New Water Softener, Brown Water after 2nd regen. Comes and goes

[NotaPlumber77]

Hey guys,
As my name says, definitely not a plumber. Hoping for some clarification here. We recently moved into an older house (1970) with a water softener from 1984. The house has well water and passed the water test inspection with slightly elevated iron levels. We replaced the softener last week since it was analog and eating through 40lbs of salt per week, and initially had no problems. We installed a two stage system, calcium & iron, and hydrogen sulfide.
However, two days ago (one week after install) after both tanks ran, we noticed that our water was immediately brown, with sediment in it. Like someone had dyed the water and added dirt to it. Even our filtered fridge water was coming out brown.
I regened both tanks twice, and it cleared it up a little. I called the person who did the installation and he said it could be a faulty bladder tank. Had someone come out that day, and he said the bladder tank is fine. He then said that the well pump is older, and the new system may be putting too much strain on it and disturbing the sand and sediments in the well?
This morning, it's back to brown again. The person who initially installed the softeners is coming back out today to look at it, but I don't know exactly what he's looking for. I guess I'd just like some advice on how to proceed, and what I should ask the softener company to do, if anything. I don't want to sound entitled when talking to the install guy, but I feel like this is on them. If not, please correct me based on the info I've provided. While the old softener ate through tons of salt, we never once had a sediment or discolored water issue in the 9 months that we'd been in the house.
Thanks in advance.

 

[Reach4]

If your outdoor hose bibb does not go thru filtering (it should not), run that for a bit to let old water wash thru, and fill a glass. let that sit. Let's call that glass #2.

Let that glass of water in your photo sit for a few days. How long does it take for the sediment to settle. Let's call that glass #1.


In another glass, add 1/4 tsp of liquid chlorine bleach. Set that along side the first glass. Glass #3, and let's say this is optional if you don't already have the bleach.

Another thought is to do some tests with the softener in bypass.

 

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[NotaPlumber77]

If your outdoor hose bibb does not go thru filtering (it should not), run that for a bit to let old water wash thru, and fill a glass. let that sit. Let's call that glass #2.

Let that glass of water in your photo sit for a few days. How long does it take for the sediment to settle. Let's call that glass #1.


In another glass, add 1/4 tsp of liquid chlorine bleach. Set that along side the first glass. Glass #3, and let's say this is optional if you don't already have the bleach.

Another thought is to do some tests with the softener in bypass.

Okay, will do. I won't get off work until late tonight but I'll try this. Thank you!
One major issue with inspecting the well itself is that they built an addition over it. The crawl space above it is only max 3ft high. The guy who came out to look at the bladder tank said it would be a pain to replace the pump if that is the issue. It was either cut a hole in our floor which my wife was not having, or dig a whole new well to the tune of 9k.
I want to push him to see how much it would cost to do the pump, even with a "what a pain" tax involved.

 

[Reach4]

A hole in the floor could be covered with a floor hatch. Well would have to be converted to use polyethene pipe rather than galvanized or PVC... And even then, it sounds like tough working.

I think you would need to be able to bend polyethylene pipe out of the upper side of a window. That could be tough. Flexible drop pipe could be a solution for that. https://terrylove.com/forums/index.php?threads/well-drop.95523/

1" WellHose - DIY Well Drop Pipes | WellHose

With WellHose DIY Drop Pipe you can easily install and retrieve your own submersible pumps Maximum Depth setting: 300ft / 90m For deeper pump settings please click here for Boreline

wellhose.com

 

[NotaPlumber77]

A hole in the floor could be covered with a floor hatch. Well would have to be converted to use polyethene pipe rather than galvanized or PVC... And even then, it sounds like tough working.

Yeah, the problem is that it would be smack in the middle of our living room. Wife wasn't having it and I agree with her

 

[NotaPlumber77]

So interesting update, I bypassed the whole system and now the water is coming out clean. Its straight well water which defeats the purpose though. So, that leads me back to believing its something with the system.
Is it possible that the soft water is dislodging sediment from our pipes, and the tech was wrong about the well being over drawn?

Edit: The water is back to brown, even bypassed. I now worry that the softener system somehow jeopardized the integrity of our well.

 

[MaxBlack]

FWIW when we moved-into this 1991 house a few years ago, we didn't like the smelly water nor the 25 year-old water softener and had a new system installed. In the process we learned the air tank had likely never been drained (and this house has extraordinarily excellent utility power so... no draw-downs on the tank bladder) and that was one source of filth. It was clear too that the old softener had not worked reliably and so... bottom line the pipes were not clean and it took quite some weeks-maybe-months for all the problems to work their way out of the system.

Maybe you just need to give the system time to clear itself out.

And "HOLY CRAP" to the previous owner's decision to build an addition over the well head!!!!!!?!!??!!!

 

[NotaPlumber77]

Yeah we're really scratching our head over them building an addition over the well head. At least if you're going to do that, make the crawl space adequate height to properly service it. I got down there this morning to have a look and it's a hack job. They poured a cement slab right over everything, and then looks like they took sledgehammers to it to keep the well head "accessible". LOL. It's an oddly shaped lot so I guess they felt the best place to put an addition onto the house without taking up front yard space was to go backyard, which also happened to be where the well was/is.

However, good news!
A tech from the softener company came out and took a look at the system. He immediately got on the phone with his company and flat out cursed the first tech's name lol. Went off about how he should have actually tested our water draw/flow and never installed a system straight to it pulling 7gpm. The new tech was great. Added a reducer, turned it down to 2.5GPM and simply extended the backwash cycle to compensate. He ran it a few times and now the water is clear again. Fingers crossed that it stays that way!

He was 99% sure that the initial setup over-drew the well, sucking the sediment into the system. Also stated that since we have lower pressure copper pipes, not PEX, the high draw rate probably dislodged existing sediment deposits in our pipes. So far so good, and I hope it stays that way. Now I just have to get our tankless hot water heater flushed. I have half the mind to send the softener company the bill, since it was their setup that shot sediment through it. At the same time though, I just want to be done with them.

Thanks to everyone on here too. You guys gave me some piece of mind and helped me feel like I didn't just blow 5k that was going to end up with us spending 10k more to accommodate the new system.

 

[MaxBlack]

Wow I'm no expert but it sounds like the new tech nailed it and you should be alright from here on out. Isn't clearing-out the HWH a simple matter of running water through it?

Dunno how deep your well is, or what piping is used that extends down to the submersible pump, but it sounds like it'd be an absolute b*tch to replace if it failed. You might consider adding a Pumptec Plus from Franklin to monitor, protect, and prolong its life.

 

[Reach4]

A tech from the softener company came out and took a look at the system. He immediately got on the phone with his company and flat out cursed the first tech's name lol. Went off about how he should have actually tested our water draw/flow and never installed a system straight to it pulling 7gpm. The new tech was great. Added a reducer, turned it down to 2.5GPM and simply extended the backwash cycle to compensate. He ran it a few times and now the water is clear again. Fingers crossed that it stays that way!

I think you are using the softener as your only backwashing tank. Since the softener will be dealing with iron, you will want to use a supplement beyond salt. Iron Out powder is one such. There are other methods.

Some use a dispenser that adds a phosphoric acid solution to the brine tank at a wick-metered rate. You can add an acid to your brine tank. Give your softener iron-handling salt and/or use a Res-Up or ResCare feeder. Expect to do some cleaning in the future without an iron filter. Those meter a phosphoric acid solution into the brine tank. Citric acid is good to add manually, and is better-smelling than Iron Out.

If the softener was backwashing at 7 gpm, that is way too much. The tank diameter determines the appropriate backwash rate. 2.5 gpm would seem to imply a 10 inch diameter media tank.

I hope this change fixes your problem.