Kinetico 2020C water softener

[Tony Fendall]

Is this unit any good? Tony

[blevins]

It is a excellant unit when used on the right conditions. Keep in mind the size of the system. It is a packed bed design which will deliver a highly efficient opperation. The unit should be prefiltered with a sediment cartridge. Also do not apply on water with high iron. This unit has been around for years. It is only been repackaged in the

2020c application. It will cost more than others but it is well worth the extra.

[Mike Grooms]

Hey,

What was the name of that guy that was the water conditioner expert that used to be here?

[Gary Slusser]

Hi Mike. Although I don't consider myself an expert... possibly you mean me? It's been awhile.

Kinetico makes good equipment but.... like all others, it has to be sized correctly and I'm sorry to say a lot is not.

IMO many Kinetico salespeople misrepresent their and other equipment such as what I sell.

BTW, they sell the same Autotrol, Clack and Fleck based equipment I and all independent dealers sell when their prospective customer won't pay the high price for the Kinetico name.

The other thing is that they don't mention any of the disadvantages of their equipment; especially their very teeny tiny softeners such as the model being asked about here. Here is more info on that.

The model being asked about uses very small packed bed resin tanks (no freeboard area meaning no bed expansion during backwash, which means poor dirt removal. They insist on a prefilter because of that) and upflow service with down flow brining. When one tank is in regeneration, the house shares water use with the tank that is in regeneration and only provides half the SFR (service flow rating) gpm to the house. That allows hardness right through the softener to the house. All softeners have a SFR based solely on the volume of resin in the softener; it has nothing to do with the control valve being used on the softener. Resin manufacturers state the SFR of their resins as

1-7.5 gpm per cubic foot. One cubic foot fits a 9" x 48" tank with 50% of the resin bed depth as freeboard area; empty space for bed expansion during backwash. The freeboard area in a 9x48" tank is roughly 15-18"; the bed depth is roughly 30" and 30" is stated as the minimum by all resin manufacturers....

The model in question is using 6" x possibly 18" tanks filled with resin, no freeboard space and can't hold more than an 1/8 foot.

Another thing, IMO unless a family has a proven need for a twin tank immediate regenerated softener, they don't need one and should save the extra money and avoid the disadvantages of them.

Gary Quality Water Associates

[Mike Grooms]

Gary,

Where the heck have you been?!

[Gary Slusser]

Because of my volume of business and posting on web site forums, I got away from newsgroups about 2 year ago. I also stopped using Outlook Express and still haven't got a new news reader.... So if I don't go to Google Groups on the 'net, I don't visit here or other newsgroups often.

Gary Quality Water Associates