"Bill" wrote in
:

If you don't know what you are doing, maybe best to call a pro...

There was a homeowner who had a low wattage water heater which worked
fine on a 240V 15 amp breaker. Then one day a heating element went
out...

The homeowner replaced the heating element, except purchased a higher
wattage heating element (wrong element). Then when the heating element
was installed the breaker kept tripping.

So the homeowner purchased a new water heater and this new water
heater was a higher wattage then the old water heater. The breaker
again kept tripping.

Then the homeowner replaced the circuit breaker with a new 15 amp
(double throw) breaker. Same problem. Homeowner kept turning on the
breaker to try to get the water heater to work...

Then with the wires to the water heater disconnected and the breaker
turned on, there was no voltage to the wires. Seems the wiring was
"fried"!

In the end the homeowner had to pay for an electrician to install new
higher amperage wiring and a higher amperage breaker, plus had the
cost of the new heating element, the new water heater, and the new 15
amp circuit breaker.

All of this could of been avoided if the homeowner had replaced the
heating element with the correct wattage element!



OK Bill. Where did this story come from? How about even a link to the
page.