ditttohead
Water systems designer, R&D
LOL, in the brine tank, what a bummer. I was fortunate to get trained on the broken gear problem during my first week of training over 25 years ago. I have still lost my fair share of the springs and bearings, but I always kept a few extra on the service trucks. Since most of my work was commercial, that is where I saw the broken gear, but I have seena few residentially, including my dads house about 15 years ago. He has since been upgraded to a 5800LXT. I ave also seen a few on 4650, but these are the same powerhead, typically for hot water applications.
Most of these were hard water complaints, and the control valve was never touched by the restaurant, hospital etc. They just simply break sometimes.
The gear is cheap, and most distribution companies still stock tons of them, even thought the breakage problemn has slowed down considerably since most of the gears that are going to break, have broken by now. Either that, or the plumbers have learned how not to cheat their customers by intentianally breaking the gears in the middle of the night while they are driving around towns randomaly looking for 5600 valves.
Most of these were hard water complaints, and the control valve was never touched by the restaurant, hospital etc. They just simply break sometimes.
The gear is cheap, and most distribution companies still stock tons of them, even thought the breakage problemn has slowed down considerably since most of the gears that are going to break, have broken by now. Either that, or the plumbers have learned how not to cheat their customers by intentianally breaking the gears in the middle of the night while they are driving around towns randomaly looking for 5600 valves.