Water Softener

BulletSponge624

The house that I just moved into has a water softener in the basement. It is not currently plugged in (hasn't been since we moved in) nor does it have any salt in it. When I do plug it in it sounds like it all kicks on, but here is my problem: I am not sure what all is needed to get it running. Do I just put salt in it and plug it in and then enjoy soft water? Any help would be awesome! Thanks!

DexterII

The first thing that you should do is contact the manufacturer of your softener, via their website or direct, and obtain a manual for your model. In the mean time, leave it turned off, as it may very well want to regenerate, which will result in a significant amount of discharge, and, if you do not have the discharge connected to a drain, will not be pretty. In your manual, you should find instructions for adjusting the softener, based on the hardness of your water, and setting the clock, so that regenerations occur at the least inopportune times; many people set them to regenerate in the middle of the night. Once you have received and reviewed the manual, c'mon back if you have any further questions, and someone knowledgable can most likely assist you. As a side note, you may also want to have your water tested, to check the hardness, as well as to see if there are any special filters that you may want to consider.

BulletSponge624

Thank you very much. I know that our water is really hard, because we end up with hard water stains on all of our dishes. That is the main reason I am trying to get this water softener up and running.

DexterII

I forgot to mention this, but I would also check around the area, to see who handles that model of softener, and, depending on how in depth the manual is, it might be dollars well spent to hire them to do the initial setup, just to make sure that your brine tank is up to par, etc.

BulletSponge624

So I have been searching the internet and it appears that my water softener does not exist.. It is a Culligan Mark 5 and I cannot find anything on it.

DexterII

My best guess then would be to call your local Culligan dealer.

ElectricMD

Have you looked for the manual online? This is a guess but maybe if you find a manual for a similar model, they will work similarly?

http://www.eculligan.com/support/mark59.PDF here's a scan i found as an example.