My softener quit providing soft water a couple weeks ago and I think it has something to do with the resin bed. What size should the resin beads be? Is there any method for cleaning the resin other than the standard resin bed cleaners? Citric Acid?

thanks
wingnut

 

Before you blame the resin make sure the brine tank is being properly filled at the end of the regeration and that the brine is being sucked in to the resin tank during regeration. No brine, no soft water

Lots of info and help here ...

http://www.kenmorewater.com/website/...nimations.html

 

The storage tank doesn't fill with water at the END of the regeneration process, it fills at the very BEGINNING, stage 1. Waits for 8 minutes, then goes to the brine cycle. This way, the bulk of the salt in the storage tank isn't sitting in water between regenerations.
The brine is definitely being drawn into the resin tank, as I've checked the brine well tube and venturi unit during the brine stage, and I have suction.

I'm dealing with a unit that's 5 years old and the home's previous owners did nothing to it in the way of maintenance. I've replaced all serviceable parts in the venturi assembly and brine well fill/suction valve, and that hasn't seem to help. My next task is to clean the resin bed, and then replace the softener if that doesn't work.

 

If the softener is putting water in the brine tank before the regeneration that is called "pre-fill" and some softeners do that. I don't think 8 minutes of water sitting in the brine tank is long enough to disolve the proper amount of salt to regenerate the resin. It usually takes about 2 hours to saturate the water with disolved salt. If the brine doesn't contain the proper amount of salt then the resin is not being regenerated and the water will not be soft (or will not be soft until the next regeneration).