It will nickle and dime you to death
never had any luck with sears products , couldent ever find the parts in a timely manner. Their service people arent very good either, usually about 95 bucks to walk into our door. They are not the quality you think that they are.
the same goes for culligan, connectico, rainsoft, GE, Water Boss and jsut about anything you might stumble upon in any hardware store.
Honestly you are very lucky that you are capable of fixing it yourself , or by now you would have coughed up a pretty penny for service to that unit.
You are 1 in 100, because no customer I have ever met has ever fooled with those units and actually won.
We get calls every week from people that wont let the Sears repair man back into their house, on units that are only three years old.
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I dont know what region of the countyr you are in, but after while, that controll head and the spring loaded cams inside it just sort of wear out...due to scaling and high water pressure ect,,ect anythiing more than about 15 years is not too bad a life span for any brand out there. (at least in the mid west).. Though some last literally forever if they have low water pressure.
HIGH WATER PRESSURE KILLS WATER SOFTENERS....The spring loaded cams inside them just cant take the strain forver . Keep the water pressure at 70psi or under and the unit will probably crank on forever and ever.
Get it above 100 ++and it will sound like a 747 jet flying over when it re-generates. Most of the units have a max pressure range of 125.
check your water pressure, install a pressure reduceing valve at the softener if necessary, to kick it down to under 70.psi It will either cure the problem completely or extend the time dramatically between repairs.
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I shouldent bring this subject up, especially to a guy that can actually make repiars to his sears unit,
Think about a new unit, and not a sears or any of the others mentioned.. It sounds like youi are a pretty handy guy and the best unit I know of is one that has an AUTOTROL controll on it..they are made under many different brands , but they literally last forever and just about anyone can work onthe unit.
If you are moving sometime soon, and dont want to shell out the money for a new one, another route is just to LEASE one from someone in your area for about $20 permonth..
just for fun , if you want to see one go to this link
http://www.affordableh2o.com/softener/268info.html
good luck.