Fleck 2750 softener - half full brine tank

[tjsmith999]

Summary: replaced resin media in 20 year old softener, worked fine for several weeks, now noticing brine tank is half full, and very restricted amount of discharge from the hose during 1st step in regen cycle. I have cleaned both injector and brine valve, but still noticing the discharge is very slow 3 weeks after the media replacement compared to what it used to be – probably only at 30% discharge vs what it used to be (trickle vs full force).


Details:

I have been in my home since 2000. It came with a Fleck 2750 water softener, with a 1600 injector I believe (based on tubing bend - it looks more similar to a 1600 than a 1700 injector).

I've been very pleased with it. I had one maintenance repair over the years of use, I had to replace the piston rod and o-ring to stop a leak, that was probably 14 years ago.


Recently I noticed my water was not softening, so I did some research. All the cycles seemed to be working fine. I figured since the softener was so old, I'd replace the media. I’m pretty mechanically inclined and cost conscious, so figured it was a good investment.


After reviewing many media brands, I ended up ordering Aquatrol from Amazon. Well I ended up getting a drop shipment from a more local dealer, unbranded in a plain yellow bag, much sooner than anticipated based on Amazon delivery estimate. No invoice in the box or anything, though it did have "resin box" printed on the outside. It came from Mid-America Water Treatment out of Illinois. I ended up calling their customer service phone # and inquired on what I had received, because it was black media (concerned it could be carbon), not the tan in the Amazon photo; because it had no invoice or labeling; and because it wasn't branded. They explained they simply shipped from a bulk supply. I was in a bind so I took their word. I also took photos of the new media and my old media - under heavy magnification it appears they are similar in diameter.


I moved forward with the replacement. After getting my old media out of the tank, I realized I was really short on media for the old resin. I had maybe a gallon and a half of media, probably half of what I should have had (based on how far up it was - I could see the tank levels with a light as it is translucent - before I emptied the old content vs after installing the new (about 2/3rds of the way up)). I thought that was a good sign, the lack of resin volume - contributing to my hard water.


I filtered out the gravel and re-used it for the base. I then weighed my new bag and knew I needed approx 0.75 cubic foot and had purchased a 1.0 cubic foot bag, so I weighed out about 25% of the bag and set that aside. I then installed the remaining 75% weight of the bag in the softener. Everything went pretty smooth, but time consuming as it was my first time doing this. All in all it went well.



I put everything together. On the first cycle, I noticed a slight amount of black resin in the first stage of softening (backwash?). I have had my softener discharge line connected to a bucket for 10+ years, so that it didn’t shoot all over my basement floor (the flow was significant). I had never noticed resin in this bucket previously, but researching online I learned that it is not uncommon after a fresh fill where the media needs to settle at a given level (from overfilling). It wasn't much - maybe a few teaspoons in a total regen. I also saw comments during my research on “fines” – so it could simply be this too. I have lost about 1.5 inches from the tank since the first regeneration (in the subsequent 10-15 regenerations), so I suspect it was slightly overfilled? I have marked the tank so I can continue to monitor loss.


So my questions are:

1) What would cause my discharge to be so low? It is probably 70% less discharge than prior to the media replacement. I saw the quoted text during my research “If you’ve checked the brine tank and the lines, then it’s possible that the problem lies with the seals and spacers or piston. When a softener is going through the regeneration stage and is not drawing brine, there’s likely a torn seal or plugged injector which will cause the softener to not draw or even refill during the brine draw stage.”

I’m not against replacing the seals and spacers if the resin flowing into the body has damaged it, looks straight forward with the right tools.

2) If the resin did damage the seals, should I add an upper basket? I’ve seen reference to a tan (standard) vs red (fine resin) upper basket. I couldn’t find a specific basket though for fine resin (a red basket). Looking under magnification the media looks similar in size old to new comparison.

3) Would it be bad to use the red basket for standard resin? I saw some comments that high iron could over time fill the cut slots, but I’m not seeing any damage on the bottom basket to indicate that would happen at the top basekt.

4) Should I remove an additional small amount of resin to be slightly beneath what the system “leveled off” at?

Thanks for your time!!!

 

[Reach4]

I have cleaned both injector and brine valve, but still noticing the discharge is very slow 3 weeks after the media replacement compared to what it used to be – probably only at 30% discharge vs what it used to be (trickle vs full force).

That would be the drain line during backwash, and the injector should not affect that.

1. What diameter is your tank? If 10 inch, the DLFC should be 2.4 gpm, which has 240 molded in opposite the F on the button.

2. If the softener is plumbed in backwards, you could blow resin out during high water use. As you face the softener, the output should be on the left and the output on the right.

3. A top basket should prevent resin loss out of the top, but you may not have one. Adding one would make sense if you are losing resin, but even with no basket, you should not normally lose resin.

1) What would cause my discharge to be so low? It is probably 70% less discharge than prior to the media replacement. I saw the quoted text during my research “If you’ve checked the brine tank and the lines, then it’s possible that the problem lies with the seals and spacers or piston. When a softener is going through the regeneration stage and is not drawing brine, there’s likely a torn seal or plugged injector which will cause the softener to not draw or even refill during the brine draw stage.”

I’m not against replacing the seals and spacers if the resin flowing into the body has damaged it, looks straight forward with the right tools.

I doubt the piston or seals would cause that low flow during backwash.

Instead I would examine the DLFC button (where the drain line connects). See if there is debris clogging that up. Also make sure the drain line is not pinched.

Highly unlikely to be the problem, but it is worth checking that the bypass valve is fully out of bypass.

 

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[tjsmith999]

Reach4 - thanks for the response...

Tank is 44" x 8", DLFC is marked with 150 opposite the F.
DLFC was not clogged at all, and I blew through the line to make sure there were no obstructions in the drain line. I could see into the body to see the piston - nothing looked abnormal. Piston looked clean & green, and no sign of resin.

Plumbing hasn't changed - so I can't have anything hooked up backwards.
DLFC also wasn't changed.
Immediately after the resin change, I ran a few cycles.
Because I had noticed the resin discharge, I was paying more attention and would have noticed the flow reduction that severe, but for the first x (5+?? a guesstimate) number of times regenerating, the pressure/volume out of the drain line was not abnormal. I had never "measured" it before, but I new it was strong enough the prior home owner (or installer) had wire tied the end of the drain line at a drain into the floor. I further improved this by putting the end of the drain line in a bucket (with drain holes) and wire tied to a rock in the bucket, because the line w/o the bucket would shoot water 2-3 feet at initial opening of the valve. I didn't like this so I created the bucket solution. I mention this because it made me very cognizant of the flow rate out of that line. Immediately after the resin replacement I also noticed a similar (or not abnormal) rate of flow out of that line, especially since I was watching it for resin discharge. Now it is easily less than half of that prior rate - so much so I suspect it is closer to 30% of flow discharge it used to be.

I do not currently have an upper basket. Am tempted to purchase one, obviously more mandatory if the resin damaged the seals.

Bypass valve is not an actual bypass valve in the modern sense. I have 3 gate valves - bypass is fully closed and other two fully open.

I'm wondering if maybe a seal, either in the injector (I realize now why you say that shouldn't matter), or where the body bolts to the part that screws into the body (there were some o-rings in there)? If there is a leak it could cause it to not have enough suction or pressure (I assume pressure, not suction) during the backwash, etc. That would seem odd since it worked for 5+ regens successfully, but not impossible that it would have issues after a few cycles.

Open to any and all suggestions.

 

[Reach4]

Tank is 44" x 8", DLFC is marked with 150 opposite the F.
DLFC was not clogged at all, and I blew through the line to make sure there were no obstructions in the drain line. I could see into the body to see the piston - nothing looked abnormal. Piston looked clean & green, and no sign of resin.

To be clear, a major symptom in your original post was that the drain line did not spit out as much water as it used to, right?

Plumbing hasn't changed - so I can't have anything hooked up backwards.

You would be surprised... people have had theirs backwards for years, and it works mostly OK. I think you said that you had the original resin go away somehow. If city water, the resin could have degraded and the broken particles washed away during normal backwash. But if the softener was piped backwards, you could have had bigger flows than that.

With an 8 inch diameter tank, expect backwash to be 1.5 gpm. Not a big stream. That should fill a 5 gallon bucket in 200 seconds (2.33 minutes).

Brine tank too full can be a few things. One can be a vacuum leak in the brine line. The leak can be small enough to not pass much water during fill, but passes a lot of air into the suction of brine draw. Sucking on the drain line up top can check for that.

Or there is no vacuum being developed during BD. There are others.

 

[tjsmith999]

Thanks again Reach4.
I haven't had much time the last two days to investigate.
I had planned on tearing apart tonight and setting the bypass so I could pull orings for sizing/replacement tomorrow.
I happened to try a manual regeneration last night. as I bumped the dial indicator, it definitely mechanically cycled, you could even hear a big thud at first as it released pressure, but then it was like there was zero or near zero water flow. As I continued to turn the dial to hit the other stages, still no water movement (nor sound). I tried this several times - nothing, nothing nothing.

I was going t pull things apart tonight, and I decided to cycle it again. Viola! as soon as I turned the dial, you could hear the mechanical shifting of the motor/valve, and suddenly water began gushing out of the drain line.

Now I'm totally confused what contributed the past 2 days!

I will keep an eye on it over the coming days and probably report back Mon/Tues once I have some insight/symptoms/results.

 

[tjsmith999]

Reach4 - I've regenerated a few times since last weekend. All seems to be working well so I'm going to leave it as is.
One thing I noticed that I wanted to mention... I thought I had lost 1.5" of resin. I must have measured initially after a fresh regen where the resin was lifted from water content, and on my measure when I thought it was down 1.5", it must have been after sitting quite a while. This weekend after a regen I noticed the resin level was back to my old mark.

I will say I'm not convinced my water is as "soft" as it was 6 months ago. My shower has more residue, bowl rings, I even bought a strip test kit, which shows my water is way softer in the house than at the outside faucet. I wonder if my mind is playing tricks on me with memories on what it used to feel like and with being more cognizant of current residue that maybe used to be there but I was ignorant to it. I had a buddy that his bumper was scuffed (barely) and he had it repaired - he noticed AFTER the repair the alignment (on the side) was off. I'm sure it was that way before. I'm betting I'm him being overly critical now of things that existed before. We'll see.

Thanks again for your input!

 

[Reach4]

Glad it seems to be working.

I would get the Hach 5-B kit, and test your softened water. Check the cold water maybe the day after a regen. Then later as it is almost time for a regen. See if it is much better right after a regen than later.

There are ways to clean the resin that is not performing as well after dealing with iron for a while.