The problem is if I add much salt it will be at the overflow outlet.

here’s what I’ve done so far:

Removed the injector body and cleaned nozzles and screen (didn’t find any debris), lubed all o rings with silicone and installed new brine valve assembly. Replaced the brine line hose and installed a screen. DLFC button was clean.

Removed the piston assembly and cleaned and coated the seals, spacers, etc with silicone (the control knob had been hard to turn – and this helped).

The salt setting is at 6 lbs. The brine pickup tube is about 2 inches from the bottom of the 14 inch by 14 inch 35 inch tall tank (no float control).

So, here’s my question – how much brine solution does the 5600 use? If you agree it’s using too much brine water – what should I check/fix?

Thanks, all.

 

[ditttohead]

First, confirm the Brine Line Flow control is working properly. What is the salt range on the sticker in the back of the valve (the one that is currently set to 6)?
The normal flow controls for this valve is .25 gpm or .5 gpm. The sticker should match the flow control or you could have half, or double the amount of salt depending on the setting. Sounds like you may be missing the flow control button if it is filling up that much water. Or you could have a leaking brine valve. you can remove the brine line and simply time the refill rate to determine the flow control size or you can remove the flow control and visually inspect it. it will have numbers molded onto it that will tell us what flow it is. You will also usually see a sticker on the brine/drain module that is either blue or black, this will have writing on it indicating the BLFC that is supposed to b installed.

FYI, time clock valves are not to be installed in California, meters are required.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[rudhawk1]

Success!
Brine Cam Gear setting is 8 lbs. (not 6 as I previously stated)

BLFC Button reads 250 (which I assume is .25 gal). I removed the button, cleaned it up and reinstalled with numbers facing me as I dropped it in. I don’t think it was in “side ways” but maybe it was - because now it’s refilling to the proper level.

I started the regeneration. It took about 35 minutes until brine rinse started – and that ran for about 45+ minutes.

Brine refill (actual opening of the brine valve assembly) ran for 8 minutes. Refilled to about 12 inches – at the level of the salt I had in the tank. I put in another bag of salt and called it a day.

Sticker on the injector body says .5 gpm (is that the sticker you're talking about?)

Thanks for the help getting me pointed in the right direction.

 

[ditttohead]

Sounds like you got it.

FYI, the sticker should match the flow control button, it sounds like yours do not match. More importantly the button and sticker inside the power head should match. The salt setting sticker for a .25 GPM button should be 3-18 pounds. The .5 gpm BLFC should have a 6-36 pounds sticker.

This may vary slightly as the stickers have changed over the years so the pounds may be slightly different but it will be close.