I purchased a Kinetico Quad 50 approximately 11 years ago in Las Vegas, NV.  The unit was installed and serviced by Kinetico for 4 years that I lived there.  I removed the unit myself and took the softener with me to Martinsville, IN for future use.  The house I moved into had well water so the unit was of no use to me at this time.  I stored the unit in my garage with the water drained, I THOUGHT, and the openings plugged.  About three years later the County started installing Rural Water in my area so I figured it was time to start getting the Quad 50 ready for install.  After carefully inspecting the tanks, I noticed the bottom tank on the secondary unit was cracked and seeping black resin/beads.  I took the tank to the nearest Kinetico dealer which was 55 miles away.  They seemed kind of hesitant about fixing my softener since I never purchased it from them.  They replaced the bottom tank and resin for $325.  Seemed kind of high to me but I had no other choice.  I finally completed the install after several snafus.  When I turned the water back on, the bottom tank on the primary unit was leaking this time.  Back to Kinetico I go and another $225 dollars down the tube.  I put off completely installing the water system until I got heat in the garage where the softener is installed.  Almost two years later I finally have a heated garage.  According to the water company in my area the hardness of the water is 22 GPG.  The control head has a number 4 disk installed and the float assy/adjuster tube in the brine tank has the tabs broken off down to the H mark.  I don’t know a whole lot about the system and the local Kinetico dealer acts like any information giving out is top secret stuff.  It is almost impossible to find any kind of information or operating manuals on the Quad 50.  I am afraid with all the movements this unit has gone through that the float positions and any other adjustments have been knocked out of whack.  My questions are these!  With the water softener configured the way I have described, is this the correct setup for the water system I am currently on? Will the water be to soft/salty or not softened enough with these settings?  There are five marks on the float rod that the float rides on inside the brine well.  What mark is the float supposed to be set at?   Does the float move up and down the float rod or does it remain where you set it?  Is the adjuster tube supposed to move up and down the shaft during different phases of the cycle or does it remain seated on the float seal?  During the brine draw is all the fluid supposed to be transferred to the resin tanks?  I know I have rambled on and on but I want all the information I can get about the Quad 50 so I can get a better understanding of how the system works. I don’t see spending the kind of money that I have spent on this system if I am not getting the optimum performance out of it. All answers from anyone familiar with the Kinetico systems would be greatly appreciated.  I am grasping for information about this systems.  Thanks to all in advance.

Answer: Well, we will try to answer as best as we can…we are not intrinsically familiar with the Kinetico product. But the way that a water softener functions is the same for any system. Depending on the size of the unit, the “programming” determines the amount of water that is added to the brine tank.  This water dissolve the salt contained in the brine tank to saturation, and then during regeneration, the (now brine) solution is pulled back into the softener resin column where the ion-exchange process occurs. To the best of our knowledge – as long as you did not change the size of the tanks when you replaced them – you should be able to put the unit on line, and go with it.  If you were using city water in the past – and are again using city water – the difference in hardness between the two would hopefully not make too much of a difference.  Worst case, you might run out of soft water from time-to-time, or possibly you won’t get the maximum efficiency from the unit.  Either way – it will still work for you. We believe that the #4 “program” disk controls the time the unit spends in each regeneration stage, and the float assembly “H” setting controls the brine tank refill volume.  Could be wrong about this – maybe a Kinetico person out there can help if we are incorrect?

I have a 32,000 grain capacity WS with a Clack WS1-EE. There are four people in our home but data from water company for last two years shows and average use of 137 G/day. Our water hardness is 19 GPG per Water Quality Report from water company. I put 1 cu.ft. of SST-60 resin in tank at time of install–did all work myself–to save on salt cost because I am using potassium salt instead of Na.

After I got it all set-up and turned it on I checked the control’s programming and found it was set to regen every 1,350 gals or every ten days, whichever is first. When I do the calculation 32,000 / 19 GPG I get 2,000 gals for number of gals that can be softened, so why do they want me to do it after only 1,350 gals?

Next, if I take 90% of that 2,000 gals, which is 1,800 gals, and divide it by 130 gals/day I get a regen around every 14 days, so why do they want me to do it every ten days? Even 130 G/day is probably more than we use inside ( i.e. needs to be softened) because we have been under an exceptional drought for the past two years and all of my exterior hose bibs for watering outside tap off of my supply before it gets to the softener.

Is there any reason I can’t change regen to 1,800 gals or 14 days, whichever is first, when setting up my controls? I would just really like a second opinion or some explanation of why I am incorrect in my thinking. Please advise, thanks.

Answer:  The acutal capacity of your water softener depends on your salt dosage setting – and this is adjustable depending on your program settings.  Using Purolite SST-60 resin, you would need to have your salt setting (using sodium chloride) at approximately 15 pounds per cubic foot  to obtain a full 32K capacity (using potassium chloride capacity would be slightly lower).  Check the salt setting on your control.  A more typical setting would be at 9 pounds per cubic foot, and this would yield a capacity of about 27,000 grains.  This is because the brining curve is logarithmic and not linear – in other words you need a substantial amount of salt to obtain full capacity – but you get a significant amount of capacity using a much lower dosage.  Doing this saves salt, especially when using expensive potassium chloride.

So in your case,  with 130 GPD x 19 GPG = 2470 GPD to be removed/27,000 grains = regeneration every 10 to 11 days, which is a normal setting.  You should have a regular regeneration in order to insure an acceptable water softener lifetime.  You can read more about this on our site at the “Selecting The correct sized water Softener” page.

Follow up question: I don’t see the Option for the Salt Setting in the Programming Manual for the WS1EE, so I have no idea what it is set at. What’s the point in getting a 32,000 grain capacity WS if it’s not set to function at full capacity?

Hello.  I love the information!

We don’t know what to do.  We built our home and had our well water tested 14 years ago.  A good friend in the industry had a commercial water softener made “to order” for our water.  It is a Turbo Soft, Fleck Head with what we believe is a mixed bed of resin.  We have had the head replaced at least once, and service calls on the softner because it doesn’t regenerate.  The main problem right now is that it doesn’t seem to be finishing its process.  Every day, but mainly in the morning we are showering in the sea!  The water is so salty it is unbearable. A irony, briny gross experience.  We have had another service call out to fix the problem, but it comes right back in a few weeks.  We sent our water in to be tested, this is the result; Iron 3.90 mg/L   Hardness 440 mg/L    Tannin 0.45mg/L   Arsenic 2.83 ug/L

We don’t want to spend thousands on a new water softener.  (We can’t)  What would you suggest? Is it time to replace the unit?, How do you determine this? Is ordering over the internet less expensive because the products are cheap? Should we just replace the resin bed? What kind of resin do we buy? We are confused as what to do.  Where can we go or who can we talk to get answers without bias?  Our good friend is no longer in our area.

We’ve had Culligan, EcoWater, Atlantis, Commers all out to our home.  They all want to sell us their product, of course they price them for $3000 and up!!  This is not possible for us.  Thanks for your help.
Lane, NW Suburbs of Minneapolis

Answer: Hi Lane, there are a few things to discuss here:

There are a a number of possibilities, but we suspect that  the briny water is due to a fouled resin bed.  Over time, if elevated levels of iron are present in your water, they can deposit within your resin bed.  As more and more of the bed becomes fouled with iron, it is less able to properly rinse the excess sodium that has been drawn into the resin bed during regeneration.  Seems as if the softener is set to regenerate at night, and in the morning after the unit regenerates, you use some water, and find it to be salty.  You run the water for some time, and the problem dissipates because you have flushed the remaining salt from the bed by running you household water through it.  One way to check is to by-pass the softener and see if the water pressure dramatically improves.  If it does, try using a product like “Iron Out” that you can find at most home improvement stores.  There are instructions for adding this material to the brine solution to clean a fouled bed. We would recommend that you perform a “cleaning process” with Iron Out a few times “back-to-back”.

If this helps, you might consider adding something that we offer called a Res-Up drip feeder to you water softener brine tank.  This is a better solution for on-going maintenance of your softener to keep the bed free of iron deposits.  You simply pour the Res-Up solution into a small drip feeder tank that attaches to the inside of your brine tank, and it automatically drips solution into the brine, and aids in removing iron during the regeneration process. All of this said, if this does not seem to work, then you might be better off replacing the resin bed or the entire unit.

Regarding purchasing on the internet vs. traditional means, we’ll try to be impartial here, as we are both an internet and brick-&-mortar based company, so we can see both points of view. You don’t need to spend thousands on a new softener – you will note that internet prices are substantially lower than prices offered by some of the companies you mention above.  There are many reasons for this.  Sometime, an internet based company will offer low quality resin, cheap brine tank design, etc., to get the price down – these are not quality systems, and the old adage “you get what you pay for” applies in this case.  However, you can also find very high quality “commercial” softeners on the web.  Just take a close look at the site look & feel – if it seems like the site is poorly designed, it’s probably a low cost one – and this sometimes reflects on the seller and the quality of product.  Also, review the softener design. A good quality softener will have the type of resin used well advertised, and the product is normally loaded with features.  Common indicators of lower quality systems are square brine tanks, generic “high capacity” resin, and not a lot of details about the softener itself.  Any good company answers the phone (or get’s immediately right back to you), and you should also consider the level of after sale product support offered.

Although some brick & mortar companies really charge far too much – almost taking advantage of the customer – not all do.  Keep in mind that they are providing equipment installation service, and internet based companies generally do not. They have higher overheads to contend with, like salary for installers, tool and vehicle cost, insurance cost, and more.  This requires charging more for the system – but if you are familiar with basic household plumbing techniques, or know of a good plumber in your area, then you can save a considerable amount of money with no compromise in quality by purchasing on the internet.

If you want us to recommend replacement resin, we need to know the size of your existing resin tank (diameter and height from the floor to the point at which the valve threads into it).  You likely have a mixed bed design, that contains both cation exchange resin for water softening, and anion exchange tannin specific resin.  If you want us to recommend a replacement system, we need to know the number of residents in your home, and the diameter of your piping (normally 3/4, 1.0 or 1.25 inch).  Hope this helps!