Chris, if your Northstar is working well and has given you no trouble in 4+ years, everything's cool

The biggest problem that I've seen is the lids - apparently even Hayward noticed this because they completely revamped the lid gaskets a few years ago (of course no one notified us that the change had taken place so ~ 10 times I went to fix an air leak, caused by the lid gasket, and had the wrong part for it). A couple of years ago 1 month old Northstars had either bad shaft seals and/or bad motors I shouldn't have to replace a seal nor motor that has only been in use a month! The higher HP models 1.5 + are supposedly able to run 120 volts, but they trip the breaker quickly if you wire them for 120 (sometimes we complete a pool before the electrician can finish his wiring, so I'll do a temp. hook up to an outlet so the pool can run until the electrician can finish up)

Please don't get me wrong - the Northstars are very powerful pumps, if they can get the 'bugs' worked out, I'd have NO problem reccomending them. I'm glad you got one that hasn't had the issues I've seen