No Water Flow From Your Inside Faucets? Maybe Your Softener Had a Resin Breakout!

[@ricardo1967]

Thank you very much for taking the time to make this video. This JUST happened in my house, Kenmore 350 Series water softener.

[@kevinh9262]

I'm sorry to hear that, Ricardo. You've got some not-so-fun times ahead of you. I hope you find it helpful, and you are successful in clearing your system. If I can help just one person save the expense, and even scare some folks into putting in a downstream filter BEFORE the nightmare occurs, it was worth the effort. FYI, I also made a video about installing a whole-house filter downstream of the softener to make sure you never have this problem again.

[@ricardo1967]

@@kevinh9262 Hello, thanks for the sympathy :-) My case ended up being simpler than yours. I think I was just very lucky: 1) It happened in early in the morning and I detected quickly, so the beads didn't spread too much 2) It allowed me some level of backflow (tri-level house with a faucet in the basement) 3) My resin beads seem much smaller than yours. I'll check your video, thanks again!

[@kevinh9262]

@@ricardo1967 Glad to hear it was just more of a bad dream than a nightmare ;)

[@mrniceguy3006]

Thank you so much Honey Badger, had the same issue with my softener. I had to replace all my faucet, shower heads, and toilet valves. And now working on my water heater, rough two days . Thank you so much for the help

[@thehoneybadger9262]

I'm having trouble understanding why you didn't do the water heater first? Even if you've cleared all the hot water fixtures, there is potential to get more beads in the hot water if you haven't flushed the water heater until it was clear. Good luck with everything. FYI, I didn't replace any fixtures (I pulled the cartridges and screens out and cleaned them when needed), but I did buy one new toilet valve.

[@mrniceguy3006]

@@thehoneybadger9262yes, I’m kicking myself for that now. I had a plumber come out, once he confirmed my suspicions, he told me to just clear the lines, never mentioned the water heater, and i just rushed to clear my lines. It wasn’t until after, I began to think about the water heater, later that evening. And therefore I found your video. Things seem to be going better now, but not sure how long my water heater will last, flushed it yesterday after watching your video, and rain was coming out, but I noticed I had to leave the water salve on in the water heater for it to flush.

[@thehoneybadger9262]

@@mrniceguy3006 Yes, the flushing works best if you keep the supply valve on, and you rapidly turn on the drain valve for about 10 seconds, then shut it off and wait a bit for it to settle, and repeat about a zillion times. Unfortunately, some water heaters have a lot of sediment in them, which makes it more difficult. I tried flushing a water heater at a house that had so much sediment that it completely clogged the stock drain valve. I had to go buy an expensive drain valve with a full open port and replace it. So you do have your softener in bypass mode, right? ;) If you have a tank style softener (not one of those all-in-one cheapies, you can re-bed the softener and buy new filter baskets and riser tubes (I recommend discountwatersofteners.com). They have excellent customer service too. Re-bedding is cheaper than buying a new one, and there are many DIY videos about that (I haven't done a video on that yet, but have re-bedded 4 softeners). Make sure you buy their funnel to fill the tank (you'll thank me later).

[@juancarlosbaez1059]

I fell you sir. It happened to me too and Spent a few days clearing the water line in my house.

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Welcome the club nobody wants to join ;) FYI, I made another video on this channel about installing a whole house filter downstream from my softener to prevent this from happening at my own house.

[@chrispixx]

A simple solution would be to put a whole house water filter on the water line coming from the water softener in a convenient place to make the filter cartridge easy to change. As long as that water line goes to all the fixtures like the kitchen, bathroom, hot water tank etc everything will be protected. Even if you don't want to filter that water it will still catch the resin in the event of a failure.

[@thehoneybadger9262]

That was my adviceto @simd510 below. And after much procrastination, I recently added one to my own house and made another video about it ;)

[@brendanmoldy]

I have been getting some beads in the softener drain and also only one single faucet in my house, strangely the only one that I left on hard water branching off before the softener. all other faucets in the house have not clogged with beads and run fine even though they are all coming off the softener...

[@simd510]

Thank you for video. Anybtips/recommendations on how to prevent something like this from happening. This is my worst fear with my water softner

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Check your water pressure often, and if you ever re-bed your resin, make sure you replace the riser tube and filter basket as well. You could also add a downstream filter to keep the resin from entering the household piping.

[@chrispixx]

I agree on the downstream whole house filter. Just put it in a place where it would be easy to change the cartridge. This would protect everything.

[@sonix5472]

Hi thanks for the video. Is there a chemical flush to dissolve the beads as some parts of my system as inaccessible like my shower pipes, filter which is burried in the wall?

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Not that I'm aware of. I don't think any builder would put a filter in the wall. Perhaps you are referring to the cartridge that controls the hot and cold water, and/or diverts it? You can pull those cartridges (I have no video yet to do that, but there are many out there) after removing the handle and escutcheon plate/flange. Maybe you could also try maybe shooting some compressed air down the shower head pipe after you remove the shower head, and turn your shower valve from hot to cold. The shower I cleared had just a typical left-right temperature control handle, and it did not get clogged. I did, however, have to pull the filter out of the shower head and clean that out. If your water won't flow with the shower head removed, then it is likely the cartridge behind the handle and escutcheon plate. If you remove the cartridge, water should be able to flow out, but you have to be careful not to let water run down behind your shower wall. This is what I had to do for the bathtub (remove the cartridge).

[@michaelsell9012]

Mine luckily went into my pool while bringing level up.. had some in pipes and lost pressure in house.. happened about 2 months ago..

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Sounds like your situation could have been a lot worse. My next home project is installing a downstream whole house water filter to make sure it never happens at my house.

[@tomcruise2406]

Secondly, when you drained the heater tank, how did you take the resin out that would have sat in the bottom of tank.

[@kevinh9262]

I did not do a 'drain' persay, it was more of a flush, with water pressure still applied. My thought was that it would stir up the resin at the bottom of the tank as cold water came in.

[@tomcruise2406]

I have the same exact issue. Found resin in toilet tank and water pressure went low in showers and faucets. Someone told me the easier way to drain the water heater is by running the hot water in the tub for good 40 minutes which will drain the resin through bathtub faucet. Is that not the case? Can you please recommend?

[@kevinh9262]

I did run the water out the tub, except I actually removed the cartridge because there was no water flow, and had to stick something into the side ports on the inlet pipe to break up the resin. I don't recommend running the hot water through the tub until you've cleared most of the resin out of the water heater, as the hot water can gum up the resin and make clearing it even harder. But yes, I did run water from both hot and cold supplies (there was no cartridge installed), using my wife on the phone to turn the main supply on and off. Just had to be careful not to let the water run out behind the tile.

[@simd510]

Is this house on a septic? Do you worry about the resin going into the leach field causing issues with soil percolation

[@thehoneybadger9262]

I have an aerobic septic system, and virtually no soil in my backyard where the sprayheads are. I basically live on a giant rock.

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Also, FYI the house where this happened was not on a septic system.

[@scottzimmerman6485]

resin should sink to the bottom of the septic and not make it out to a leach field as far as any rental with a water softener , put it in bypass , and be done lol

[@kevinh9262]

@@scottzimmerman6485 If they were my rentals, I would agree with you. Softeners in the hands of tenants can be a real pain for maintenance. However, my son insisted on putting them in, because the water is pretty hard in our area. He moved to Tennessee and collects all the rent checks, and I get to deal with all the maintenance problems, as his unpaid 'property manager' ;)

[@simd510]

Did the house have a pressure relief valve?

[@thehoneybadger9262]

Yes, a failed one ;) I believe this is what collapsed the lower filter basket. Unfortunately it was at a rental house, and symptoms of the failed PRV were not reported, just the loss of all water pressure after the softener failure.