On Sunday, October 28, 2012 9:56:53 AM UTC-7, Bob F wrote:
The thermocouple on my 7yo Whirlpool water heater went out Sat. The stores open

on the weekend had only right hand thread thermocouples, and as far as I could

find out, the manufacturer would sell me a conversion kit for $31 which would

take 10 days to receive. (out of warrantee)



My solution: I carefully clamped the threaded fitting on my old thermocouple

end-to-end in my vice so one face was up, then used a 1" cutting disc in my

dremel tool to cut a slot into the fitting so I could slide it off of the tube.

I slid the threaded fitting on my new thermocouple down out of the way, then

slipped the slotted one over the tube and carefully screwed it into the valve

fitting. It works perfectly.



If you have a several years old Whirlpool or American Products water heater, you

might want to check to see if it has the left hand thread on the thermocouple.

If it does, and it is still in warrantee, contact the manufacturer now so you

can get the conversion kit for free ahead of the time you really need it.
The Lowe's Hot Water Heater enhancement kit works fine for replacing the infernal LH threaded thermocouple. The only work of caution is to clear the mounting screw holes in the cover gasket before attempting installation. Then mount the door FIRST while everything is loose. Then warp the other stuff into place. Perfect job solves the problem with the pilot light not being lit after main burner goes out. BTW, my thermocouple measured 19 Millivolts (0.019 on the multimeter).


The early symptom of failure on my thermocouple is that it took 1 1/2-2 minutes

of holding down the pilot light to get it to re-light and stay lit. The new one

took about 20 seconds.