Top Causes Why Your Water Softener Keeps Running

by | Blog, Water Softeners

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The water softener’s job is to clean the water from all the minerals, including calcium, magnesium, and others so it can make it better for drinking, cooking, and doing laundry. It simply improves the water quality.

But what if it keeps on running? What can you do about that? Should you do anything about that? 

Most times, the issues connected to your water softener running are easy to fix, and below we’ve listed all of them. But if none of the issues are what you’re experiencing, you should definitely call a professional.  

What is a water softener?

As we said earlier, the water softener’s job is to clean the water from minerals such as calcium and magnesium, but how does it work?

The water softener has beads or raisins that have a negative charge, and since the minerals are of positive charge, they stick on to the beads as water goes right through them.

Now, since all of the minerals are drained away from your water, the water softeners then have to replace the minerals with sodium ions, they are of great essence in making your water softener.

What are the causes?

Since we explained how a water softener works, now it’s time to answer the question of why does my water softener keeps running, or draining. There are a couple of things that might be of fault here, and most of them are nothing serious and require almost no time or effort to fix.

Let’s begin.

  • The leaks. First of all, leaking in the water softener’s system can be a common thing, as it is in anything related to water appliances. So, if you are asking yourself why is my water softener keeps draining, the first thing to check is if there are any leaks. This is a serious problem, and you might consider contacting your service company but put it in bypass mode first so the system stops working and any further leaking is avoided.
  • Another thing that can be at fault is the constant draining of the water softener. This means that the water softener system may be stuck into regeneration mode when it’s supposed to switch to another phase. This is a common thing when there’s a power outage, so you can try to reset the system and check the control panel. If this does not work, and the water softener keeps on draining, then you might consider calling a technician, because this fixing might require some more work.
  • What if the water softener doesn’t soften the water? This is something that might happen to anyone. The system is not doing the only job that it has to do… There are some things that might cause this, like the system containing too much salt into the tank. This issue is the most common one. Another thing is the capacity of the water softener, meaning your needs exceed the system’s water capacity. And last but not least, you might have a problem with the tank’s raisin beads, if this is the issue then this can be easily changed by replacing it with new beads.
  • Water softener reducing the water pressure. This is also a common problem with any water softener, and it can be caused by many things. Things like raising clogs can cause this, but also you should check if there’s sediment buildup in the tank and causing a blockage. Also, there might be iron built up in the tank, but if this is the case you can just add the mineral cleaner to the tank.

Wrap up

Now we tried to get all of the most common issues people have with a running water softener, so next time you are dealing with this consider fixing it yourself with some of the information you got from us, but if there are some major issues with your water softener, there’s no shame in calling a professional to fix it for you.

If you’re looking to replace your current water softener, check our massive guide here on the best water softeners.