No water flow out of little giant

Or maybe you have rocks in the neck of your heater worst than mine, enuf to restrict it to cause that swelling........

Took me 45 min., here's what I broke out of my neck today.
Mixing rinses is a bad idea I've finally figured out...






Caked on new thermostat I installed 2 weeks ago like a rock, I had to use a wire wheel to grind it off.......


The pile that come out of just the neck, who knows what's in the curved coils that I can't get to.


Might explain your intermittent flow out of your heater before the coil blew out.

Yikes, that is a lot of crap! Sure you don't have an enemy somewhere?

Back in high school, we used to add a cup of minute rice to a guy's radiator if we wanted to get even. It does look like build-up from incompatible chems, what rinses are you running?

I'm my own worst enemy...........

Before I knew better, I was adding encap when needed to whatever rinse I was using at the time, which was last Chempec XL333 & Liquid Slurry.......but now that the damage is done, and lesson learned I only run encap........but who knows how long I'll be fighting this filter clogging problem.

Mixing them creates a rock hard substance that seems to clog everything where's there's any kind of flow restriction..........a 90 deg. bend, a reducer (like at the exit of the LG heater), filters or where ever the water has to slow down I've noticed.

I did that too despite warnings from nearly everyone. It plugged up my chem pump, but that was the extent of it.

How hard is that stuff? Can you flush it under pressure or do you need to dig through it like "hot rodding" a radiator core?

It's about as hard as a rock, I had to break it up into the little pieces you see in pic with a screwdriver and hammer to get it out.

And the worst part is, acid doesn't even touch it, so doing an acid flush/descaling doesn't help at all!!

I put it all back together and after about 1/2 hr. of running it with high heat all hell broke loose again, and EVERYTHING clogged up.......This is the typical deal about a 1/2 hour of run time and all female QD's and filters clog from the heater out....this all started when I fixed the heater, once I got good heat back, seems the heat breaks the crap loose. The good news is the heater isn't leaking, but who knows after the days/weeks/months of heat cycling it may take to get all this crap out.

That sucks....I can't think of any shortcuts to offer, except maybe a psi washer and vibration. Of course, that vibration might lead to a crack as well.

I got nothing...

I'd ask a radiator shop if they could clean that.

Also, not to be the bearer of bad news......but all of your hoses downstream from the LG are going to packed with the same crud.

If that happened on my TNT I would have a water box full of that crud as well as my pump.

Good Luck Dave.

Wow I don;t see how you were even flowing water. I wonder if that what caused you to spring a leak?

Do you think It calcium deposits?When I opened up my multilayer the encap buildup was white and goey and not rock hard

I would poor some clear on one of those rocks to see if it softens it up if it does pour it in the coil and let it sit in there for a bit.
Or like Eric said see if a radiator shop could clean it.

As far as my coil. I have only had one coil. It cracked in the same spot that was welded the first time.

I'm not sure how water was able to flow, honestly.

No, it's not calcium............but I know what you're saying about it being "gooey" in your sprayer, I get the same thing.  I'm pretty sure it's the heat that causes it to turn rock hard.  You should see the high pressure hose that comes out of the heater and goes to QD on the front of the machine.......yesterday while trying to flush this crap out, it completely clogged, stopping ALL water flow. 500 psi water and not a drop was coming threw the 5' long piece of hose, then I tried blowing 180 psi of compressed air thew it, and again nothing!! It's done, I have to replace it.

I've about tried it all so see if I can find something that softens it, and nothing has even touched it.  Super strong low PH acid, real high PH Alkaline, and it doesn't phase it.

I've been flushing it out all day, basically........for hours....and I see very little crap coming out now, so hopefully I'm close. I'm going to clean a few rugs now, and see what happens.

Mine was clogged (But not near as bad as yours from putting,powders in my fresh water tank.)I drained and cleaned my tank and replaced all hoses and the heater coil. I was tired of cleaning my jets on my wand. So it replaced the works.

Those pics reminded me of the time I had kidney stones years ago

Worked on one like that years ago. Don't know what caused it. I always wondered if it was from the chemicals being cooked in the coils and sticking to the inside my be after shutting the heater off while still hot causing buildup over time.

Only thing I've seen cause this kinda thing, Eddie is mixing encap with an emulsifier/rinse.

It's a total nightmare, and I'd avoid it at all cost.

I'm still dealing with this clogging nightmare, if anyone has any suggestions on how I can clean out this heater coil, I'm hear??

I spent the first hour of my day today figuring out where the clog was at today............taking apart every QD, looking for the clog. It was of course the last place I looked, the female QD right on the back of the heater, and it was so clogged solid I couldn't clean it out and had to put a new one on.

I'm really tired of the time I'm wasting by dealing with these clogs. At this point, if I could afford it now, I'd just buy a new coil to be done with it.

That sucks man, nothing worse than unreliability in a machine.

It sounds like you tried everything, I would have used oxalic acid and pushed it through using a drill pump or a cheap sump pump in a loop. Circulate it and hope for the best.

If that doesn't work, I can't think of anything else.

Go pick up some muriatic acid at the pool store and let that sit in the coils see if that breaks it down, might be worth a try it's only a couple of bucks

Mo wrote:Go pick up some muriatic acid at the pool store and let that sit in the coils see if that breaks it down, might be worth a try it's only a couple of bucks

Doing that is what kinda started this mess...........It was when I was running muriatic acid threw the heater it sprang a leak. Now that I got the leak fixed I'm still battling the clogging problem since getting the heat fixed...........the high heat is what's causing all this crap to break free and clog everything. I really need a new coil I guess, it's the only quick fix I can see.

milspec6 wrote:That sucks man, nothing worse than unreliability in a machine.

Yea really! I just got the damn machine completely rebuilt to get that reliability back, and now this heater crap!............Sux coming home from work every day and having to work on equipment so I can work the next day, feels like a 25 hr a day job!

I was at Lowes getting something for my dryer and I saw some coiled copper tubing. I wonder if I can use the 3/8 inch coiled tube add fittings to replace the little giant heater coil.

The PSI rating on the box was 700 PSI and max heat rating 400 degrees. What do you guys think? Dave go ahead and give it a try and report back

I don't know about that, Mo!

You're the one with the welder. Just cut out the part that that you thread the unitrol into and weld it on the new coil.

Mo wrote:You're the one with the welder. Just cut out the part that that you thread the unitrol into and weld it on the new coil.

I Think it's going to take more than that.

You'd have a coil 5' in Dia. with that 3/8" tubing, in order to hold enough water to keep up with the flow.

Not to mention, I'd be really surprised if it could stand up to the heat and pressure, even if the specs say it will.........I'm afraid you'd end up with a steam bomb that could blow at any second, which could be really dangerous....second/third deg. burns really hurt, I've had a couple.

That's why I wanted you to do it

I'm dumb but not stupid!!!