Water Softener died

[www.GymRatZ.co.uk]

Our EMWC TwinTank WaterSoftner bought in 2009 has turned up it's toes. I'd forgotten they have a finite lifetime.

New single tank unit ordered. Another DIY job to do that wasn't planned. Also now have to run power to the back of the unit as the last one was all mechanical.

Perhaps we'll get an improved water flow from the shower, thought water co. had turned pressure down a bit but it now seems this might not have been the case.

Ah well, hopefully the replacement one will be as trouble free as it's predecessor.

[Peter Parry]

It is a normal ion exchange softener. The "mechanical" means the daily regeneration of the resin pack takes place after a certain amount of water, measured by a simple turbine, has gone through rather than relying upon an electric motorised valve and timer where the regeneration occurs at night when no or minimal water is being used. Because the mechanical ones regenerate when they feel like it rather than when no water is being used they usually have the resin bed in two separate tanks so when regeneration of one tank is taking place the other continues softening the water without interruption.

[Tim Streater]

Our old one regenerated every three days or after N litres of water had been softened and went through salt like a, err, dose of salts. New one uses much less salt. Both of them regen at a settable time which defaults to 02.00, or you can do a regen *now*.

On both machines, during the regen process the softener is bypassed and hard water enters the system, but at 02.00 no water is being used at home so that is not an issue.

It's also interesting that the soft water from the new machine is soft, but feels hard in that once hands rinse properly. The old one was irritating in that the softened water felt slightly soapy.

[Davey]

Our twin-tower mechanical TwinTec unit regenerates every so many litres, set by the installer. It does not 'eat' salt hungrily and I have had no problems with it at all. Unless I forget to put the salt blocks in, it works beautifully. It has a 10-year warranty, and was installed in 2011. So far, I have only praise for it.

One unit we had in a rented house in the US had a programmable regen. timer, but only had a 6 day week. So if you set it up for 2 am Tuesday, next week it was on Monday, the following week Sunday, etc. Weird.

I think your first unit described above had a bad regeneration setting.