Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

First of all, I find having the instant hot water to be great. You get used to the convenience of having it. So much so, that when our older tank started leaking, we decided to replace it. This unit looks good, the valve and spigot seem to work fine. Installation was pretty easy. So, it would get 5 stars from me if this one was the first one I had. HOWEVER, this is the THIRD one in about 10 years. The first one was an earlier InSinkErator model and failed after 3 or 4 years. (I forget what the failure was). So, since the spigot was still good, and InSinkErator had a new stainless steel tank heater, we replaced the tank. It was the same model as this unit. We installed it in 2007. It worked fine until a few weeks ago. Got up one morning and the floor was all wet, and inside the cabinet was wetter. The leak was coming from inside the heater tank unit. (Fortunately, we got it cleaned up before the laminate floor was damaged) I did some searching and all the other models had similar (or worse) reviews.. convenient, but lots of failures. So, we decided to stick with InSinkErator. And, since we had changed the faucet on that sink last year, we got this unit with a spigot that (sort of) matches the new faucet. Amazon delivered it promptly, installation was pretty easy (well as easy as any plumbing that involves crawling under the sink!). The "feel" of this valve is nicer than the old unit we had. Once I got it all installed and working, I had the old, leaky tank sitting in front of me. I am an engineer. I design and build things.. and I have ALWAYS wanted to take apart things to see how they work (or don't work). This tank was about to go in the trash anyway, so I could take it apart with no worries about it maybe not going back together again. So, I did. A couple of screws, push and pry in a few spots and the case opened up. It turns out that the leak was in a plastic tube that was in direct contact with the stainless steel tank. I don't know the exact kind of plastic, but it was NOT a type for high temperatures. The tube had aged, turned brown, gotten brittle and cracked where it was in contact with the hot metal tank. This tube MIGHT have cost ten cents. They could just as well have used tube made from a better plastic or rearranged things a bit so the low temperature tube was not in contact with 190 deg F metal. It MIGHT have cost them 10 cents more. So, they saved 10 cents, but the result was this thing leaked after 4 years. I had to spend $200 to replace it, and if we had not caught it when we did, we might have had to spend a LOT more to repair or replace the kitchen floor. Actually, looking at other reviewers here on Amazon who had these fail just after the 3 year warranty expired, maybe they intended this to happen. And, maybe the new one I just bought has better tubing. (I did not open it up to look). They did change some of what were copper pipes to plastic tubes on the rest of the system. Anyway, these are nice to have. In spite of the problems, I got yet another one. But we warned, they seem to fail right after the warranty expires. And, based on prior experience, this time I installed the unit with a FloodStop leak sensing automatic cutoff valve FloodStop for Sinks Lead Free Water Valve FS3/8-CD. They seem to work fine, and will beep and shut off the water if this tank (or anything else under the sink) starts leaking. One final thing, I said they failed in 3 or 4 years, but two of them lasted 10 years. The reason was that for a couple years we had a relative with dementia living with us. She could not understand that the little spigot was scalding hot water and would try to use it for washing dishes or her hands. So, for that time we had it turned off. The valve handle is pretty hard to activate, so kids small enough to not understand about it probably could not turn it on, but you do NOT want this if you have an adult in the house who cannot understand that its not "normal" hot water.