Hello everyone, We recently (in the past 3 days or so) have noticed a significant drop in water pressure. We also noticed that the water is very soft meaning it is much more slippery than normal if that makes sense. Our system is a 4 year old pH neutralizer/water softener system with Charger digital components. We have a large pre-filter as well before the system. We use spun filters with 50 micron pre and 5 micron post filtering. Oh, we are on a well and the pressure kicks in around 44 psi and kicks off at around 52. I seem to remember the switch going up to about 60 before cutting off and dropping to almost 40ish before kicking on?. I haven't touched so I do not have an answer for that. We had a new pressure tank installed 2 years ago as the bladder in the old one went kaput and caused the well to constantly run. The tech set the system up to backwash in the middle of the night. As far as I know that is still occurring. If someone is going to ask me what our well gallons per minute measurement is, I haven't figured that part out yet! The system has pretty much been trouble free until now. I turned on the bypass and we are now going straight from the well and pressure tank and have much better pressure. To test, my wife stood in the shower with full pressure. I turned on our kids shower and almost no change. I went back in the basement and turned the bypass back to the softener system and the drop was dramatic with both showers going. Water actually stopped coming out of some of the nozzles in the showerhead! The system has two approximate 5 ft high canisters, the softener is on the left I guess because the line from the salt tank connects to it. The tank has plenty of salt and I add a 40 lb bag about every 6 weeks or so. Interestingly, when I held a light up to the side to see how much material was in the tank I noticed that the left one (softener side) had a reddish tint to it similar to our pre-filter. The pH neutralizer side had almost no color just the light green reflecting from color of the canister. I cannot say that I noticed that before, I think I would have noticed it. We do have high iron here where I have to change the membrane pre-filter every month or maybe every 6 weeks. They are both filled at least half way up. I guess my question is: Can these clog over time and be the reason for our drop in pressure. Is the reddish tint something to be concerned about being that we have a good size pre-filter? How did the left tank get the reddish color and the right one not? Again, it has been relatively sudden that we experienced such a dramatic drop. Perhaps, it has been building and all of a sudden it just got real bad, I don't know The owner's manual for the Charger Pro H2O WS1 Control Valves are very non-user friendly. I feel as if you have to be an engineer to follow the instructions and I'm afraid I will screw up some setting. I see something about regeneration but I'm not too confident that I should be pushing too many buttons. Is maybe the backwash system not working? The install company typically comes every March/April to add material to the tune of about $175. Seems high to me. I'm trying to avoid a service call if it is a quick fix. Thank you in advance for any advice you may have. &lt;br /&gt;<br />
Joewilly

I have an ancient water softener. the holding tank is blue and it is about 30 - 40 yrs old. I have to manually regenerate it and the brine tank is not filling. I have done the press in the red knob and turn counter clockwise and all that. The holding tank empties, but it is not pulling water out of the brine tank. Could the float be clogged or something to do with that whole piece be the problem? I would appreciate any advice on this, other than get a newer softener : ) .