broke my regulator spring!

[Firekist]

I thought this was pretty weird.. just over 3 year old harris 2500 oxy reg.. I slowly opened the valve on the oxy tank, then started to screw in the t bar to up the pressure..
"Chunk" and then the tbar just screws in with no resistance .. weird.

I take the reg apart ( the first time doing that 5o a reg), and here the spring is broke in 2 places.

It had a 3 year warantee of course.. heh.

Anyway; thought it was different.. never heard of that kinda failure before.

---seth

[Julian]

Sounds pretty gnarly... I was checking out a cut open regulator they had on display at Airgas the other day. I never really considered what's inside a reg before.

[ReLo442]

Fire - your lucky that happened in the 3 yr warranty time!!!! Glad it was just a simple spring break and no a catastrophic rupture or something crazy like that.

What are we supposed to do with a regulator when it goes out or breaks like this? I mean i know there are places that rebuild them, but most places I call tell me its not worth the money and to just buy a new one. I had my oxy reg go out as I got to a festival last month. No time for rebuild had to frantically search for a welding place and buy the one they had. No my propane reg is started to flutter and breath quite a bit so im thinking its gonna be replaced to.

[smolder holder]

^^I had the same issue with my prop reg earlier this year....i got five+ years out of it so i couldn't really complain to much.

[Julian]

It's definitely worth it to get a reg rebuilt... the body, gauges, knob and outlets are usually perfectly fine. It's some little gaskets and springs that go out. You can easily save 50% over the cost of a new regulator, if you can find someone good to rebuild it that is. They offer the service (I think on the side) over at my local Airgas.

[Emmett's Glass]

Here's the place I've taken my regs for rebuilds:
Hansen & Miller
4101 Leary Way NW
Seattle, Washington 98107
(206) 782-8842
E

[ReLo442]

Thanks!!!

My oxy reg is a super old school one from years and years ago so itd be cool to polish it up, make it all shiny again and get it working. I think ill have to look into it.

I found this site that has a lot of repair kits for regulators.
http://www.regulatortorchrepair.com/store.php/categories/regulator-parts-repair-kits