Nice water heater! Good point about the salesmen and the "regular" installers. They serve each other in a way: the sales reps know most people are concerned more with price than longevity, and will coach the fickle into a unit that is inexpensive and that the contractors like to install. The service pros will do the same thing if you ask their opinion. They know most people will forget about the unit until it breaks down again. Without preventive maintenance, a high quality unit will break down in about the same time frame as a less expensive unit anyway.
Now that you have an awesome new unit, don't forget to do PMS on it! Flush the sludge out of it every year, and it will live much longer than its rating. My buddy got 25 years out of his 6 year unit. The burner finally died last fall. It popped the heat fuse in the thermocouple, and the thing had a weird reverse thread in it which was no longer available. It now sits in my truck bed, waiting to be used as a heat store for a future project.
|