Water Softener Project

[UncleDave]

The house had had acidic, and rock hard well water for about 20 years.

The toilets and certain fixtures are permanently stained blue from it and fixing it to the degree that was needed was a time consuming and expensive process

I could have put the softener at the well head, but then Id be dumping the brine on top of my well and Id be using softened water for irrigation ripping through tons of salt.

No room inside the house for it.

Had to.

Create a pad and enclosure outside that isnt an eyesore but looks like it was part of the house originally.

Add the softener, Add calcite filter.

Replumb both to flush the brine slurry into the septic transfer tank

Re plumb the filtration system putting the 20 micron glass spun filter at the wellhead, and a big blue carbon block coming out of the calcite filter and softener polishing what goes into the house.

Split the softened water, running unsoftened water to the irrigation taps on the side and back, but running softened water to the front hose bib so you wash eth vehicles with softened water laminated the etching and hard water spots we get now.

Its no wonder the original owners didnt do this -It took a lot of time and effort and money to get it right.

Going to repair the whole house soon so just primed the containement

Ill put-up a few more picts later.

 

[JohnnyG]

How many grains hardness? Hardness and acid don't usually go together, since hardness is an excessive amount of calcium/magnesium. In fact, they even make softners with citric acid (non salt) systems now.

Everything else seems OK, except for the brine going to septic. If your soil won't perk tho, you don't have much choice. It won't really hurt the septic system unless the salinity gets too high and starts killing good bacteria.
You MIGHT have been able to run the brine/backflush to surface water, or a seperate drain area.

My BIL is doing the exact same thing for the brine disposal, but lives on sandy soil, so he's burying a 55 gallon drum with precautions for it NOT to silt up.

 

[UncleDave]

How many grains hardness? Hardness and acid don't usually go together, since hardness is an excessive amount of calcium/magnesium. In fact, they even make softners with citric acid (non salt) systems now.

Everything else seems OK, except for the brine going to septic. If your soil won't perk tho, you don't have much choice. It won't really hurt the septic system unless the salinity gets too high and starts killing good bacteria.
You MIGHT have been able to run the brine/backflush to surface water, or a seperate drain area.

My BIL is doing the exact same thing for the brine disposal, but lives on sandy soil, so he's burying a 55 gallon drum with precautions for it NOT to silt up.

I'll dig up pre and post measurements, Im pretty pleased with the reduction in hardness and swing in PH.

The system had a fairly decent sized citric bead stage prior- it didnt move the meter enough.

Let me rephrase where the backflush is going - its going into whole house sized sewage transfer tank - it then gets periodically pumped to a treatment plant.

 

[JohnnyG]

^Sounds expensive, but much better overall.

 

[UncleDave]

Getting there..

 

[UncleDave]

^Sounds expensive, but much better overall.

It was - and it is - totally different house.

I could have cheapened out on the up front and just done this at the wellhead but the in the long run Id spend more on money and carrying labor for salt and contaminate my own water table while doing it.

 

[UncleDave]

Part of this whole spend now includes getting rid of the 20 year old toilets that have been permanently stained by the acid causing copper to leach out.

he master bathroom unit had been switched out at some point but the upstairs and guest toilets each had horrific staining that even acids didn't fix.

3 new toilets coming up......going for the chair height units - getting old.

 

[xgmad]

that's a good looking 20 year old toilet.

 

[JohnnyG]

Not a fan of the higher toilets. I think the Japanese Benjo was a more natural "way to go". But hey, if your knees won't bend, you don't have much choice.