A "heated" discussion.

Todays chat is about RV Hot Water Heaters.  More specifically RV hot water heater maintenance. 

Most RV’s have one of two types of water heaters that both operate the same. The difference being one has an aluminum tank while the other has a steel tank. They also come in standard size of 6 gal. or and upgraded 10 gal. tank. The fuel source which they run on is electric and or propane. Now not to be confusing but there are some other options out there as well but for this decision we are going to limit the scope of our coverage to the two most common units.

First you might say, what maintenance, I have a water heater in the house and never have even looked at it? Good question but that unit has been setting in the same place since it has been installed and usually has between a 40 and 69 gallon tank. Where an rv water heater again has a much smaller tank and the thing has been bumping down the road it’s whole life. 

The aluminum water heater tank, which is more expensive to purchase and is considered  an upgrade, is lighter and needs little more than a rinsing out to clean. More and more of these aluminum tank water heaters are being used today but the steel tank water heater is still the more common one you will find in an rv.

As our 5er has a 10 gal. steel tanked water heater this will be the one I am describing the on maintenance today. 

Ok so we have been getting some odd smells in the sink when running the hot water. After talking to an RV repairman here in Yuma, he suggested that by servicing the Hot Water Heater (under full time use should be done several times a year) it would more than likely resolve the issue. After reviewing on line how to rinse and inspect the tank, as well as the replacement of the Anode Rod (a magnesium sacrificial rod that erodes rather than the steel tank), I ran across the site that went into more detail about the oder issue. After reading about and watching the video this process made the most sense to me.

As some of you may have gathered I not only like doing my own service work on our RV but I also would rather do all of it at once rather than short sheet the job over a few extra bucks.

Our RV is in very nice shape but it is not new nore had I ever done this before so it did take a 1 1/16 6 point socket purchase to remove the anode rod. The tank had not been thoroughly cleaned out for many years and even though the anode rod had been replaced it was already down to 1/2 life because of the hardness of the water in the parks we have been staying at. 

First task to do was turn off the fuel supply to the hot water heater, in our case that meant shutting down both the propane and electrical supply specifically directed to the heater. Then run the hot water faucet until the water cools down, shut down the water supply while leaving the hot water faucet open to bleed down the pressure from the tank into the sink.

Next was to pull the pressure relief valve’s handle to drain off any residual pressure that may still have built up. After these steps have been taken you can now remove the anode rod to drain the tank. In our case, as we were going to cook out the tank with distilled vinegar, we also need to remove the pressure relief valve mounted at the top of the tank to give access to fill the tank. This valve had never been removed and to say it took a little persuasion might seem be an understatement but it did finally come loose. 

After thoroughly rinsing out the loose deposits in the tank, with a RV hot water heater rinse wand using fresh water, the old anode rode was replaced and 5 gallons of distilled vinegar was added and to make a 50/50 mixture in the tank. Then turning back on the water and propane we let the tank reheat and set over night making sure as to not use any hot water to keep from contaminating the lines. The following morning the cleaning process was repeated yielding the anticipated result. A nice clean tank with almost all the calcium deposits removed was the end result.

Both a new anode rod and pressure relief valve were installed and the tank refilled with fresh water. The propane was then turned back on and the heater restarted using propane to speed the process.  With the water heated back up, in about a 15 minutes, we turned on the hot water faucets and our odd smell was gone.

As a side note, the water now heats faster both on propane and or electricity as well.