You installed it. You NEED to service it!

I got a topic that's on my top of mind right now as we we talked about recently just the change in seasons , right as we're kind of getting everything ready to go .

We were talking recently about , you know , ordering parts for equipment right , and I gotta tell you I used to install a boiler line . Quite regularly I Still use their tankless water heaters .

All time that I had from that company , like this big chest , this big Foot locker kind of Box of parts , basically everything inside the box more or less , that could be unbolted and rebolted on to the unit , okay , minus like a heat exchanger or something right , you know that was so . That has proven to me so valuable over the years .

Call comes in , cold call , from a company you didn't do the install even , or it doesn't matter , I guess it just call comes in , hey , we're getting this error code . Quickly look up that error code if you don't have it memorized and I never memorized these things , by the way and they're like oh , that's , that's a , that's a flow switch .

You know , go in my shop , dig out a flow switch out of that box of parts for that model . Yeah and boom I'm . I'm gonna be in business when I go out to the job , I'm gonna have what I need and Then some . I'll be able to get the customer back up and running .

If it's under warranty , I'll have the company send me a new part to replace the one I pull out of my kit , like that's such a . That's the way to do it .

I know there's been talk of it , I just don't there wasn't even a parts kit for the old one , right , and I think that , and especially now with this new 100 . It's the same as the 200 , so , like gas valves and fans and ignitors and flame rods and , you know , burners , they're the same model to model , like the one hundred size for size .

Yeah , the 85 and the 120 in the 100 have the same burner fan and Gas valve as the 85 and the 120 and the 200 series . Sure , those , they're interchangeable part to part , I think the gas valve .

The control board is definitely different because , yes , the upgraded controls , but and then I don't know about the BCU , but it'd be nice to have that I think actually the BCU might be the same between all of the boilers , but no , don't quote me on that . I could be wrong ?

Right , I still am . But yeah , this , this whole , this whole not having a parts kit is bugging me . There are other companies that are like this as well . There are some companies , though that also not just the one I was talking about , that was Navian , but not just the one I was talking about . There are others , like IBC has a parts kit .

Maybe isn't just complete , but it's there . You're gonna have , like a gas valve inducer . The stuff isn't cheap either . Look , I'm not looking to have you give it to me , although if you want to , man , I'd take it .

I just want to be prepared when there's a problem , and I guess the whole reason I brought this up for the younger people out there starting out on their own you know , younger is in like you're newer to this being , you know you don't have a boss doing this for you . Sure , I'm telling you my experience with the parts kit .

Do it , do not look at it and go oh my God , that's $800 . I can't believe it . Oh , it's $1,200 . Oh man , I'll tell you what . In certain situations , if money is that , if you're looking at that and you simply think that that's the major hurdle in the way , like you don't think it's worth it .

I'm gonna tell you otherwise , because I have had jobs where having the part meant that I got paid for that service call in one trip , got my customer back up and running and now I have gained a customer . Yeah , this is a scenario where you can hardly put a immediate price tag on that . You can maybe say okay , what does it cost you to get a customer ?

Like , between this amount of money and this amount of money I'm holding my hands up for anybody just listening it's either gonna be at least as much it could . You could spend as much as that to acquire a new customer , right ? But if you're doing that organically and you know they called you , you had the part , you solved their problem .

In this day and age , people are just I wouldn't call it a loyalty thing as much as although some people are just simply loyal , I would say people are just , they don't wanna be inconvenienced , right , and so that part's kidded . It can be so worth the initial upfront cost it might be .

So anybody listening that's on the fence , you don't think you can afford it . You think it's expensive . I'm gonna tell you it's probably a lot more expensive not having it .

I don't have a Navian Parks kit sitting on the shelf .

I have not installed but there's since now prevalent in my market because I go to the training like they're famous for offering the hey , come to the level two or three , whatever they call it training and we'll give you a Parks kit . And it's like okay , I gotta do it anyway .

In my opinion it pays off , not just for I mean , they might not even be giving the Parks kit at them anymore . That might be a special thing Like maybe it's the rep that I don't have any idea but I got most of my kits that way . I did buy one more recently because I know there's a . Their new combi is different than the old one .

Oh okay and I know I see it out on jobs already and so I know it's being installed a lot around me and I am a service contractor listed on their site . So I do get calls referred to me from people out in the homeowners and I wanna be prepared .

Look , I put the money up for it , not because this isn't a commercial , they didn't give it to me Like I paid damn good money for that kit , but , like I said , it pays for itself . It just does , and I can't think of anything that annoys me more . Well , I can .

Probably that's a stupid statement , but for emphasis , some little few things are more annoying put it that way than going out being able to diagnose a piece of equipment Like a common thing that I know I should know better because I see them all the time and then not having the part to fix it .

I can get one delivered me within an hour , which is pretty spectacular , yeah .

But when you're talking about the , you know an obscure part inside of this piece of equipment that like you could have had in a box and your shop or on your van , right , that to me is like super annoying because I've been on both sides of fence and I just I hate telling people all I got to order the part I'll be back .

I'm not sure how long it , you know . Just stuff like that is just annoying to me .

Dsw satisfied , right up , cleans up , he's checking out the heat , he goes , I think he goes in , turns a thermostat on in the basement , boiler fires up and he walks back into the boiler room and there's like a little wolf of smoke coming off the top of the boiler . He's like what the heck ?

Oh , and something happened to the control board and I don't think it's right . But I'm gonna say I I'm not , I'm gonna say I shouldn't , I shouldn't say it this way . There isn't anything Rob could have done that could have caused this . Right , like it's sure , it's one of those kinds of things .

There's two little diodes on the top of the main control board , right underneath the ignition transformer , that are Just blown out , roached out , just toast . Yeah , 16 year old boiler . I'm like god , dang it . Oh , wow , yeah . So there we are .

You know , just got done servicing a 16 year old boiler , put some new so drain valves and did a flush on it and I mean , you know , kind of getting her up and going for the winter . You know , boilers still got some life left in it . And so I call around town .

He calls me and we walk through it and he's like I , I see these two bad little diodes here and they're , they're toast . And I'm like , all right , well , that sucks , but Okay , let me see if I can find a control board . So I look one of the supply local supply houses has one on the shelf . I'm like perfect , jacob was wrapping up a job early .

I'm like , hey , run out to this supply house , grab that , take it to Rob . You know , because he's all the way across town . It's a 40 minute round trip , 45 minute round trip . If Rob's got leaves to go , do it . So anyway , jacob drops this part of board off to him .

Rob puts it in and calls me after you know , half hour , 45 minutes later and goes I can't get the dang thing to run . He goes at lights but it won't run . I'm like , huh . So we , you know , muscled through a few things here and there . You know , tech support was already closed for the day and I was like , all right , well , I don't know what .

I don't know , I don't know , man , something's , we're missing something or it doesn't , it's something's wrong with the board .

And and I replacement board , yeah , with a replacement board , then brand new one and I'm like , okay , so I go out and I'm looking and I Go back out , go out on Friday morning the next morning and I'm looking at it and I'm screwing around with this boiler and I pull the burner out and I wash the burner and I reground the burner and I , you know , go

through all the steps and he's a heat already put a new flame rod and a flame , a spark igniter and ignition wire and a spark ignition Mark electric wire . I mean , he's already been down the steps , you know , and I'm like what the heck ? I stick my meter in between the Between . Was that , yeah , to check the read flame signal . And I got flame signal .

Like what the heck ? But the boiler doesn't . When I scroll over on this lock-in bar boiler , it doesn't show flame signal and I'm like see the flame rod .

And I'm like I think I got a bad board . And she's like , well , I'm gonna , I'm gonna talk to my Guys and see what they see the thing that was throwing me off and I don't know if I'm I was just a total goose chase or not . The boiler never recorded any cycles , no ignition attempts . And I'm like , well , that's super weird , you know , yeah , happens .

And then so when I so , I was like , all right , well , so I call back to the supply house and I'm like , hey , you guys had two of these boards yesterday . And they're like , yeah , yeah , we got another one here . I'm like sweet , so I drive the 45 minutes across town and I go walk in in the door and they're like , oh , we can't find that board .

I'm like , are you freaking , kidding me ? And they can't find it . Yeah , so I'm like all right , so call the other supply house that had one three hours away . And so it's Friday holiday weekend . This was Labor Day for weekend Friday and I'm like I need you to red label UPS this Saturday delivery . Okay , yeah , we think we can do that anyway .

So board shows up , I go up on Saturday and Pop the board in and boiler fires right up . But this this kind of goes back to my Instagram story that there was a couple people that were like oh , post an update , let us know what you did , what you found , and I will do that .

But what was interesting is the boy , those lock and bar Boilers and I don't know about the newer ones , the older one , 16 year old , vintage KBN 105 , if it's a failed ignition , it doesn't count it as an ignition cycle . How weird is that ?

The I don't know that company . I'm telling you sometimes I None of them are perfect . That's all there is to it , not even the one that we currently and are pretty well established with . Yeah , the V's miss , I'd like . Yeah , whatever , whatever parts kits , though , anybody listening , we're gonna wrap this up . Get a parts kit If you don't already have one .

I mean , this should be basic . A lot of people would like totally understand that , right , but uh , you got a plane going overhead , it's sounds like it's landing in the driveway . It's your luggage .

Maybe you just haven't got around to it or you your hesitant because of the cost . I'm telling you there's a huge value here . Everybody's gonna start someplace and if you are in this place where you have not done this yet , but you're out there servicing equipment and you're installing it , I I'm a huge , huge believer and I'm really not gonna argue this .

I Don't think I'll change my mind on it . If you install it , you should be able to service it 100% . I Believe that . But that's a that's my own , you know , was it my own ? A credo is that should , should , should call it a credo .