Salt use down

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LLigetfa

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I've not been keeping a close eye on the salt use. Mostly I fill the brine tank to the top and check it every few months. Anyway time sorta got away on me and I lost track of when I last filled it but had a nagging feeling that the salt level was not dropping.

I popped the top on the tank and the cap on the brine well so I could observe the brine draw during a regen. The first thing I noticed was that there were air bubbles in the brine draw line. Also the brine level had closed the float valve. The bottom of the brine pickup was buried in sludge and so the combination of air leak and sludge was keeping the float valve from opening. I pushed down on the fill check float and the brine started to flow but the flow appeared to be slow. My guess is some of the sludge got sucked in when I disturbed the pickup by tugging and pushing on the float rod.

I let the regen continue until the brine refill stage. The refill lifted the fill check float and shut off the flow with many minutes still left on the fill stage. I took apart and cleaned the injector, the brine line and the pickup. I cannot see what is preventing the air check from sealing.

After I put everything back together, I tested for an air leak by lifting the float to stop the flow. There were no more bubbles with the closed fill check but when the brine ran out, the air check did not seal. Brine fill again was stopped by the fill check float with 5 minutes of fill time remaining. I thought the fill time determines how much water is added and not the fill check float. Is not the fill check float only supposed to engage when something goes wrong?

Water test results
Iron 6.75 PPM
Manganese 0.4 PPM
Hardness 75 GPG
pH 7.2

Softener cycle times observations
60 minute brine draw
- white injector, .25 - .275 GPM
- air check not working

7:52 minute brine fill
- overfill check float shuts off with 5:02 minutes remaining
- brine fill is purported to be .5 GPM
 

Reach4

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Bubbles started only after the brine had been drawn down, or maybe before? How about a leak above the air check valve and below the float valve?
 

LLigetfa

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Bubbles started only after the brine had been drawn down, or maybe before?
On first regen, the bubbles were at the start of the brine draw. Bubbles also after brine well emptied.

How about a leak above the air check valve and below the float valve?
The fill float check uses a rod that goes down to the pickup which is completely submerged in brine at start of cycle. Only place for an air leak is the elbow at the top of the brine well where the brine tubes connect and exits the tank.

The combination fill check and air check looks like the following. The elbow goes on the top of the vertical tube.
Water_Softener_Brine_Valve_GE.jpg
 

LLigetfa

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On first regen, the bubbles were at the start of the brine draw.
Just to be clear, the bubbles at the start of the cycle were only when the valve would not open due to being buried in sludge. After I removed the sludge and put it back together, I only got bubbles after the brine was all sucked out so suspect the air check or the fill check is not sealing.
 

Bannerman

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7:52 minute brine fill
That's an odd setting. 8 minutes X 0.5 GPM BLFC = 4 gallons X 3 lbs/gallon = 12 lbs salt.

12 lbs salt will be appropriate to regenerate ~ 28,000 grains capacity in 1 ft3 resin, 36,000 grains in 1.5 ft3 or 40,000 - 42,000 grains in 2 ft3.

Suggest accessing the brine fill flow restrictor to ensure it is actually installed and if so, to verify the flow rate indicated. Alternately, disconnect the brine line at the top of the brine tank to measure the water flow from the open brine line in 60-seconds during Brine Fill.

As the Brine well normally extends to the bottom of the brine tank, most debris and sludge from the salt area, will normally be held back from the brine pickup and air check assembly.

I prefer the Fleck 2310 Pickup assembly as the safety valve and float is located at the top of the assembly, well above the brine, and the air check valve is screened to reduce the amount of debris and sludge that can enter.

2310bv-sc.JPG
 
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LLigetfa

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I left the programming up to the installer but now I wonder if he installed the safety float height correctly. I read somewhere that the float should be set just below the overflow. Mine is set 8 inches below the overflow. I would think at minimum, it should be set just a tad higher than the level reached by the programmed fill rate. Am I right to think the float should not stop the refill after less than 3 minutes?

The softener is a 10x54 tank purported to be 50K (1.7 CF). After a regen, the Clack head says I have around 455 gallons. Is 8 minutes fill correct at .5 GPM?
 

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The softener is a 10x54 tank purported to be 50K (1.7 CF). After a regen, the Clack head says I have around 455 gallons. Is 8 minutes fill correct at .5 GPM?
8 minutes and 1.7 cuft of resin would give 7.06 lb/cuft. So passes sanity check.

If I presume a compensated hardness of 120 (which may be low considering high hardness compensation, I predict about 312 gallons without taking reserve into account.

If you are taking out the iron and Mn, before the softener, then things get easier.

You have challenging water, but you knew that.
 

LLigetfa

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Yes, there is an iron filter before the softener so should need less compensation. The brine well had iron and manganese staining so the iron filter is not catching all of it. Mind you I did recently add more FilterAG media to it and increased the BLFC. I ran some Iron Out through it to clean the brine well and the softener. Whenever I do that, it affects the water clarity which upsets the wife.

I raised the fill check float and will monitor it more closely. The water clarity needs to improve before the wife can do laundry so I have to keep my hands off it for a week or two.
 

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The safety valve & float's purpose is to prevent brine tank overflow in case of malfunction or power loss during Brine Fill. Many tanks equipped with a safety valve and float will not also include an overflow, but since yours does, the float will only need to be adjusted to shut off water entry slightly below the overflow port.

While media tanks utilized for softening resin are typically sized to allow 50% freeboard, a 10" X 54" tank provides only sufficient space for only 1.35 ft3 media + 15 lbs gravel + 50% freeboard. By reducing media expansion to only 40%, will permit 1.5 ft3 media use in that size tank. As such a 10" X 54" tank would be unsuitable for 1.7 ft3 softening resin without some resin loss to drain.

Although an upper screen may have been installed to reduce resin loss during backwash, media accumulation on an upper screen may cause the actual backwash rate to be reduced, and repeated loading will likely cause the upper screen to eventually fail. If a greater amount of resin was needed, a 12" diameter tank should have been used which would allow up to 2 ft3 resin to be installed.

An 8 minute BF setting combined with 0.5 GPM BLFC will result in 12 lbs salt to be dissolved. That salt amount (= 8 lbs/ft3) is sufficient to regenerate 36,000 gr capacity in 1.5 ft3 resin.

index.php
 
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LLigetfa

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While media tanks utilized for softening resin are typically sized to allow 50% freeboard, a 10" X 54" tank provides only sufficient space for only 1.35 ft3 media + 15 lbs gravel + 50% freeboard. By reducing media expansion to only 40%, will permit 1.5 ft3 media use in that size tank. As such a 10" X 54" tank would be unsuitable for 1.7 ft3 softening resin without some resin loss to drain.
It was quoted and billed as a 50K softener.
 

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Reach4

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Name a square size that would approximate the area of the tank midway through the brine level rise.

For example, if you named 14 inches square, I would estimate about
11.8 inch rise in salt, but only about a 4.7 inch rise if there were no salt.

Out of curiosity, are you using salt pellets, or something else? I am only wondering about your sludge. I guess the inter-piece space in solar salt would differ from pellets, but I don't even know which would displace more water per inch.

You still have the micronizer before the filter AG, I think.
 
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LLigetfa

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How much of a problem is there if the air check leaks? It has leaked since day 1 and my old softener also leaked. On my old system, the air in the HP tank would move forward into the iron filter and softener during high flow and I could hear the water splashing as it entered the media tank. By installing a second HP tank with shortened AVC, that is no longer the case.

After the regen, if I put my ear to the media tank, I don't hear any loud splashing that would suggest a lot of air trapped above the media. There is no air sputtering at the sinks. There is some sound of air going through the water heater when the wife fills her soaker tub. The tub filler is high flow and so drops the pressure on the entire system. With the reduced pressure, trapped air expands and can move forward.
 

LLigetfa

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Name a square size that would approximate the area of the tank midway through the brine level rise...
Tank is 12" at the base, 14" at the top and 32" tall.
Out of curiosity, are you using salt pellets, or something else? I am only wondering about your sludge...
I use Morton Rust Defense which is in pellet form. It has always accumulated sludge. My old softener brine intake had a slotted screen but no fill check valve.
You still have the micronizer before the filter AG, I think.
Yes, micronizer > HP tank > modified HP/contact tank > iron filter > softener.
 

Reach4

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Tank is 12" at the base, 14" at the top and 32" tall.

Using 12.75 square as an approximate model (reduced from 13 due to rounded corners etc), I would expect about 14.2 inches of rise in salt. So the float valve would have to be set pretty high. Maybe 12.5 would be a better model, That raises the expected rise to about 14.8 inches.

I use Morton Rust Defense which is in pellet form. It has always accumulated sludge. My old softener brine intake had a slotted screen but no fill check valve.
I am wondering if a wet-dry vacuum down the brine well (after the way was cleared) could suck some sludge. Then decant the liquid back to the tank. That could only get the sludge that made it thru the slots in the bottom of the brine well.

If you use regular softener salt and added your own citric acid, it would probably be cheaper, and/or you could increase the amount of citric acid.

There is some thought that solar salt, despite having more non-soluble dirt stuff, may be less prone to produce less slush. Here the pellets are cheaper than solar, and in some other areas it is the other way around.

They also sell softener salt in 25 lb blocks here. I have not tried that.
 

LLigetfa

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I am wondering if a wet-dry vacuum down the brine well (after the way was cleared) could suck some sludge.
I did just that. Stuck a length of 3/4" copper pipe with busted half of a 45 elbow left on the bottom down the brine well.

I do periodically let the salt level get low so that I can bail out the sludge and salt. I just spread it on my gravel driveway to kill weeds rather than try to separate the salt from the sludge.

I was stocking up on Morton salt at Menards in the US whenever it went on sale. That was before the border closure due to COVID. The last of it is in the brine tank now so after it is depleted, I will have to change brands since Morton is not available locally. Windsor makes what looks to be a similar product that is available locally. I've not found an MSDS for it to compare ingredients.
https://windsorsalt.com/product/windsor-clean-protect/

I did a bit of research WRT air entrapment at the top of the media tank. According to Waterite, the air will accelerate iron fouling of the head but they offer an air blocker that purports to solve that.
https://www.waterite.com/images/uploads/files/Air Blocker R2.pdf
 

LLigetfa

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If you use regular softener salt and added your own citric acid, it would probably be cheaper, and/or you could increase the amount of citric acid.
I have considered using citric acid instead of Iron Out to periodically clean the system. The Iron Out tends not to all get rinsed to the drain and so finds its way into the HWT where it liberates iron that then irks the wife when it shows up in her bath water. This only affects the hot water. The cold water looks fine. It could also be that the now softer water is what is liberating the iron in the HWT but I do smell the Iron Out in the shower. Regardless, after I do maintenance on the softener, I end up in the doghouse.

She is doing laundry today despite my work last night upsetting water clarity. I heard her draw water in her soaker tub, presumably to check the clarity. I suggested she start with dark loads. I don't know how much hot water she uses for laundry.
 

Reach4

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I have considered using citric acid instead of Iron Out to periodically clean the system. The Iron Out tends not to all get rinsed to the drain and so finds its way into the HWT where it liberates iron that then irks the wife when it shows up in her bath water.
Sounds like extending the brine draw cycle a lot after an IO treatment, which would extend the slow rinse, would be useful to clear the IO better. The slow rinse uses laminar flow, where backwashing, and even fast rinse, mixes things up.
 
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