Crown Bimini Residential Boiler Overview

7 thousand dollar mistake. In the Spring of 2012 I had a local licensed plumber replace an old oil heating boiler with a High Efficiency Gas fired direct vent condensing boiler. According to the plumber this was the way to go, it was manufacture by a reputable company by the name of Crown Boilers now owned by Velocity Boiler Works, it was efficient and reliable, a good fit for rental and residential properties. The boiler know as a Bimini bwc070 worked well the Fall of 2012, Winter and Fall of 2013 and Winter of 2014. The heating bills were very reasonable. The Fall of 2015 the unit abruptly failed to work. The same plumber determined the blower motor was deceased and had to be replaced. Crown Boiler refused any warranty and during some heated conversations with Crown support people they actually hung up on me. The plumber supposedly tried to help, but did not succeed either. The total bill came to $973, $550 for the part, the rest labor, five man hours to replace a blower motor. I knew I was in deep trouble right away because the plumber's technicians had no clue how to service this unit and were basically on the phone the whole time trying to find out how to remove the next screw. Totally unfamiliar with the product they suppose to service, it was pathetic. The Fall of the 2016 I hired the same plumber ( I know, I'm an idiot ) to give the unit a once over before the start of the winter. Again the technician sent to perform the procedure had no clue, but deemed the unit in working order, which it did for another year. During the Fall of 2017 my tenant informed me the unit was not turning on. I was away and neither the plumber nor its answering service picking up. Discovered that by turning the ac power to off for a few minutes and then back on, the unit would continue to work, sometimes for weeks and months before failing again. Limped a long for the winter of 2018. Made several attempts to have the unit checked out by a factory rep without any success. One did finally come by without any notice when I was away on business, so nothing got resolved. This past September, Fall of 2018 I started to get really worried, no support from the Plumber and the unit would not even run one complete cycle without the controller crashing and shutting down. Called the original plumber, they were on time but again no proper tools and had no clue what the errors meant. Got a hold of a different plumber somewhat familiar with the Crown Boiler, after and hour of trouble shooting and some calls indicated the computer was now bad as well as a possible clogged heat exchange. According to him and not mentioned in the maintenance schedule the heater exchanger is supposed to be removed and cleaned every year, a procedure that takes several hours. Wow. The repair with parts and labor would be practically the price of a new unit. Nice, 7 thousand up in smoke in roughly five years. Ripped it out of the wall and replaced with a Bosch. Welcome to the joys of rental properties and dealing with unscrupulous vendors and contractors. How do they sleep at night is beyond me. Will never buy anything Crown again.

I purchased a Crown Boiler just over 2 years ago for my home. The blower motor went out this weekend and we had no heat or hot water. Velocity refused to consider it under warranty and I'll have to buy a $550 part for my new boiler after spending several thousand dollars on a boiler and water heater from them. The company that sold it to us tried to persuade them to replace it and they still refused. I will never recommend a Crown/Velocity boiler to anyone!

Where do I start! When we first started using the boiler I notice that it was using water. I contacted Crown and they told me that it was impossible for boiler to be using water because they pressure test them before they leave the factory. Well it turns out it was not properly pressure tested because it was leaking and it destroyed the mother board in the boiler which was replaced. However the water consumption did not stop. And we continually had to reset the computer after that. At one point we came home and I had to deal with frozen water pipes. I have contacted Crown and they say there is nothing they can do I have to go back to place were it was purchased. When I try to get someone there to address the problems they say it is Crown that has to send them a new boiler or parts. What a circus act. Do not trust this company called Crown and now I believe they changed there name to Velocity Boiler Works. I can't understand why?

I have a Bimini 120. when it works its great. I have had 3 repairs already. Two sensors and blower assembly (over $500 part). Parts always have to be ordered. Never in stock. Informed Crown about this. Their response was to give a name of supply house which doesn't sell to consumer. My friend is an HVAC guy who has an account with the supply house none of the 3 parts that went wrong on my boiler were in stock. So plan on being without heat for 3 days minimum. Would I recommend them, not at this point. Also didn't care that they didn't address my email with a reasonable answer instead pointed me to a supply house. I felt shrugged off. Next boiler Weil-McClain.

First, the unit requires manual reset anytime there is a power outage…dumb. Freezes up in the building if I'm away for a day or so. So Crown now sells an add-on kit for $270 plus install. Really? Second, after only 2 years the fan assembly is giving an e28 error message 3-4 times a day. Restarts fine after I manually reset but then it fails. The factory said no warranty on components. So the fan is $550 plus the unit needs to be recalibrated so probably a $200-300 tech call. That adds up to over $1000 for two years of service and making their poorly engineered product right. Buy another brand.