Hardness is the amount of calcium, magnesium, and lime in city or well water. Understanding the hardness of a customer's water is crucial to help them attain optimal performance of their water softener. Don't worry, it's easy to program the right hardness level with just a few simple steps.
Quick Tip! It's important to understand that setting a higher hardness level does not necessarily mean you will get softer water - read more about that here. You need to calculate the hardness of your water supply accurately to determine what your hardness level should be set to.
Click each step below to expand directions.
Step 1 - Retrieve Data
You'll need to find the levels of Hardness and Clear Water Iron in their water supply first.
Step 2 - Calculate Hardness
Once you've got yjrot levels of hardness and clear water iron you can calculate hardness. The softener communicates in GPG (Grains per gallon). If the hardness number is not in GPG you'll need to do a little math. Don't worry, the numbers you need are below. If the hardness number reported in PPM or MG/L, divide that number by 17.1 to convert to GPG. Here's an example:
250 ppm / 17.1 = approx 15 gpg Hardness
Step 3 - Calculate Clear Water Iron
If the customer doesn't have Clear Water Iron, skip to Step 4.
If they have Iron in their water supply, you'll need to do a little more math. You'll want to multiply the iron value by 5, then add that number to your hardness value. Example:
2 ppm Iron x 5 = 10 ppm Iron
10 pm Iron + 15 gpg Hardness = 25 gpg Total Value
Step 4 - Program Your Softener
Finally, you'll want to find the Hardness programming screen by scrolling through the menu on the softener with the Program/Select button. "Hardness" will show up on the bottom of the screen like pictured below. Then, use the Up/Down arrows to set their correct hardness value.
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