Filling and drawing brine, but still no soft water


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Old 01-08-11, 10:23 PM
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Filling and drawing brine, but still no soft water

I have a Kenmore UltraSoft 425, about 5 years old, that recently stopped giving soft water. I was using the System Saver pellets, and noticed I had about 6 inches of salt mush compacted at the bottom of the salt tank. I removed all salt, cleaned the tank, and refilled with salt crystals. I did a regeneration, and checked for proper function and water flow at each step of the regeneration. The tank fills with about 10 inches of water, and the brine is then drawn up until there are only a couple of inches of water left at the bottom of the brine well. I've confirmed that the control valve stops in the "service" position, but the water still doesn't feel or taste soft. The water will sporadically feel or taste soft for a short time, but I can't detect a specific pattern. Our water doesn't seem to contain much iron, but I bought Iron Out and ran that through the system, just in case.

I am pretty handy with household repairs, but this one has me stumped. Unless there is a crack in the distributor tube that is allowing water to bypass the resin bed, I can't think of anything that would cause the softener to output hard water after several regenerations. I don't even know how I would check for a cracked distributor tube.

Does anyone have any ideas on what else I might check?

Thanks,
Jerry
 
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Old 01-09-11, 06:39 AM
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Your resin may have become fouled when the mush developed and prevented regular regeneration. If so the solution is several regenerations with higher than normal levels of brine.

Change the hardness level to the maximum level the control will accept and initiate a manual regeneration for the next three nights as you go to bed. If that resolves the problem then return the hardness setting to normal. If it doesn't try for three more nights before giving up.
 
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Old 01-09-11, 08:08 AM
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Thanks Bob. I'll give that a try. I'll even manually add more water to the brine tank than the regeneration cycle normally does during the fill cycle to give it a little "salt boost".
 
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Old 01-09-11, 08:35 PM
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If the distributor tube is cracked often there is resin showing up in the sink, tub and other places.. so if no resin then the tube most likely is not cracked but with in the valve the disc and seal is cut or cracked and water is crossing with in the valve body.
 
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Old 01-10-11, 08:00 AM
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I've seen the distributor tube collasp into the bottom basket which will cause the top o ring to fall out of place. This will allow the unit to cycle properly but have hard water. To check, follow procedures for removing valve head and if the o ring is laying the upper basket, this is the cause.
 
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Old 01-12-11, 02:09 PM
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I pulled off the valve head, and the o-ring appeared to be pushed up into the valve head a bit. I put it back over the distributor tube, and replaced the head, and am now regenerating to see if the brine had been bypassing the resin bed.

In the past several days, I have tried 5 regenerations. I also mixed 3 cups of Iron Out in 3 gallons of water, drew the solution directly from a bucket into the resin tank, and then left the tank to sit for about 10 hours with the Iron-Out. I followed that with another regeneration, and the water was still hard. I'll see if the o-ring may have been the problem. If not, I guess that my resin must be shot.

My question is, before ordering replacement resin, is it possible that the resin could be fouled after only 5 years of service, with municipal water? Our water isn't exceptionally hard in the Miami area (about 14 GPG), and I don't notice any iron taste in the softened or hard water. I must admit, however, that I've never used a water softener cleaner during the 5 years since installation.
 

Last edited by nitewind; 01-12-11 at 02:38 PM.
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Old 01-12-11, 03:35 PM
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With municipal water the primary cause of resin deterioration is the chlorine. The higher the residual chlorine the faster the deterioration. Rub the resin between your fingers--if it is is mushy it has deteriorated.
 
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Old 02-04-11, 07:19 PM
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Distributor tube/o-ring

If the top of the distributor tube is cracked or broken, or the o-ring seal has failed you can check this by putting the unit into brine draw. If you immediately get salt water thru the drain line to the drain, you may have a damnaged distributor seal o-ring where the distributor seals into the control valve. Under normal operation, the brine must travel thru the media bed before exiting the mineral tank during the brine cycle, which may take up to 4-5 minutes before brine can be detected at the drain.
 
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Old 03-06-11, 04:30 PM
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A good way to check to see if the o-ring at the distributor tube is good and the distributor isn't cracked up top is to put the softener into brine draw and let it run for a good 2 -4 minutes. Then bypass it and move the valve to SERVICE/aka soft water. Unbypass the softener and head inside and turn on JUST THE COLD WATER. When the brine starts coming out, see how long it lasts. If it barely comes out then the o-ring is bad or out of whack or worn out or the tube is cracked towards the top.

Basically, it's a pretty easy check to see if the brine mixture is going through the resin bed as it should or taking the short cut through the unsealed part(s).
 
 

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