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Thread: Water heater leaking - question

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Mar 2005
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    Houston, TX
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    Water heater leaking - question

    LOML called me at the office this morning to say that the water heater is leaking. She said it is a very slow drip and the pan with a drain is easily keeping up with it. Unfortunately we've got commitments which will keep us both busy until Sat.

    Does anyone have experience with leaking water heaters? Is this something that I've got to replace ASAP or can it wait 3 days? My choices are pay $300 for installation today/tomorrow, or install it myself Sat morning, or install it myself tonight starting at 9 PM. What would you do? BTW, the water heater is in the attic over the second floor so a complete failure would be terrible.

  2. #2
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    Jan 2004
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    Lewiston, Idaho
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tom Jones III
    BTW, the water heater is in the attic over the second floor so a complete failure would be terrible.
    Tom.........I've experienced two types of failures on water heaters that resulted in leaks. (1)The pressure valve on the side developed a leak. I was able to replace the valve on that one. (2) The bottom fell out of a gas water heater that we had. The only good news about #2 is that it was in an unfinished (at the time) basement. Based on what you stated above, I wouldn't let it go until the weekend. JMHO .............
    Ken

    So much to learn, so little time.....

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2006
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    Kalamazoo, MI
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    First of all a disclaimer: All advise in the following post is to be used at the readers own risk. I would not worry about the water heater before Saturday. I have never seen a catastrophic water heater failure yet. Usually the bottom of the tank is so full of lime scale that it could drip at a very slow rate for months. Sounds like you have it in a catch basin with a drain, probably 1 1/2" pvc to your sewer or septic. This will handle any leakage short of a sidewall blowout.

    Save the $300 for WW toys.
    Kyle in K'zoo
    Screws are kinda like knots, if you can't use the right one, use lots of 'em.
    The greatest tragedy in life is the gruesome murder of a beautiful theory by a brutal gang of facts.

  4. #4
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    My experience is that water heater leaks do not get better with time. They don't always change quickly. Can you stand not having hot water until Saturday? One solution would be to turn off the power/gas and the water to the tank. If you relieve the pressure, teh leak shouldn't get any worse between now and saturday.
    Lee Schierer
    USNA '71
    Go Navy!

    My advice, comments and suggestions are free, but it costs money to run the site. If you found something of value here please give a little something back by becoming a contributor! Please Contribute

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2006
    Location
    Greenville, South Carolina
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    I am not a licensed plumber

    Having said that, I have had experience of leaking water heaters in several different houses. If the leak is slow and small, you will probably be all right until Saturday. It may already have been leaking for a while.

    How did your wife discover the leak? Did she go in the attic or did something leak onto your ceiling? There should be more than just a pan if the WH is in the attic. It should have a drain to the outside of the house to prevent the catastrophe.

    Whatever you do, don't shake or push on the WH unless you're ready to get it out of there right then. These slow leaks are often "slow" because a lot of gunk is sort of sealing the bad place and moving the WH might unstick the gunk (how's that for a technical explanation?).

    If it were me, I'd wait until Saturday. (Insert disclaimer at this point.)
    Cheers,
    Bob

    I measure three times and still mess it up.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
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    Mountain Home, Arkansas
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    As said, they don't fix themselves. Best to shut off and replace ASAP. We replaced our with a Marathon from the local electric company. Most energy efficient heater around, according to them. We pay $11.00 a month on a lease basis and they fix/replace forever if anything goes wrong. Can also be purchased. Our previous 'new' one went south after only two years. It was a GE, and rots of ruck getting warranty service from them, dealer wouldn't honor if GE wouldn't honor.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Mar 2005
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    Houston, TX
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    According to LOML she thinks that it is a rust spot that is leaking near the bottom. I know that there is a pan under the heater with a pvc pipe that leads down the outer wall and empties onto our driveway. LOML noticed the leak because she saw the water on the driveway. The pan and drain will keep up with a small leak but would never keep up with a large hole -- i.e. you could not drain the entire heater using the pan to handle all the water.

    The biggest problem with replacing the water heater is due to the schedule, I assume that I will have a hard time carrying a 40 gal. gas heater up the stairs then up the attic stairs all by myself?

  8. #8
    I've replaced two water heaters in the two houses I've owned (first home and current home). It's certainly not a technically difficult job, just a bit of muscle and soddering. The first one was gas and just stopped working. The second was electric and we noticed magic blue smoke smell in the laundry room one day. The power went off immediately and we were on the way to the Borg.

    That being said, I wish the last time I had taken it as an opportunity to upgrade to an instant hot water heater. They cost more, but you don't have to pay to heat the tank 24 hours a day and it won't run out of hot if you shower and wash dishes and wash clothes at the same time.

    I would probably give in 24 hours to see if the leak gets worse. If not, then wait until Sat, but still monitor the leak daily. If it is getting worse then it's time for a faster replacement. (just my opinion, I'm not a pro)
    Jeremy Gibson

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Mar 2005
    Location
    Houston, TX
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    Tankless?

    Tankless would only cost me $999 or $700 after rebate, traditional heater will cost $400. The advert. for the tankless says I'll save 30% in fuel costs. Best of all, they advertise that it will work for 20 years or more which means I'll probably never have to change it again. But I have no idea how far the marketing claims are stretching the truth.

    Mostly I'm worried about maintenance. Searches on this forum leave that as my only real concern. The tankless should far exceed my capacity needs. The borg has a tankless that has 10 Year limited warranty on heat exchanger, 3 Year limited warranty on parts. The company is Paloma.

    http://www.homedepot.com/prel80/HDUS...4+4370&pos=n08

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Jun 2004
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    Water Park Capital of the World
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    2,219
    Check out this web site for Rinnai tankless water heaters. http://www.foreverhotwater.com/

    This is the brand I had installed in our new house. I think a 25% savings would be more in line than the 30% shown by HD. I don't know anything about the HD unit, but I know I'm happy with my Rinnai. I don't recall what the unit and installation cost, but I'm pretty sure it was more than HD is listing theirs at.

    I'm not sure about the installation of the HD unit, but the Rinnai should be installed by a plumber licensed by Rinnai. They are more complicated to install than a regular tank type water heater.

    IMHO if you can swing the extra money up front, I think one of these units will more than pay for itself in the long haul.

    Karl
    Creeker Visits. They're the best.

  11. #11
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    If you can do without hot water for a few days I'd get it shut down and get a hose hooked up to it to drain the tank. You can always fill it back up to test the source of the leak Saturday, but if it turns into a full blown leak, having that thing empty on you while you're not home isn't something you want to risk.
    Use the fence Luke

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Location
    Starkville, MS
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    172
    I can't tell you WHEN you need to replace it, but I can offer one very small piece of advice for what not to do while your are putting it in. DON'T assume that the idiots that built or inspected the new water heater actually tightened up the inlet and outlet pipes correctly. I put in a new GE water heater (I know, first mistake was buying anything made by GE. I should have known better by past experience). After soldering the pipes, I started filling it with water and heard a hissing sound. To make sure it wasn't just the relieve valve or the sound of air leaving through the rest of the house piping, I closed the hot water valve and the pressure relief valve. Sure enough, I had air escaping from both the inlet and outlet pipes. It had left the factory without the pipe nipples being sealed and tightened.

    One hour of pipe cutting, sealing, and re-soldering later I was back to filling again.
    Doyle

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Dec 2005
    Location
    Central Ohio
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    Tom,

    Any chance it's the pressure relief valve? If it's just a small drip, there might be scale/debris preventing the valve from closing. Open it using the test lever briefly to see if that stops the leak. Or, if there's a bunch of water coming out of the valve, shut off the gas or breaker right away.

    If it's not the pressure relief valve, I wouldn't risk flooding the entire house or scalding someone. I'd shut it down and drain it right away.

    I'd say getting a 40 gal tank into the attic is a 2-4 person job.

    Andy
    who replaced his gas water heater in an unfinished basement last year because it transformed itself into a carbon monoxide generator
    Last edited by Andy Fox; 07-12-2006 at 2:30 PM.

  14. #14
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    Feb 2004
    Location
    Odessa, Texas
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    Tom, by living in several houses and apartments over the years, I have had the unpleasant experience of "Several" water heater failures. Some leaked slowly for a day or two, then broke loose, (probably due to using hot water and it stirring the sediment/caking, and opening a path for the water to increase it's flow. One leaked slightly just enough to make the carpet in the hall seem slightly damp but the kids had beeh shooting water pistols and I thought it was that, but 2 hours later it Squished when I walked back through there, and a small Stream had developed.

    One thing I can tell you for certain, is that if it breaks loose and floods, especially in the location your's is in, the $300 you had quoted to have it installed, will seem like chicken feed. If it were "ME" with the experience I've had with those, and we've had one flood three times, (two while we were not at home), I would either; 1. Shut off the water supply to it until Saturday, when you have time to install it yourself, or 2. Get some help to haul it up there and at 9:00 PM install a new one tonight, or 3. Make a call to the Plumber within the next 30 minutes so he can install a new one this afternoon.

    Besides the added expense of drying, repairing and replacing stuff from a flooded water heater, is the time involved and inconvenience of having to do all that while everything is drying out.

    JMHO.............Norm
    "Some Mistakes provide Too many Learning Opportunities to Make only Once".

  15. #15
    I had a water heater fail in the middle of the night. The first clue was when I got up to get a cup of coffee when I walked into the kitchen I ended up sloshing through water. The heater was in the laundry adjacent to the Kitchen. No warning at all the thing just burst in the middle of the night. That was 30 years ago.

    a two years ago I replaced my 17 year old heater before I had a repete. The next day I heard water running and discovered the pressure relief was open. I cycled it and it reseated. a few minutes later it went off again. I figured I had a defective one. Before calling to get a replacement one I figured I'd check the water pressure on my house. I put a pressure gage on a hose bib and discovered that my house water pressure was at 150 lbs. So I ended up replacing my incoming pressure regulator. Now it's at 80 lbs. where it belongs.

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