Fixing a Water Softener

[Ross365]

Having grown up in an area with soft water, and now living in an area with hard water, I really love my softener... but it's stopped working.

It's the conventional type with a resin bed which is regenerated with brine, but during the brine rinse it's taking virtually no liquid from the salt tank. There is no guidance on servicing in the instructions. I'm thinking of trying to set it up to do a reverse flush when in the brine rinse position. Not very optimistic, but softeners are damn expensive to buy (for what they are).

The machine is a no-name brand off ebay and only 2-3 years old. My last machine was from Wickes and lasted 30 years, but Wickes no longer do them.

Anyone got any experience or insights? The brine gets sucked in to the resin tank by what I think you'd describe as a "water ejector pump", i.e. a bit like those vacuum pumps which connect to a water tap in school chemistry labs etc. The water supply is set at 4 bar pressure.

 

[frank horton]

simmilar probs....tried to get somebody in to fix it......
with call out costs etc just binned it.....it was an expensive model tho, now forget the brand.....
be interested to see how u get on......I dont need one at all now....

 

[voipio]

Is the brine chamber filling with water, but not emptying again? If it sounds as if water is definitely flowing during the brine resin regeneration step, check that the brine draw-off tube isn't blocked. Some of the cheaper brands of pellets contain salt that isn't very pure, ending up with all sorts of crud floating about in the brine. Applying suction to the end of the draw off tube might pull back stuff that could be blocking it.

 

[123hotchef]

I had a go at fixing my kinetico one got it all apart so may valves and seals it was crud from the cheap salt I had been using! It worked fine for a few months after that then decided to stop working again, So I ended up getting a cheaper version that aint so fussy with what salt it eats.https://www.nisbets.co.uk/automatic-water-softener-cold-feed/cf614

 

[Anguz]

Eductor is the term I belive for the pump. Any dirt in it will stop it working

 

[Gareth J]

I've a bigger version of these.

Had an issue recently, resulting in the brine chamber emptying of water completely, which is unusual. Someone had almost completely closed the supply flow to the unit. It wasn't noticed as demand wasn't very high and enough water passing to keep up. The company that maintain the system suggested, as above, blockages can cause issues. Appears to be a simple Bernoulli suction affair. In my case, a low flow rate appears to have been a cause of issues too. Might be worth checking full flow through the unit.

 

[RWD3M]

My water softener stopped softening (it was functioning however, just not softening|) so I ran one of hese through it:

Water Softener Resin Cleaner, Resin Bed Cleaner - Ultra Soft

Water Softener Resin Cleaner is used to clean and disinfect the resin bed of your water softener, removing iron, manganese, bacteria and silt build up.

ultra-soft.co.uk

Worked a treat.

 

[Ross365]

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll definitely have a go with it.
Eductor may well be the word I was looking for. During the brine rinse of the resin, I would have thought there would be fast flow of water through the eductor to get suction, but the flow is really quite low. Suspect that it is a blockage somewhere - just a matter of finding it and sorting .

 

[Bladevane]

As part of the eductor and associated pipework operate under a slight vacuum I would check there are no leaks.