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How to Repair a Leaky Water Heater

A leaking water heater can be a major pain. Thankfully, if you are aware of what to do in such a situation, you can quite possibly fix the leak on your own for little to no cost. However, exercise caution while working on the leaking water heater, as they are extremely dangerous appliances. Leaking Water Heater

First, a quick overview of the parts of a water heater is necessary, so that you'll experience an easier task of troubleshooting your leaky water heater. The most obvious part of course, is the reservoir. The gigantic, metal tank holds the water. There are also hot and cool water supply lines, which feed hot and cool water to and from the reservoir and are located near the top of the water heater. Another main area of the water heater is the pressure relief valve, which is found near the water supply lines. The pressure relief valve releases water to ease the pressure inside of the reservoir if a lot of pressure builds up. Lastly, the drain valve, which is found by the bottom of the tank, releases water inside of the reservoir if you drain the tank.

The first step in troubleshooting for a leak would be to locate the region on your water heater that water is leaking from. If water is leaking from the relief valve, the hot and cool water supply lines or the drain valve, you may be in luck, as they are generally easy to fix and involve little to nothing. If the leak is found at the base of the bottom of the reservoir, however, you will probably need to buy a new water heater.

It best to test for a leak in the hot and cool water supply pipes. A leaking water heater might be a relatively simple, inexpensive fix if the water supply pipes at the top of the water heater are the source of the leak, so its worth the full time it takes to test. If you test the ball valves on each of the pipes and the nuts are loose, you may use a cotton swab to ascertain if water is leaking from them. If the hot and cold water supply pipes are leaking, this can frequently be resolved simply with a wrench to tighten the nuts. If they are already tight, or tightening the nuts appeared to have no impact on the leak, it is advisable to call a specialist for help. Since the cause of the leaking water heater could be excess pressure accumulated within the reservoir, a qualified expert should fix the problem. Too much excess pressure might cause the hot water heater to explode in the event that you don't understand what you're doing. Watch About Water Heaters Here

If the leaking water is dripping out of the relief valve, rather than from the hot and cold water supply lines, this might actually be the sign of a normally functioning water heater. However, this generally shows that the leaking water heater has accumulated pressure within the reservoir from the temperature settings being too high, or the water is simply being warmed to too high of a temperature. Therefore, be sure never to touch the water that drips out of the pressure relief valve, as it'll be scalding hot. If the source of your water heater leak is the pressure relief valve, you can call a water heater repair serviceman to find out the correct temperature settings.
A leak in the drain valve close to the bottom of the water heater reservoir is also a problem that may be an inexpensive fix. If water is leaking from the drain valve, it could be loose or broken. If the drain valve is loose, just tighten it using a wrench. If this doesn't fix the problem, or if the drain valve looks like it may need replacement, you'll need to contact a specialist to fix the drain valve.

Finally, if the water heater is leaking from the reservoir, this is sadly an indication that you'll need to buy a new water heater. When the source of the leaking water heater is the reservoir, this is normally permanent damage due to rust and deterioration. This may be avoided with your new water heater by draining the mineral deposits in the reservoir on an annual schedule.