I went out in the garage yesterday about ten minutes before I had to go to work to drop something off and discovered a bunch of water in the middle of the floor. Because there are machines and crap all over it took about thirty seconds for me to trace it back to the water heater. There was a steady drip coming out from under it and landing on the floor.
Insert your favorite profanity here, I’m know I used several.
I didn’t have time to mess with it so I grabbed a drain pan and threw under it because it’s up on a stand and headed out.
When I got home I went and checked on it and had to empty the drain pan. I figure it’s leaking about a gallon every six hours.
So I just spent all damn day cleaning out a pathway for whoever it is that is going to get to change it out.
The back of the truck is completely full of shit that I am going to take to the dump.
This is a rental so the rental management outfit gets to handle that.
Now that someone can actually get to it I have to figure out how to get in touch with this management outfit on a weekend.
It’s been a couple of years since I’ve had to do that, last time it was the dishwasher finally shit the bed as I recall.
I want to say that I have to email them through some fucking portal that requires a password.
This is going to be fun.
I’m thinking by the time I get that figured out and they finally send someone out here to replace this thing it will be Tuesday at the earliest. In the meantime I get to dump that drain pan ever few hours and it will be full by the time I get home from work Monday.
Joy Joy, it never ends.
Last month my idiot soninlaw calls me and says their water heater is leaking out the top. WTF? So I go down there and bigger than shit it was coming out around the inlet AND outlet pipes AND the exhaust pipe.. Took about 30 minutes to remove the damn thing. Went to lowes. $869 bucks later we got a new one and me and him put it in. That one lasted from about 1990 until now. That’s when I put it in last time.
You did pretty damn good then, 35 years service life is exceptional for a water heater. Current production water heaters typically last no more than 15 years, although sometimes you’ll get a few extra years out of one.
Is that natural gas or propane? That one vent at 45 degrees, mine has to vent at 90
Most states/municipalities do not permit a 90 degree exhaust pipe. It’s against code.
Too much turbulence, could blow out the flame and you would get gas flooding teh area.
I have a leaky pipe that follows me wherever I go….
yeah. hot water heaters. don’t help your co-workers out. yeah.
I can swap out a hot water heater in 1.5-2 hours tops. yup. I done that damn many over the years. ANYWAY. a coworker of mine, Carlos had his heater blow/leak. on Thursday. he told me about it all on Friday. he bitched about it the whole 8 hour shift. plumber said it be 750 at least. plus the heater (2003 prices)
plumber said he be there by next week (about 6-7 days)
so, he bitching to me about it . I tell that swapping them out in not rocket science.
so. a plan is made. Sat, I show up with pickup truck and tools. WE got to the home defect. they, Carlos and his buddy Serge ( he was a SEAL many years ago) don’t understand the difference in water heaters. like why a 3 year or 4 year or the 5 year ones. Simple, engineers in this country have found out just how thin they can make them to last 3,4 or 5 years.
about 45 minutes later, we leave. armed with ball valves and unions needed.
30 minutes more than it takes me to do this alone.
the heater is plumbed with soft copper lines- they suck bigtime. any plumber using soft copper has been paid for the job and NOT coming back. so, after giving up trying to get the new lines to work with the old shit. a good 2-3 hours spent.
no matter what, the damn shit kept leaking. damn old soft copper lines.
I ended up replacing all of the soft copper lines with hard copper. add ball valves as needed. total time spent with 2 assholes who needed EVERYTHING explained to them 5.5 hours. next time, don’t call me I told them.
granted I did get a nice bottle of scotch out of it.
install ball valves and unions to make the next time easy to do.
a plumber showed me this many years ago like 40 or more now a days
so, yeah. I know hot water heaters
one thing I did see there is a flex line going to your heater. not sure about the “left” coast, but back east here that is a big NO-NO. is it propane or natural gas ?
natural gas lines need to be hard pipe. also you need a drop section to any crap in the lines. like a T-fitting with a short length of pipe capped at the end. this is to keep any crap in the lines from blocking the pilot light or something like that.
seems like it was found to be the root cause of a few houses going boom. pilot goes out, basement fills with gas, a spark and then boom.
something you might want to point out to whoever does the job.
flex pipe is only for stoves and the like. and not water heaters.
You have to have flex pipe , earthquakdxs will break a hard piped conection. I am surprised the water heater ain’t strapped to the wall though.
Find the hole and use a self tapping screw with a rubber washer to temporarily plug the whole.
hole.
What are you moaning about? On this side of the lake they would be imperial gallons, not just those wimpy little US ones . . .
The heater itself is supposed to be sitting in a pan as well IIRC
The bottoms tend to rot out. I found that allowing the sediments produced during heating tend to accelerate the rotting. Seems counterintuitive, but what I have observed. I flush mine about once every two years and it doubled the life of the heater.
You must use flexible pipe to hook the heater to your gas source. We had a 4.1 quake in centered in east TN that hit us in the mountains of WNC and a hard pipe would have been broken, just as it would in Kali.
Not long after moving in our house the water heater started leaking from the hot water out at the weld, couldn’t shut the water off because the valve was frozen. Had to open the p&t value & run a hose from the drain out to the yard. Order a new heater, guy came on a Saturday, removed the heater & capped off the pipes so we would have water, came back Monday & installed it. Everything was fine, Tuesday another heater showed up, never got billed & nobody would come get it. Now I have a spare. During the china flu bs.
The first item of note for me was the fact the water heater is on a stool with the hard lines going to it. Up here, that is cause for the gas company to cut off your service until something more suitable is in place (and then they charge you for a re-inspection!) With the water in Saskatchewan, water heaters rarely live past five years and it is rare for anyone to have warranty past six months that is honoured without a comprehensive water treatment in the home, and even then the manufacturer will find a way to weasel out any assistance should there be any issues.
My heater is electric, and I replace the element every eighteen months, because going two years simply doesn’t work.