Water Heaters - Quantity of hot water is poor.

Hi, I was visiting my Mom at Thanksgiving time and was helping with minor chores. One of the things she mentioned was poor water flow on all the house hot taps and tubs. I would say that less than 1/3rd was available on the hot side compared to the cold. Unfortunately, all of my tools were home and I did try to prove my theory that somehow the dip tube wasn't an issue. I found that you can do this by valving off the inlet cold water and refeed it from a garden hose at the cheasy plastic drain connection. I bought a male to male adapter to hook the garden hose up to the tank. This test improved nothing but eliminated the dip tube as a problem, same low flow. I bought 3/4 inch compression couplings and cut into the hot side of the tank piping. The male to pipe adapter sweat into the tank tubing had no intention of coming loose and I had few tools. To make a long story short, I found so much rust accumulating at the discharge hot port that a piece of #12 wire with insulation would not fit through! I found that by graduating drill bits I could cut through the rust and free the port of it's obstruction. This house has plenty of pressure now and I needed only a tubing cutter and a few minor tools to fix it. The Rheem tank is about 12 years old so this is at least okay for the time being, hope it helps you out . p.s. I flushed the tank well and read the thread on anodes and flush kits.

Good info right there. I see this happen quite often where the ports become clogged, thus restricting flow.

Thanks for the knowledge! :thumbup: :coffee: