A broken water heater means an unpleasant day. People often discover they have a failed water heater in the morning after they get up, go to the shower, turn on the tap … and the water never heats up.
You don’t want to start your morning this way: not only will getting clean be difficult, but you’ll need to have the water heater repaired so you can take care of many other tasks that require hot water through the rest of the day.
The best way to fend off water heater failure is to know ahead of time your water heater is coming to the end of its life. We offer excellent water heater repair in Fresno, CA that can get water heaters over the bumps in the road. But when signs point toward a water heating system that’s almost finished, we recommend consulting with us about a water heater replacement.
Indications of a Water Heater That’s Ready to Retire
Like any complex piece of equipment, a water heater will start to show signs it’s beginning to fail before the final breakdown occurs. Here are the major ones to watch for:
- Discoloration in the hot water: You’re probably familiar with the rusty-red discoloration from taps that haven’t been used for weeks. This is what you see when you turn on the water after coming back from vacation. If you start seeing this discoloration from hot water taps—and only the hot water taps—it often means the tank of the water heater has fully rusted.
- Corrosion: Corrosion of any type on the water heater is a serious problem. Corrosion on replaceable parts, such as the heat exchanger, can sometimes be fixed. But usually when corrosion sets in on the tank, the water heater needs to be scrapped and replaced.
- Continual leaking: A few leaks from a water heater may occur during its service life. These are standard repairs. But when the water heater is more than 15 years old and you see water pooling around the base, it’s time for a new water heater. There are likely many more leaks occurring in places you can’t see.
- Drop in hot water volume: The best measure of hot water volume for a water heater is the morning shower routine. If the hot water runs out before everyone in the household has their showers, and this was not an issue before, the water heater is losing its ability to heat up a sufficient supply of water. Although a repair may fix this, for an older system it usually means the water heater is in its final stages.
- High heating bills: A water heater can account for 40% of heating costs in a house. When an old water heater begins to fail, it will start to raise heating costs by amounts that are hard to miss. So when you notice gas bills or electrical bills rising during times when you aren’t using another heating system, then it’s time to have professionals look at the water heater to see if it’s past its useful days.
Work with Purl’s Sheet Metal & Air Conditioning for your water heater replacement and repair needs: “Quality Is the Cornerstone of Our Success” since 1952.