Why are large amounts of water collecting in the salt tank of my GE water softener?

It is normal for water softeners to pump water into the salt tank at the end of each regeneration. This water dissolves some of the salt and this dissolved salt (called brine) is rinsed through the resin tank of the softener during the next regeneration. The amount of water needed for the regeneration depends upon how hard the incoming water is and how big the water softener is.

Typically a household softener regenerates once every 3 to 7 days. Each gallon of water added to the brine tank will dissolve 3 lbs of salt. A small softener will consume between 4 and 12 lbs of salt per regeneration and a large household softener will consumer 8 to 24 lbs of salt.

The easiest way to see if your softener is putting the right amount of water into the brine tank is to see how much salt it is using during each regeneration: start by measuring how high the level of salt (not the water) in the tank is above the bottom of the tank. Next, add one 40 lbs bag of salt and see how many inches higher the level of salt is now. Say it is 4 inches higher after you add the salt. that means that every one inch of height is equal to 10 lbs of salt. Now wait until after the next regeneration happens and recheck the height of the salt. If the salt drops 2" they you know your softener used 20 lbs of salt. If it is a small softener and is using 20lbs or more salt per regeneration then the system is using too much water.

It is worth investigating if a component called the "brine valve" can be adjusted to reduce the amount of water added after each regeneration.

If this is not possible then it could be that the softener has developed an internal mechanical fault such that it is not fully shutting-off the flow of water to the brine tank after each regeneration cycle has been completed for the softener's ion-exchange resin granules which are held in its "resin tank".

A likely cause of the trouble could be that the softener's "brine valve" is now failing to completely shut off the flow of water. It might be caused by a component such as a valve sealing washer on the valve module that you may be able to access and repair as a D-I-Y job.

A different cause of the problem could be that the internal "resin tank" - which contains the ion-exchange resin granules - has developed a crack or split which allows water to leak at high pressure into the brine tank. The resin tank is not usually repairable so, if that is the cause, a new resin tank is required. The cost of the work required to have a new tank fitted is unlikely to be worthwhile. It is usually much cheaper to buy a new water softener.