I bought my 1st AMTROL Boilermate indirect fired hot water tank (41 gallon Classic) 6/03 when I had a new furnace installed. With a Lifetime warranty on the Boilermate no less. It lasted 2 1/2 years before it began to leak badly-that's when I discovered parts and labor were not covered-it was December in Alaska and I needed hot water quick, so I paid. The 2nd lasted 1 1/2 years and that's when I discovered the original installer had gone out of business overnight. On this occasion another plumber directed me to the local AMTROL distributor-who was said to be humbled by all the customers whose tanks were failing and paid with coupons issued by AMTROL to be paid directly to the plumbing and heating companies-who came right out to the house, okayed a replacement tank, picked up the labor costs, but I was still stuck with $100 in parts. The 3rd tank lasted just 363 days-this time, no labor was picked up by the distributor this time, but a call to AMTROL got me an upgrade to a 60 gallon commercial tank, all for $858 for parts and labor. Needless to say, I am not happy with all this outlay of cash, which is over $3000 (total cash outlay for original tank plus install and for the parts and labor for the next 3 replacement tanks) for a supposedly high quality 41 gallon hot water heater that has leaked and failed, each of the 3 times it was put in. I'm on my 4th tank in 5 years. It's seems to be a faulty product yet it continues to be on the market. Feel that there is something wrong with the tank design that causes it to leak. After all, those 3 of mine leaked. The distributor told me last year that some of his customers' tanks failed in 6-8 months. And that I was lucky that my tanks leaked out of the bottom-some customers had pinhole leaks up on the side near the top that suddenly shot a stream of hot water way across the room, under pressure. And damages weren't covered either. I'm currently dealing with a AMTROL manager at the Rhode Island Company Headquarters to hopefully get reimbursed for the labor charges for the most recent install. Of course, it helped that our local NBC TV affiliate did a consumer report on my 3 bad tanks last week-the reporter did call AMTROL for a statement and did get a manager from a local plumbing store to speak on camera. So, I would like to hear from other people with similar problems with the Boilermate tank-it seems that the redesign that was done in 2000 involves using 2 different metals which eventually causes tank corrosion and leaks. Tanks made before 2000 last 10,12, 15 years. Made after that? Failure within as little as 6 months-and the company now only gives a 5 year Warranty on those 41 gallon tanks. That should tell you something right there. AMTROL is a world wide company and they make lots of different tank type products-but how can a company continue to put a product out there with such a terrible failure rate? And not be held accountable??
0 comments