Water Heater Frustration

[jinjimbob]

American Water Heater Company, which manufactures Whirlpoolｮ Water Heaters under license.

Rheem makes Rheem, Ruud, Richmond and General Electric tanks.

I have a Rheem brand propane water heater, been working ok for 14 years.

 

[AlanB]

Man Eddie, feel for you man, hate it that it goes that way for you, but it does make me feel a bit better that it is not just me.

I truly hate when I run afoul of the "policies" that are only at the return desk etc. Has driven me nuts at times, but like you, have usually found when I got to the manager, and was able to control my anger enough to continue speaking intelligibly, that they made it right.

I also hate the "lifetime" warranty, that is good for the lifetime of the applicance... Got to love that, lawyerese at it's finest if you ask me. Kind of like my HF tool warranties I now found out.

Feel for you, would probably just buy a new element and keep the shipped one as a spare.

State water heaters are made right here in TN not far from my house.

Good luck getting it going, I know my better half would be a little less then pleased at this point in your story, I would probably launch her towards the customer service department and run

 

[EddieWalker]

Thanks again for the encouragment. We're heating water on the stove and taking baths the "old fashioned" way. haha

The element didn't make it yesterday. Obviously their idea of overnight is different then mine. I took out the old element and will buy a new one at Home Depot today. If the new one shows up, I'll have a spare.

It truly is amazing how water heaters keep getting worse, but then again, it could just be my luck. I don't install too many of them, but have never had any problems when doing so for a client. I've done three this year, and all went well. They were all gas, so that might be the difference.

Eddie

 

[dmccarty]

and was able to control my anger enough to continue speaking intelligibly,

And that can be so hard to do! Even when NOT angry.

Later,
Dan

 

[Dutch445]

In April 07 the heater in our home started leaking,
and after checking with local contractors that I knew
had done some work in the house, I found our propane
supplier had installed this heater 7 years prior,,, and it
had a 7 year warranty. He actually got the tank replaced
under warranty, even though we were a few weeks out
of warranty.
A few days after the new tank went in (gas, with power vent)
we had that smell also... and I was told to remove that
anode (magnesium) as that would be causing the odor.
We do have a water softerner also, so both the gas company
and the softener guy said it would be no problem to remove
the rod.

Sorry to hear of your frustrations... I've been thinking of upgrading
washing machines, and having second thoughts because of the
lack of reliability of new stuff...

 

[Chuck52]

Eddie,

If you are a member of a rural utility, they may have a deal like mine. We can get a free water heater if we agree to let them hook it up to a "peak demand" thingie that can turn it off if needed. One of those was in place when we bought our house in '01. If it has ever been shut off by the utility company I was never aware of it. It's an L.B. Green or some such brand I had never heard of, but it has given no trouble since we've lived here.

Chuck

 

[sunspot]

Thanks for the tip about Whirlpool. I was eyeing them at Lowe's for myself.

 

[ultrarunner]

I've been a property manager for 25 years and water heaters "Were" about as trouble free as one could hope. All that changed for me about 12 years ago.

I always bought Hoyt heaters made in Oakland CA and then Reno NV. When I couldn't get Hoyt anymore, I tried AO Smith and had way too many problems. Smith blames CA energy conservation regulations... but that doesn't help me one bit.

I now only buy Bradford White heaters and so far.... not one problem...

By the way, some of my old HOYT heaters are lifetime guarantee with copper tank... man what a great heater... too bad they don't sell them anymore.

 

[jinjimbob]

I thought that removing the anode rods will cause the rest of the heater to die quicker, as the rod is the sacrificial part.

 

[EddieWalker]

Just a thought -- I once had a problem with a two pole breaker and a water heater -- turned out the breaker did not function properly so I was only getting 110 instead of 220 -- drove me nuts until I checked the water heater with a meter and did the big ahaa -- felt pretty stupid. You might want to double check the internal wiring and back to the panel given it seems you have never had 80 gallons of truly hot water --

I'm starting to wonder if I was too harsh on the water heater companies. I've replaced the element and it tests good. The guy on the phone told me to do the test, which I did, but we did it wrong. I figured out that he had me test the wires on the top element, which tested good, but when we tested on the wires for the bottom element, it tested bad. I tested the wires on both elements, but just realized that the wires are not attached to the element on the bottom, so it was never tested. I need to test the old one, but even with a new one in, I'm still not getting hot water.

I have 122 volts on both wires. I'm not very smart, and this is probably my problem here. If my breaker is bad, can I still get the voltage on both wires? Will the voltage jump or carry over to each other?

I'm tired, but coudl it be the breaker that went bad, or maybe was never good from the beginning, and just barely working. It dies and I think the water heater is bad. I buy a new one and it doesn't work. I'm frustrated and take it back. I get another water heater and it doesn't work either. That's three water heaters that will not work.

The only common denominator has to be that breaker. How do I test the breaker?

For what they cost, I'm probably just going to buy another in the morning and see what happens.

Thanks,
Eddie