water softener drain line intallation
I’m installing a water softener. I’m not sure what kind of latitude I have w/ regards to the installation of the drain line for the backwash cycle. I’m in a walkout basement. The house sewer lines are all overhead. The instructions indicate that I should try to fit the line below the top of the softener. That seems odd to me. Aren’t water softeners typically installed in basements w/ sewer drains overhead? My water pressure runs about 50. How far can I go with this line? I would think I could run the line for a fair distance, no?
A related but different question – the backwash cycle is basically just dumping a bunch of very hard water, no? Is there any reason I should be concerned about where this backwash ends up? I’m planning on dumping it into our septic system. I could also flush it out in the yard, I suppose.
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Your backwash water is a very high level of salt water. The brine tank is just that, salt water to rinse the beads in the softener tank. I would not unload that water into your sepitic tank for fear of killing the bacteria that is breaking down the solids from your waste drains. Use a dry well or directly into your leach field.
Try this thread http://forums.taunton.com/tp-breaktime/messages/?msg=22690.1 for a wide variety of opinions and some fairly colorful argument.
Thanks. I was stupidly thinking that the recharge cycle was 100% efficient. Of course the backwash will be saline. The question appears to be /how/ saline, and whether the salinity will adversely affect the septic system.
Tough to know who to believe here. You can find supporting opinions for either side of the argument on the web very easily. In fact, a huge number of google links on water softeners turn up para-scientific essays on the virtues of magnetic softening. I'm not sure where to get good info about this.
I do have a pump tank after my primary septic tank. I don't know if code allows it, but perhaps I could push the backwash there.
But then the leaching field also has some business to do. If the saline really does affect the septic tank (and I'm a little dubious a properly tuned softener would have that affect), then wouldn't the leaching field also suffer?
Of course my wife wants this done yesterday... ;)
I'm assuming my water pressure (50) is sufficient to push the backwash 25' or so horizontally up across my basement ceiling?
We try to put them in a footer sump, which should go to the outside, not the septic, or when possible, outside to a downspout drain that flows to daylight. The brine has not had any affect on the grass in the ditches, or on the street beyond the curbs to the best of my knowledge.
Keith: You just stole my line. Back in the mid-50's, my father installed a softener in our well water system in west Miami, Fla - literally 3 blocks fromthe edge of the Everglades. Our water was so hard, it dulled knives when you cut it. Dad ran his backwash water out onto the lawn, which I mowed w/ a push mower, so I know whereof I speak. That dammed grass grew like no other, even getting two backwashes per week w/ "Salt" water. I suspect it wasn't too salty!
Interestingly, Dad got a power mower the week after I left to go to college. Wonder why?
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