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Yep--salt was being used up at the normal rate with each recharge.Originally Posted by Akpsdvan
Something inside the valve body went wrong once before: the unit would reach the end of the recharge cycle, but water kept running down the drain. Eventually, a little "call service" light would illuminate. The first few times I could tap the valve body in various ways, something would shake back into place, and the unit would recover. It got to the point, however, when this procedure would no longer work. So I called Culligan repair. The guy took a look and said it would cost $300 to fix. Seeing the shocked look on my face, he immediately stressed that the repair cost was set by corporate. The part he put in looked like it should cost about $5. I told myself, "The next time something major like this happens, I'm ditching this unit and Culligan." This same valve problem began reasserting itself last month, although this may or may not be tied to the "no longer softens" problem.
Last edited by SemiHandyRon; 02-21-2011 at 02:26 PM.
Most likely one of the seals is out of place or cut so that water is passing where it should not be passing ,, ie either to the drain or from the untreated side to the treated side inside the valve body.
There is not a valve that has some kind of challenge... different valves have different items that can give a challenge depending on the water that the unit is treating.
Yep--things break down. I just object to a repair bill that amounts to almost half the cost of a new softener.
Now investigating Fleck 2510SXT 40K units. Prices at qualitywaterforless.com and ohiopurewater.com are nearly identical. Anyone have good/bad experiences with either?
2510 in any form is a work horse that will last and last.
The 2510 was one of the Culligan valves in the 70's , it was brass and called Mark 49...
A lot of the parts on the 2510 are on other fleck valves.
Good stuff! Proceeding. I might be back here in a panic when I mess things up. But I installed by own RO system and emergency backup sump pump OK, so I give myself a 78% chance of doing everything right.
I report--success! After several delays, I finally got it installed strictly DIY. Two people at work advised me to go the SharkBite route, but I decided to go the solder route instead so I watched all the YouTube videos I could on how to solder copper pipe. Being a first timer, the soldering was a little sloppy and excessive. In retrospect, perhaps I should have gone the SharkBite route.
But now I have a question: how fast should the brine water be moving through the tube during the Brine Draw segment of regeneration? I ask because I notice that the brine water seems to be moving quite slowly. I can see the speed because there are large segments of air interspersed in the brine water in the tube. That, of course, raises a second question: should there be air in that tube?
There should only be large air bubbles in the brine tube at the tail end when the brine level has drawn down. It sounds like you have an air leak. Aside from that, the bine does move slowly.
Air leak--hmmm. Any advice on how to track it down and fix?
Where the line goes through the side of the brine tank, I assume there is a fitting with a 90 degree elbow. One side or the other of that elbow is where I would expect the air to be leaking in. It is the only place there is a fitting that is above the water line where you can see bubbles. Try putting a few drops of water on the fitting to see where it gets sucked in. Soap bubbles might work too.
There was a service paper awhile back from a company that I deal with talking about how the nut on the brine line that screws onto the float assembly there in the brine tank like to back off and that one should maybe use a small pair of channel locks to tighten it past hand tight .
Then there is the other nut that is on the pick up line from the bottom of the brine tank, it might need to be tightened.
Never take it that because it is from the factory all the fittings are tight like they should be.
Well...there were no factory tightenings on these. The thing came as a four-box kit, and I attached both ends of the brine line according to directions (compression bushing correctly positioned, nut tightened slightly past hand-tight, etc.). Maybe I'll need to use some teflon tape, pipe dope for plastic fittings (if there is such a thing), etc.
There is no need for the teflon tape or any of the other like items..
You might tighten the nut some more..
Going on to the tube in order
Nut
the item that looks broke... and the thin end goes on first so that it is pointing to the nut, it will slide in between tube and the hole withing the nut.
Then the other ring, that has two parts all in one, the right to the nut, then the sleeve pointing to the end of the tube then the insert either plastic or brass...
Then pushed into the elbow at the top of the assembly and tight........
I think I followed the directions correctly, but will reevaluate. Thanks. Those little brass plugs are supposed to be removed, right?
Arrgh! I see what I did wrong: I removed those little open-ended brass sleeves, mistakenly thinking they were closed-end plugs. I just found where I had cast them aside, so can reinstall today. That's what I get for doing this part while fatigued.
Yes, those brass sleeves prevent the plastic line from deforming so that the compression fitting can seal.
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