Have you noticed your softener is using an excessive amount of salt? That may means it's recharging more often than it should. Read on below to make sure your system is set up to work efficiently!
Your water softener recharges automatically based on two factors:
- Your hardness setting
- The amount of soft water you use each day
Click each section below to read more.
Hardness
Your softener's hardness setting should be set to match the amount of hardness and iron in your water supply. The higher your hardness, the more salt the softener will use. To determine your appropriate hardness number, use our Hardness Calculation guide.
Water Usage
If your softener detects very high water usage, it'll use more salt to keep up with the increased demand for soft water. In some cases, the high water use could be because of a leaky fixture or other plumbing issue somewhere in the home. Let's do a test to see this may be the case:
1. Go ahead and turn off any running water and water-using appliances in your home (showers, faucets, washing machines, dishwashers, etc.).
2. Hold the Select button for about 3 seconds until ‘000’ appears on the screen, then let go. This is the water flow meter.
3. We can use this feature as a tool to make sure no water is running in your home that you're unaware of. If you notice the numbers begin climbing, soft water is running somewhere in the home.
4. Check and monitor the flow meter over several days to confirm there are no leaky faucets, occasional running toilets, etc. that could be using water without your knowledge.
Also, if any outdoor faucets or sprinklers are on softened water, this can result in a much higher demand being placed on your water softener, resulting in more recharges and higher salt use.
Optional Programming (Select Models)
Some models include the option to set a maximum number of days between recharges. If this maximum happens to be set very low, like 1 or 2 days, your system will recharge more frequently and could use much more salt than necessary. To check your 'Max Days Between Recharges' setting:
1. Go ahead and hold the Select button until ‘000’ appears on the screen, then let go.
2. Now you'll keep tapping the Select button until you see a screen that displays ‘Recharge’ and ‘Day’:
- If ‘- - - -‘ or AUTO appears on the screen - no maximum has been set. This means that the system is only recharging as needed according to your water usage and hardness.
- If a number is shown - you may wish to raise the maximum to a longer interval to prevent excessive recharging, or turn the 'Max Days' feature off by tapping the down arrow button until '- - - -' appears in place of a number.
3. When you're finished, tap the Select button twice to return back to the home screen.
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