Water Softener Questions

[George Yetka]

Avoid culligan. Im a mechanical contractor so i got a deal on their gold equipment. Ive replaced alot of parts in 5 years. Go with fleck. Backwash can go into indirect drain into septic or sewer but not into storm drains. Best solution for dischsarge is to dump in a drywell (dig a hole lay down landscape fabric and fill hole with stone wrap the fabric around it and run a piece of pvc out of it and backfill. It will allow the water to perculate into the ground.

I have the following in order. ground is high in iron and had a little bit of bacteria.
neutralizer
softener
coarse sediment filter
greensand filter
fine sediment filter
UV
RO for drinking water only

The water is completely tasteless after all that. Costs about 650 a year in sal/filters/uv bulb. Filtration causes pressure loss and ph drop. Run system at 70pounds but more like 40 after all that. PH starts 7.1 but gets down to 6.0 or a little below after RO. Public water is accross the street but our town will not allow it

[Derek Meyer]

I've been looking at water softener systems for a while, and I'm leaning towards a citric acid system. They use a citric acid cartridge (food grade) to neutralize the minerals in the water. I've read that the water will get rid of scale on your fixtures, is safe to drink/wash with, and is much easier for the treatment plants to handle. The main downside is cost - the citric acid carts are about $80 to $90 and last around 3 to 4 months.

[Curt Harms]

We have a Water Boss, we've had it since maybe 2000. We recently had to replace one part, a valve that was sticking. There's one powered part on the whole thing, a cam wheel with a magnet embedded in it. Pretty simple. We have public sewer available so no issues with the recharge water. I'm not really sure what's in the discharge water, I'm suspect there wouldn't be much salt (NaCl). My suspect high school chemistry would say calcium chloride and magnesium chloride. An article on how water softeners work from a chemical standpoint:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...-softeners-wo/

[Jim Becker]

I forgot to mention this previously, but see what smaller, local businesses are in your area as an alternative to the "big names". I was fortunate enough to find one here for our acid neutralization system and we've been really happy with their installation and their service. It's a family run, small business. Their price for the "stuff" was noticeably lower than the "names" but high quality, too. A local firm will generally be in-tune with local water conditions, too, since they undoubtedly live with them.

[Bruce Wrenn]

I forgot to mention this previously, but see what smaller, local businesses are in your area as an alternative to the "big names". I was fortunate enough to find one here for our acid neutralization system and we've been really happy with their installation and their service. It's a family run, small business. Their price for the "stuff" was noticeably lower than the "names" but high quality, too. A local firm will generally be in-tune with local water conditions, too, since they undoubtedly live with them.

Fleck (Pentair) sells their heads to contractors who add the tanks, and resins. Put on a private label, and presto they now are a distributor.

[Stan Calow]

Bruce, what is the problem that you're trying to solve with a softener? Health, laundry, calcium buildup? Are you on a private well, or a public system?

[Jerry Bruette]

Fleck (Pentair) sells their heads to contractors who add the tanks, and resins. Put on a private label, and presto they now are a distributor.

That's correct and those contractors can customize the resin to fit the problem you're trying to treat.

The local brand I went with had resin that would handle a higher amount of iron than Culligan, even though Culligan had a better price.