Can Bleach Damage a Water Softener?

Sanitizing your water softener helps keep your water clear and fresh.

Water softener systems use salt to replace hard minerals in your home's water. These minerals can cause significant damage to plumbing and appliances like dishwashers and water heaters over time. Occasionally the softener system should be cleaned, and chlorine bleach is recommended for the job. However, if used incorrectly, bleach can damage the inner workings of your water softener.

Soil Buildup

Water softeners' use of any one of several varieties of salt -- from rock salt, to pelleted, to solar or evaporated -- subjects the appliance to a buildup of soil or debris from the salt itself. Salt is a mined mineral and may contain these impurities in small quantities. They are not enough to interfere with the performance of the unit unless left unattended for a period of time.

Odors

In addition to a visual check for soil buildup, odors can also let you know when the time has come to clean the brine tank on your softener system. A sulfur smell is caused from sulfate-reducing bacteria living in your tank. They are harmless in that they cause no illness, but the odor is unpleasant at best. Any stale or stagnate odor or taste in your water is cause for a good cleaning of the softener system.

Schedule

A maintenance cleaning should be performed annually or biannually on a regularly used system. If the system is shut down for more than a week, it should be cleaned out and sanitized before restarting it. Any time a softener system is started up after a building has been vacant for a period of time, it should also be given a thorough cleaning prior to use.

Procedure

Turn off and disconnect any other water treatment equipment that is connected to the softener and that also uses sodium. Put your softener through a manual regeneration cycle. (These are typically timed to run every 24 hours or so and can be over-ridden; consult your user's manual or a professional installer with questions.) For small units, pour 1 cup of bleach into the brine tank, or 2 cups of bleach for larger units. Immediately run a manual recharge cycle on the softener to flush all the bleach and salt out of the system. Allowing the bleach to sit in the tank can cause damage, so flush immediately for best results.

References

• Inspectapedia: Guide to Water Softener Cleaning and Sanitizing

Resources

• North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service; Home Drinking Water Treatment Systems; Glenda M. Hermann, et al.; March 1996
• Plumbing Supply: The Fabulous Soft-Economizer Water Softeners