In the top photo, notice how much beefier the new part on the right is, than the original part on the left.
It's been a long time since I added anything to my blog, but here I go and we are in a new area here. LOL I hope that some owners of the above named massage chair contact me. It's a shame to have these potentially great chairs in-operative.
In May of '07, I bought a Jade Melody 11000 and had it shipped to my house. All was well, real well, until one of the parts inside overheated and broke/melted. I both called and emailed the Florida Takemi company and was met with a lot of resistance until I told them all I wanted was the part that broke and told them what I thought was wrong with it that made it break in the first place. They sent me a new part. The only tool I needed for the repair that wasn't in my tool box was a small bearing puller, easily available at my local NAPA car parts store. I think the new part lasted about 2 years and then it finally succumbed to over-heating and fatigue/tearing, then failed.
One day, I was perusing my email and saw a story about 3-D engineering that took old broken or no longer available parts and with the aide of lasers made a whole new part out of plastic. I contacted a plastic engineering company near my home and we had a very nice talk. The engineer's child's day car was close to my home, so he stopped by to see the broken part and how it worked in the chair. I told him there were probably several thousand of these chairs around the country that suffered from the same problem as my chair. His interest grew.
The fellow took the part with him and called a few days later with a quote. It was understandably high, a couple hundred bucks, as it was one off and he was including all the nooks and crannies that the original part had. I asked him if he made the part out of one solid block with all the holes in the right places, if that would actually make it much stronger, and if it would be cheaper?...his reply was, "MUCH stronger, and, less expensive". Also, the piece would be made out of much better material. I think the part that I finally got was something close to delrin, a very high load capable and heat resistant material. Delrin ball bearings are used in non-lubricated situations such as roller reefing rigs for sailboats. The pressures are serious in that situation and there is no lubricant. Anyway, there are other materials that are equally fit for this application. I think what I got was something that was a useful bit left over from another job. The material was more than adequate, as the part is still working just fine.
The reason I wanted to finally discuss this is that I am thinking there are others out there with the same problem and just need a simple part to get their chair operating again. After an exhausting/exhaustive search of the internet I could find no trace of the original Takemi company or the manufacturers of the chair. There are, by the way, hundreds of Chinese manufacturers of massage chairs...or, at least there were when I last did a google search. By the way, the chair has done wonders for my back. But when it was in-operable, I was in a lot of pain. Paid for itself the second year, in terms of savings on massages.
I have attached pictures of the broken part and where it is located, as well as a side-by-side photo of the old part and the new. Everything was working just fine and then all of a sudden one of the smaller nylon rollers, I believe the right one (from a sitting position in the chair) went all floppy. It is such a simple fix that anyone with basic fix-it abilities and regular screw drivers, wrench, small bearing puller and the new part, can get this going again in about an hour or two or even less, depending on how many times one has had the back off of the chair. There are four joint nylon parts inside that operate the massage rollers...two large and two small...that could be cause for failure. In my chair it was the smaller right one that kept failing.
Edited 12/6/15
The company I had make my part has grown to such a large size they cannot take the time to make small batches of these parts. They made several sets of 20 and sold them off slowly over five or six years. They did find another shop that offered to make the parts. Two different people ordered a good number of parts and upon notice of shipping, both canceled their orders. Folks, that just isn't a nice thing to do to a company that is simply trying to help people out. The shop owner got mad and threw the parts in the garbage and is no longer interested in making this part.
Have a great new year and hope you can get your massage chair working better than new.
