hot water heater short......

[glennster]

had a tenant call , no hot water. went over to check, wow, so much for a 5 year old bradford white water heater. toasted the lower element controls. good thing it didnt start a fire, breaker tripped apparently in time. hey john t....wha happened??? looks like all the ions fell out.

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[DH in Carolina]

Lower element is probably still good. Lower thermostat brobably had burned contacts and caused thermostat to burn up. Lower thermostat also gets water in them if the top element leaks any arpund gasket.

 

[Dusty MI]

My water heater heats cold water. Why would one want to heat hot water?

 

[da.bees]

Looks like most all the smoke got out of it.

 

[markiz41]

Did you already pull it? Shouldn"t this be under warranty? I believe they give 7 years for the tank, don"t know about the electrical. Either way, should be easy to fix if no damage to the tank.

 

[Brad Buchanan]

Kind of like the folks who 'unthaw' a steak.

Brad

 

[Geo-TH,In]

Good thing you had the cover on it to contain the fire.

Agree, bad contacts = lots of heat.

I recently has a light bulb explode when I turned the switch on, tripped breaker. The bulb was the hi-efficiency florcent type. Lucky it wasn't an exposed bulb. In an enclosed fixture. Had to pitch the fixture. Never would have gotten the smell out not to mention hot plastic went all over.

Had to replace my shorts too.

George

 

[C W Hinton]

My question exactly!!

 

[36 Coupe]

Replace the lower thermostat and check the lower element for a short to the tank.

 

[36 Coupe]

No repair done now everything get thrown out.20.00 max for new parts.Water heaters are good until the tank leaks.Installing new heater requires plumbing permit and inspection in most places.

 

[john *.?-!.* cub owner]

problem may have been a wire not tightened properly on thermostat. Does not look like too bad a repair job from picture.

 

[Cliff(VA)]

I fixed a hot water heater for a friend once. The complaints was that the water was too hot (steamy actually) and that the owner was getting a tingle when washing her hands.

Turned out that the lower element was shorted to the water. Since only one side of the 240V hot was switched, the other side was returning to ground through the water.

Really weird.

Cliff(VA)

 

[36 Coupe]

Thats a common problem.