Water Heaters - Electric heater not heating water well

I have a State Industries Electric Water heater. The other day it just stopped heating the water - well, not entirely. It gets "luke warm", not hot enough to steam the mirrors when showering...

I checked the thermostat and it was set to the lowest point (hot). The heater is in a closet in our condo and we do take things in and out but the dial for the thermostat is recessed into the tank and requires a screwdriver to turn it so I doubt it got turned down. I turned it up to the second hottest setting (has Hot, A, B, C, and Very hot) anyway and the water is hotter but not nearly as hot as it used to be.

Should I call in someone to repair it or just replace it - it's eight years old...

:wall:

Just wanted to get this to the top of the list - been 3 days with no response.

Water still getting warm, just not as worm as it used to. Any suggestions. Should I drain and refill? Replace the ellement? Replace it?

Sorry that you haven't gotten any responses. You can try blowing the water heater down to get rid of build up in the bottom of the tank and that may possibly help. Another common problem in water heaters is the dip tube, a lot of times they will deteriorate and even break off.

Can you tell how many heat elements it has?? You would have to shut off the electric to the water heater then open up the service area where the elements enter the heater.

Thanks for the response. I shut the power off and emptied a few gallons of water out of it - for the first few seconds the water was very dirty.

Then I took the access panels off and it has two elements.

Also hit the reset button

OK, so whether it was the reset switch or getting rid of the settlements at the bottom I don't know but it seemed to work last night. Got my first HOT (vs. luke warm) shower in days - was very happy.

Got in the shower this morning, not so happy - the water temp is back to luke warm.

I'm wondering how much the temp. of the air around the H2O heater would make an effect - we are in New England and in an effort to save some $$ are going as long as we can with out turning on the heat. Long story short, it was pretty cold in the house this morning...

The heater has two elements and as far as physical condition, look brand new - no rust or anything anywhere. And it isn't leaking anywhere. It is only 8 years old, should we be replacing it already?

See if the element is tripped again. If so i would just replace it. "The element that is"