"James" wrote in message
.. .
Changing a couple of faucet washers yesterday. Cut the water off and removed
the washers to take to Lowe$ for comparision. Planning on being gone for a
couple hours so I filpped the water heater breaker off just in case sine the
water was off. Got back, fixed the faucet, water and breaker back on. Got up
this am and no hot water! Flipped the breaker a couple of times and was
preparing to remove the elements and noticed that the thing was working again.

Question is: Do these things have some sort of a protection circuit or do I
have a flaky breaker?

This is turtle.

Flakey Breaker or Flakey Tank Thermostat [S], but 99% thinking Breaker.

I have seen breakers not want to reset on the first try and will take 3 or 4
flips to get it to take.

Now here is what I've seen to try to test your breaker for this. Turn the
breaker off for about 30 minutes and then come back and push the breaker to on
real slow and don't flip it on. They will usely will do it again if you don't
flip the break fast back on. Just push it verey slowly to back on possion.

TURTLE