When do I get salt for my waterer softener?

Find the manual and follow it’s instructions. If you lack the manual, find the make/model and use that to find the manual.

It might be like mine, in which case, you dump in a bunch of salt pellets for water softeners (different models might use a different form of salt). The receptacle on mine has enough room for several bags, but one is enough (just need to refill it when/before it runs out of salt). There’s a marker like a ruler all up the inside, which tells you the level number it’s full to (whatever the lowest number visible after adding the salt). You use the control panel to tell it the current salt level, and when you want it to “recharge”, and the current time (which can get randomized by a power outage, causing the noisy recharge process to make noise during the day – that might be what you’re not used to hearing). Then you just leave it alone until you remember to add more salt.

Thanks @Zaku.

I’ve heard it groaning in the past but Rick said it was just recharghing.
This was a bit different.
Thanks Obama Cato.

Hardware store.

Check it once in a while.

Fill it to the line when under 50%

Mine sounds awful when it recharges, so I set it for 2am. But yes it probably also does sound different when it has run out of salt. You should be able to peer into it and see what the salt level is at.

One more thing, if you have a lot of iron in your water, there’s a special type of salt to buy to minimize the discoloration of clothes, dishes and toilets. You can get it at the same place you buy the regular salt.

Some places will deliver salt to you and (I assume) refill your softener.

I get mine at the hardware store. But the bags are 40 pounds and you’ll probably have to get someone to dump them in for you. I have a big salt tank so I usually get a bunch of salt and fill it every 6 months.

I was able to buy the salt at Home Depot, Lowe’s, and my grocery store.

Salt? Explain?

@Jeruba Water softeners consume bags of salt pellets to do their thing.

Rick explained it in terms of…the salt creating electricity or something.

@Dutchess_III No. The water softener has a bunch of beads that are negatively charged and use the sodium in the salt to be their cation. As the water goes through, the sodium gets knocked off the negative ions in favor of the calcium and other hard mineral cations. Periodically the water softener will then wash the beads and “knock off” the mineral deposits and replace them again with fresh sodium.

Ya! That’s what he said @Caravanfan!
I hate the way it feels tho. Slimy.

If you hate the way it feels then don’t get salt for your softener.

The pipes here need replacing @Caravanfan. Every so often we wind up with brown, brackish water.
Where I grew up there was a high concentrating of sulfer. The water smelled like rotten eggs! Not that it bothered us when we drank untreated hose water! That’s probably when I learned how to close that flap at the back of my nose / front of my throat so I couldn’t smell it.
Came in handy for swimming because it stopped water from going so far in my nose that it burned.
Later, also for changing horrible diapers.
Now, what is that flap called Doc? Yes, it’s a trick question!

There is no flap at the back of your nose.
Honestly, in terms of the “slimy” feeling you get used to it and ultimately when you go to hard water you feel you’re not getting clean. I prefer it.

What is the nasopharynx @Caravan?

I grew up with soft water. After I moved away from home I had forgotten about it how it felt until we moved here 40 years later and Rick installed the soft water tank.
My first shower was like “Oh yeah!” Home sweet home. Bleh.

Honestly, the biggest downside is washing glass dishes and how slippery they get when you rinse them. Wouldn’t bo so bad except I have to stand up and so I’m concentrating on staying on my feet and not losing the dishes at the same time! But rubber gloves would probably help with that. (I don’t remember slippery dishes growing up cuz we always had a dish washer!)

It’s the nose and the back of the nose and the mouth cavity.

Yes. I can close that up and seal my nose from throat so I can’t smell shit!