I had been using Weller for almost 50 years, but stopped. They're expensive, the parts are expensive, and I was having a lot of failures with them.
I'm not a hobbyist, so I solder every day.
About four years ago, I had two Weller stations quit the same week and was left with only my Weller GT (which I love, but it's big). I took the cheap Chinese soldering iron out of my road kit and put that in service. A year later and it's still working properly. I ordered two more, one for the road kit and one for a back up. One of them finally quit after four years.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/60W-IRON-SO.../223905127489?
With the Weller stations, I had several thermostats/temp sensors fail and several heaters. Honestly, these POS's work as good as the Wellers do and the total cost with shipping is less than one service part for the Weller.
But one caveat: the last one I got came with tips that were tinned but had no plating. They literally lasted a day. I just ordered another one and I'll see how the tips on that one lasts. Hopefully it was just a bad batch, but I still have a bunch of tips from the earlier orders that I haven't used yet.
John