An Overview Of The Regeneration Process - RainSoft EC5 Series Owner's Manual

An Overview of the Regeneration
Process
Your RainSoft EC5 Water Conditioner performs a periodic regeneration
cycle to clean itself and restore its capacity. How often it regenerates
depends on your water use, incoming water hardness, and several other
factors, but 1 - 2 times a week is typical. An automatic regeneration will
never occur more than once in a day, and is programmed to occur at a time
when you are unlikely to be using water (late at night in most cases). The
time of regeneration is adjustable via the control interface or customer app.
Here is an overview of the regeneration process:
CYCLE 1- Brine Fill
The first step in preparation for the regeneration is to add water to the
brine tank. The amount of salt the conditioner uses in its regeneration is
directly related to the amount of water added to the brine tank. The salt
will only dissolve into the water until it reaches a point of saturation, then
no matter how much longer it sits, no additional salt will dissolve. Many
softeners add a fixed amount of water to the brine tank at the end of each
regeneration cycle. With that type of unit, the water sits in the tank until
the next regeneration, usually for several days.
Your EC5 conditioner uses a more sophisticated and efficient approach
called "proportional brining." The computer continually monitors your
water use and decides if regeneration is needed today. If regeneration is
needed, the computer moves the valve to the brine refill position about two
hours before the scheduled time of regeneration. You may hear the motor
running and some water flowing at this time. Because the computer knows
how much water you've used, it calculates the exact amount of salt that will
be needed to completely restore the system capacity. Then it adds just
enough water to the brine tank to dissolve that much salt. So you can say
it creates brine in proportion to the amount of capacity you need to restore
it doesn't waste salt.
EXAMPLE: If the time of regeneration is set for 2:00 AM, you may hear
the system apparently start to regenerate at 12.00 AM. What it is actually
doing is running the brine fill cycle. It will fill the brine tank for a few
minutes, then return to its normal home position for 2 hours. The actual
full regeneration cycle starts just after 2:00 AM. (See regeneration time line
example below)
Example: Regeneration Timeline
Example: Regeneration Timeline
12:00 AM - 12:30 AM
Cycle 1 – Brine Fill
(A) Minutes
12:00 AM 1:00 AM
11:30 PM
Cycle 2 - Brine Makeup / Service
12:00 AM - 2:30 AM
Service Flow (Soft Water) / No Drain Flow
Cycles 1 and 2
Notes:
1) Cycles 1 and 4 times are variable times precalculated before the regeneration process begins based on current resin capacity.
2) Times listed are example times.
2:30 AM - 2:35 AM
Cycle 3 - Backwash (C Minutes
2:00 AM
Default Scheduled
Regeneration Time
2:00 AM
12:30 AM - 2:30 AM
(B) Minutes
Valve Regeneration (Hard Water Bypass) / Drain Flow
)
3:00 AM 4:00 AM
2:35 AM - 4:45 AM
Cycle 4 - B rine Draw / Slow Rinse
(D) Minutes
2:30 AM - 4:50 AM
Cycles 3, 4, and 5
4:45 AM - 4:50 AM
Cycle 5 - Fast Rinse
(E) Minutes
5:00 AM
5:30 AM
15