Hello,

I watched your video on the Raypack rust and the condensation issues you described. I expect that this was the cause of our pool heater failing. I have a three year old pool Heater, a Raypack 406A that rusted completely out on the heater tray and turned to dust. I went ahead and bought another tray, pilot light, etc., but after watching your video, I am thinking maybe I am not approaching this correctly.

For the initial three years, we relied on a pool company to manage our water chemistry and apparently that may not have been the best choice considering the extensive rust and deterioration in the heater tray. Now I do all of the water chemistry and have opened the pool this year with great results. So when I think about replacing just the tray and pilot light (and now apparently the gas valve has gone bad) and consider that this is about $1000 in parts so far, before I do all of this work- Should I just get a brand new heater instead?

My approach is that the condensate has most likely damaged other components and maybe I am only going to end up spending all of this time and parts to just have a broken heater in another few months. If I buy completely new heater and stay consistent with the water chemistry, that may be better solution.

I am also concerned that what you described as gas line sizing issues also forming condensate could be a problem and want to see if I can somehow confirm that I have the right size piping for my heater application.

So in summary, what are your thoughts on fixing this heater that suffered bad water chemistry (tray, pilot, valve) and who knows what else as compared to starting from scratch and replacing the heater, confirming the gas line sizes and moving forward?