Shots Across The Bow

Rubber Hoses and Shop Vacs...It must be Friday Night at the Hailey House!

Yep, things can get pretty freaky here on the weekends. It's Friday night and daddy is ready to play!

Yeah, right.

I got into the shower this morning and turned on the water, bleary-eyed after staying up until 3 again, watching the war. I started washing, and after a couple of minutes realized the soap just wasn't lathering up like I expected it to. I rubbd a little harder, tried this and that, switched hands, but to no avail; it just wouldn't lather. Then I noticed that neither the soap nor I were getting wet.

Like I said, I was tired.

I looked at the shower head, and this pathetic little drizzle of water was trickling out of the showerhead. Yippee. It wasn't a complete surprise; I had noticed that the hot water was really no more than luke warm over the last few days, so I knew the water heater was feeling lonely, and wanted a little personal attention, but something must have gone seriously wrong to kill my water pressure.

So being the resourceful (broke) guy I am, I decided instead of calling a plumber, I'd fix the problem myself. I hooked up a hose to the heater drain, and opened the valve. Then I closed the valve and got out the electrical tape and fixed all the holes in the hose put there by my cat (may she rest in peace). I opened the drain valve again, made sure I had good flow, then left for the nearby home improvement warehouse, where I picked up 2 heating elements ($20.00), some teflon tape ($1.95), and headed back to do battle with the water heater.

I got back and checked the hose, and saw that the water heater was drained, so I got to work. When I got into the laundry room, I noticed an unusual smell. This is a normal occurance in my laundry room, so I didn't think too much of it, except that it got stronger as I got closer to the water heater. It was a hot smell, sort of like an old electric train transformer when you've run it too long. It just didn't seem right, so fearing a fire, I searched for the cause.

For future reference, there's a great big sign on the side of the water heater, telling you to disconnect the power before draining, or the elements will overheat.

You might want to pay atention to that sign.

After the heater cooled down a bit, I went to pull the element from the heater. They make a special wrench to pull the elements from the heater, but being the resourceful (broke) kind of guy I am, I figured I could do it with channel lock pliers. 45 minutes and 2 band-aids ($0.15) later, I headed out to my local home improvement warehouse for an element wrench.

I returned home, and once again set out to remove the upper element. I attached the hex shaped metal cylinder ($8.95 plus tax) and tried to loosen the element. It had been in place for 10 years, and was very comfortable there, and really wasn't interested in relocating. I tried to convince the element that it would be much happier in the land fill, where it could see all kinds of new and interesting things instead of staying locked in welded bliss to the water heater. It turned a deaf ear to my attempt, so I turned to gentle persuasion in the form of a three pound sledge hammer. One gentle tap sent the wrench rocketing to the floor, where it ricocheted up into my shin, causing considerable consternation on my part, and expanded my young son's vocabulary a bit more than I intended so early in his life.

I realized that the problem was one of leverage, not force, so I discarded the useless 5 inch handle for the element wrnech and substituted my biggest phillips screwdriver. Bracing my self, I gave a large tug, and the element began to pull free. With each turn, it got easier, until the it shot out, followed by a column of luke warm water.

I get my water from a well, and it's not really hard, but I can't call it soft, either. Minerals in water do a neat thing in a water heater. As the water heats, then cools, the minerals aggregate, then precipitate, which means that calcium chips form in the bottom. In my case, those chips were about 18 inches deep and had sealed off the drain, so the heater was still about half full of water.

I changed clothes, mopped up the mess, and started draining the heater again. I straigtened out a coat hanger ($0.15) and used it to stir up the chips any time flow slowed down. Eventually, the heater was emptied, for sure this time, and I got back to work. The old element was encrusted with calciun, so I threw it away, and went to remove the bottom element. This went much smoother, and the easy part of the job was done.

I checked the bottom of the heater, and it was filled with calcium chips and rocks, so I started scooping them out. This is a really fun job, because you have to work through an inch and a half hole. I used one of the old elements as a scoop, and pulled about a pound of calcium chips out through that hole a teaspoon at a time, when I was struck with an inspiration. I went and got my shop vac to suck out the chips. Unfortunately, the hose was too big to fit through the hole, so I could only get what was right at the hole. I could have run to my local home improvement warehouse again, but being the resourceful (cheap) kind of guy I am, I went and cut a short length of garden hose (which was ok because I don't have a garden) and duct taped it to the vacuum hose.

For once, something worked, and it only took an hour or so to remove 10 pounds of calcium, an old element somebody had left in because it was too crusted with scale to fit through the hole, one sock (don't ask, I have no idea) and two trilobyte fossils through the element hole.

It wasn't pleasant.

Eventually, that was done, and I was ready to install the new elements. I teflon taped the elements, snugged them down, and started refilling the tank. I had to open a couple of hot water valves to allow the tank to vent pressure while it was filling. I knew I had to do this from my Navy Nuclear Power training, which comes in handy every 2 or 3 decades. I plugged in the heater, and went to check my hot water.

Remeber when I said I had no flow in the shower? Well I didn't. Replacing elements does nothing for flow. Just in case you were wondering.

I unplugged the heater, drained it, which went much faster without all the calcium, and removed the elements to check the pipes. I looked through the bottom element hole and saw the cold water inlet pipe completely crusted over with more calcium.

Oh joy.

I disconnected the supply line from the wall, removed the pipe with a pipe wrench, and used my trusty clothes hanger to ream out the line. Unfortunately, the hanger wasn't long enough, so I headed out to my local home improvement warehouse for a plumber's snake ($25.47). I was too tired to be resourceful anymore. I cleaned out about 18 inches of calcium chips from insode the pipe, and closed everything up. Again.

I checked both elements for leaks, then checked voltage. The upper element was fine, but the lower element had no juice. So I went back to my local home improvement warehouse for a lower element thermostat ($8.95) caame home and replaced the unit. Then I read the label on the installation instructions, which said, "Non simultaneous operation." This is a fancy way of saying I just wasted time and money because both elements are not energized at the same time on this water heater.

But, I closed everything up, and checked the water. It flowed freely, and started to get hot. I had visions of my first really hot shower in three days. I knew it would take about an hour for the heater to finish heating the water, so I cleaned up the mess I made, and did a couple more chores.

About 2 hours later, knowing that the water would be hot, I went to take my shower. The hot water lasted about 3 minutes, then turned cold.

My three daughters were going out to a party and a school function, and each had taken a shower, plus done two loads of laundry. They did thank me for fixing the hot water heater, though.

Posted by Rich at March 22, 2003 3:34 AM | TrackBack