Most people think if they are not getting hot water from their water heater they need to call a plumbing company so a plumber can install a water heater for them. But in fact if you don’t see water laying at the base of the water heater on the floor you do not need to have a water heater replacement. But there are some items to check or a faulty part that maybe needs to be replaced in order to produce hot water from the water heater.
If you have a conventional electric hot water heater if it does not have electric to the water heater it will not produce hot water for you. With that said normally electric water heaters have two elements in order to produce the demand of hot water one on the top and one on the bottom of the water heater. The first thing to check to see if the breakers has tripped these are either 20 or 30 double pole breakers located at the breaker box panel or a fuse at the fuse panel. If this seems to not to be the cause of the problem go to the water heater there will be normally two excess panels on the side of the water heater jacket these panels can be removed by unscrewing the two screws holding them in place. Once this is removed you will see a high limit safety switch and a red reset button that could be tripped if this is the case reset it by pushing it in.
This is tripped because the high limit safety switch is overloaded or the water is to hot inside the tank which trips the high limit safety switch as a safety precaution measure. In this procedure its a good idea to wait awhile and let the heater or switch cool down before resetting the high safety limit switch. If this procedure fails to work you have further problems going on and the replacement of the thermostat or heating element are in fault. See if the thermostat clicks when adjusting it raising or lowering the setting from the previous setting of 120, this could be in the stuck close position. Also the replacement of the heating element this could be shorted out causing it to run continuously causing the high safety limit switch to trip. Most of the time the replacement of the heating element located at the bottom of the water heater are the ones that need to be replaced due to sediment at the bottom of heater.
You can prolong the life of your water heater and heating elements by flushing your heater once a year make sure the electric or gas control is turned off for this procedure. On a gas water heater see if you see a lighted flame at the end of the pilot gas tube. If no flame at the pilot light that is a sign of a replacement thermo coupling. A bad thermo coupling causes the gas control to not let gas to the burner for igniting as a safety device. If you do end up seeing a pilot flame at the end of the pilot gas tube and the burner is not igniting a replacement of the thermostat could be at fault. If you should be unaware of any of these procedures call a well trained plumbing professional to further diagnosis the problem with the water heater.
