Every summer I know I have to recharge the water softener for the dishwasher. We just get too much spotting and the dishes don’t seem clean enough without it. But we don’t have a whole house water softener precisely because of the salt added to the water. As it’s hot in front of the house in the summer it gets pushed down the list until the wonderful cooler days of fall. Then I better do it before it gets cold!
This water softener is made for RV’s and it needs manual recharging. Luckily it does seem to last about a year just on the dishwasher. The tank sits behind the dishwasher which is located in the corner between the kitchen sink and counter. I installed a water shutoff so it is easy to disconnect to drain it. It is charged with regular table salt and it only takes two boxes. But draining it is messy so I do it outside. It’s kind of heavy but I can slide it along the floor and only lift it out the front door.
Had a lovely day to take the time to regenerate it. I have to look at the directions each time which are stored in Books on my Mac. Basically it is turned upside down to drain while the lid is on it. Then it is turned back over and I had to rinse off the mud! I need a large pipe wrench to get the lid off and it’s just a matter of bumping the tank on the walk to settle the media inside. Then both boxes of salt are poured into the tank and the top screwed back on. Then the media has to be rinsed.
The rinsing is long, 20 minutes at a trickle and another 15 at a stream. At the end of the rinsing the water leaving the tank should not taste salty. That’s it. Just drag it back into the house and hook it back up and slide the dishwasher back into place. It’s amazing the difference that the salt media makes to the clean dishes!