Heater failed after turning on 1 week in service

Water flows into the front and out the back. There should be arrows printed on the header.

There are two valves that can bypass the heater. A two way and a three way.

I understand how the valves work. The part that says Closed matches a gate in the valve. So, the center arrow points to the closed line.

I understand how the valves work. You have (3) two-way valves and (1) three-way valve.

The current configuration looks correct. However, you said that ALL valves were open during heater firing.

In any case, the three way valve can have the gate pointing down, like it is now, or it can point up, in which case the line to the heater is open, but water will go down the vertical line and not through the heater.

[Edit] Looking more closely, I see that the three way valve goes to waste. I thought that it went to the pool.
[End edit]

Is the configuration in the picture exactly how it was every time that the heater fired?

Did you verify flow on the flow meter every time before you fired the heater?

Are you sure that the chemistry was correct from initial startup to today?

Do you have chemistry readings documented?

I would suggest that you get an independent evaluation of the situation from a service person to see if they can verify if the heat exchanger is scaled.

I think that it's either due to improper chemistry at startup or the valves were not set correctly during operation of the heater.

If the heat exchanger is scaled, it's easy enough to verify.

If it's not scaled, then I would have to suspect that the valves were not set correctly during operation of the heater.

The heater can fire with no water flow because it uses a pressure switch and not a flow switch.

Also note that the heater needs at least 40 gpm. If the flow was less, that could cause problems.

You can try to reverse flow to the heater without turning on the heater. There might be something blocking some of the tubes of the heat exchanger.

Did the heater ever work once it was plumbed back into the system (before which, it was brand new as it was bypassed). I don't think the heat exchanger could scale up in a month!

A heater can scale up in a month under extreme conditions.

Plaster startup is a time where the chemistry has to be carefully controlled or the pH can go super high.

Can you see any scale in the tubes?

Is the internal bypass working?

How are you measuring the 50 degree rise?

Is it still overheating with good flow and the valves set correctly?

Have you had an independent service person evaluate the problem?

How much straight run before and after does the flow meter have?

How much straight run before and after does the flow meter require?

Good for you. Companies rely on the "little guy" giving up and leaving them alone!

Jeff,
If Hayward is willing to pay full price for the heater and pick up, GO FOR IT !!! This tells me that they know they have a problem and you have worn them out and they have no more oil for your [legitimate] squeakiness.

Next, I would never buy anything from any pool company that has not had it in the field for 2-3 yrs minimum. Anything new is a total Crud shoot and until the kinks are ironed-out by the real customers, their labs will never emulate true field experience. Whatever heater you buy, it has to work so go w something that is proven and solid.

Finally, your chemistries would have to be massively off for any exchanger to be scaled in 1 month, and this unit was not even integrated or used for 1 of the 2 months. It's a real simple thing to pull the heat-exchanger and empirically determine if it has any degree of scale to cause the time-outs you've had. Hayward's default is scale bc they know the design is bad. If not, they would have checked that a LONG TIME AGO. Take the money and buy the brand the Forum recommends and go w a proven workhorse...the less bells/whistles means less to fail and invest in a unit that has been known for success. Yes, a 400K will take longer than a 500K, but it needs to work, period.

To conclude, I'd like to hire you to protest to Hayward my EcoStar[less] VSP3400 pump and have them reimburse me fully, and I'd even take it back to them.

Good luck and keep us posted,
tstex