I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire". Although she said she did not actually see any fire, just
smoke.

I should mention that I worked as a plumber for 8 years before I
retired, not including the many years I was a handyman doing plumbing,
electrical and other repair work before that. Yet I never ran across
this type of problem. However, I worked in a city where almost
everyone had natural gas heaters. While I have worked on several
electric heaters, they were few compared to the gas ones.

Yet, I am in a fog on this matter. This woman said that she had
noticed for a few weeks that there was not enough hot water. On
Friday she went into the basement to do laundry, and noticed the
smoke, and got her husband.

Neither of them are handy, so I question this whole matter. However,
I know they are not going to lie about it. I should mention that that
water heater was just installed about 3 years ago. I know this for
fact because she had called me to find out the name of the person that
took over for me, and I know he replaced it. In fact I told her it
might still be under warranty.

Anyhow, knowing that there are only 4 electrical parts, (2 elements
and 2 thermostat controls) plus some wire, what the heck could really
burn? The element is in the water, and while I know they are the most
likely part to burn out, they can not smoke under water. This seems
to only leave the thermostat controls.......
Has anyone ever seen one of them go up in smoke?
Once I ran into a defective one, but I have never heard of them
burning....

Anyone have any opinion, or ever expreience this?
Somehow this just dont seem to make much sense to me....
Most people replace gas heaters with electric ones because of the
lesser fire hazzard, and now I hear this......

Mark

wrote:
I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire". Although she said she did not actually see any fire, just
smoke.

I should mention that I worked as a plumber for 8 years before I
retired, not including the many years I was a handyman doing plumbing,
electrical and other repair work before that. Yet I never ran across
this type of problem. However, I worked in a city where almost
everyone had natural gas heaters. While I have worked on several
electric heaters, they were few compared to the gas ones.

Yet, I am in a fog on this matter. This woman said that she had
noticed for a few weeks that there was not enough hot water. On
Friday she went into the basement to do laundry, and noticed the
smoke, and got her husband.

Neither of them are handy, so I question this whole matter. However,
I know they are not going to lie about it. I should mention that that
water heater was just installed about 3 years ago. I know this for
fact because she had called me to find out the name of the person that
took over for me, and I know he replaced it. In fact I told her it
might still be under warranty.

Anyhow, knowing that there are only 4 electrical parts, (2 elements
and 2 thermostat controls) plus some wire, what the heck could really
burn? The element is in the water, and while I know they are the most
likely part to burn out, they can not smoke under water. This seems
to only leave the thermostat controls.......
Has anyone ever seen one of them go up in smoke?
Once I ran into a defective one, but I have never heard of them
burning....

Anyone have any opinion, or ever expreience this?
Somehow this just dont seem to make much sense to me....
Most people replace gas heaters with electric ones because of the
lesser fire hazzard, and now I hear this......

Mark

Might is simply be a connection which loosened over the years and
eventually got hot enough to start smoking? I have seen loose electrical
connections get to the glowing and molten metal stage which took out
insulation in the process. That could explain the lack of sufficient hot
water too. Just a WAG of course...

--
John McGaw
[Knoxville, TN, USA]
http://johnmcgaw.com

wrote:

wrote:
I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire".

He CUT the cable?

Jeeze, I know you said later that he wasn't handy, but it's a good thing
he didn't electrocute himself in the process.

I started to think, "Hasn't he ever heard of a circuit breaker box".

But then I stopped myself when I realized that if I asked SWMBO to go to
our breaker box and flip off the breaker for our electric water heater
I'd undoubtedly receive a blank stare from her. She has myriad other
positive abilities, it's just not something she's had a "need to know".

*********

Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?

*********

Jeff


--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
"Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength."

High resistance connection where the house wiring connects to the water
heater makes a lot of heat and burns the insulation.


Anyone have any opinion, or ever expreience this?
Somehow this just dont seem to make much sense to me....
Most people replace gas heaters with electric ones because of the
lesser fire hazzard, and now I hear this......

Mark

I said "HE TURNED OFF THE BREAKER FIRST". But when it kept smoking,
he cut the cable. This alone proves the guy is not handy, because
that obviously did nothing and when the breaker was shut off,
obviously the power is off and there is no need to cut the cable, but
rather he should have first called the fire department after shutting
the breaker off, then opened the heater access panel and find the
cause of the fire and douse it with an extinguisher. I too was rather
puzzled about the reason to cut the cable, but some people just do not
have a clue about things like this..... I even told the woman that
once the breaker was shut off, there was no reason to cut the cable,
and asked why they did not call the Fire Dept.? She just said she
dont understand things like this, and could not answer my question.

Mark

--------------------------------


On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 12:31:04 -0400, Jeff Wisnia
wrote:

wrote:
I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire".

He CUT the cable?

Jeeze, I know you said later that he wasn't handy, but it's a good thing
he didn't electrocute himself in the process.

I started to think, "Hasn't he ever heard of a circuit breaker box".

But then I stopped myself when I realized that if I asked SWMBO to go to
our breaker box and flip off the breaker for our electric water heater
I'd undoubtedly receive a blank stare from her. She has myriad other
positive abilities, it's just not something she's had a "need to know".

*********

Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?

*********

Jeff

wrote:
I said "HE TURNED OFF THE BREAKER FIRST". But when it kept smoking,
he cut the cable. This alone proves the guy is not handy, because
that obviously did nothing and when the breaker was shut off,
obviously the power is off and there is no need to cut the cable, but
rather he should have first called the fire department after shutting
the breaker off, then opened the heater access panel and find the
cause of the fire and douse it with an extinguisher. I too was rather
puzzled about the reason to cut the cable, but some people just do not
have a clue about things like this..... I even told the woman that
once the breaker was shut off, there was no reason to cut the cable,
and asked why they did not call the Fire Dept.? She just said she
dont understand things like this, and could not answer my question.

Mark

--------------------------------

Well, y'know I plumb blanked out on the part about him turning the
breaker off, maybe because I kept trying to figure out what you meant by
his cutting the cable "to finally make out the fire." I've know what
"make out" means for over 55 years, but a fire is hotter than
anything/anybody I'd care to make out with.

In defense of my comment about his electrocution, maybe he didn't know
which was the correct breaker to throw and switched off the power to the
clothes dryer by mistake? G

Jeff




On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 12:31:04 -0400, Jeff Wisnia
wrote:


wrote:

I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire".

He CUT the cable?

Jeeze, I know you said later that he wasn't handy, but it's a good thing
he didn't electrocute himself in the process.

I started to think, "Hasn't he ever heard of a circuit breaker box".

But then I stopped myself when I realized that if I asked SWMBO to go to
our breaker box and flip off the breaker for our electric water heater
I'd undoubtedly receive a blank stare from her. She has myriad other
positive abilities, it's just not something she's had a "need to know".

*********

Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?

*********

Jeff

On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 18:49:59 -0400, Jeff Wisnia
wrote:

wrote:
I said "HE TURNED OFF THE BREAKER FIRST". But when it kept smoking,
he cut the cable. This alone proves the guy is not handy, because
that obviously did nothing and when the breaker was shut off,
obviously the power is off and there is no need to cut the cable, but
rather he should have first called the fire department after shutting
the breaker off, then opened the heater access panel and find the
cause of the fire and douse it with an extinguisher. I too was rather
puzzled about the reason to cut the cable, but some people just do not
have a clue about things like this..... I even told the woman that
once the breaker was shut off, there was no reason to cut the cable,
and asked why they did not call the Fire Dept.? She just said she
dont understand things like this, and could not answer my question.

Mark

--------------------------------

Well, y'know I plumb blanked out on the part about him turning the
breaker off, maybe because I kept trying to figure out what you meant by
his cutting the cable "to finally make out the fire." I've know what
"make out" means for over 55 years, but a fire is hotter than
anything/anybody I'd care to make out with.


LOL


In defense of my comment about his electrocution, maybe he didn't know
which was the correct breaker to throw and switched off the power to the
clothes dryer by mistake? G

This I dont doubt, but I think the cutting of the cable would have
been pretty exciting, but not the kind of excitement I tend to enjoy!

It's things like this that make me glad I am retired. I used to put
up with some pretty crazy people when I was in business.

For example, there was a woman that disconnected or disassembled every
electrical device in the house. This is not a joke. She believed
there was a "bug" in the house. No, not a cockroach or spider, but a
camera type of bug watching her. This woman was completely nuts and
how she managed to remove ALL of the guts of the breaker box without
getting electricuted amazes me. The mains were just hanging there,
and still live. Every outlet, switch, light fixture was removed,
appliances torn apart, etc. She carefully watched everything I did
and had me check for bugs in every box, and then I had to double
check, and triple check. But I was being paid by the hour, so I just
did what she said, tried not to laugh, and made a lot of money
answering really stupid questions. Plus, I got a free tv when I
finished because she insisted there was a bug inside and showed it to
me. That yellow CRT booster was added by a tv repairman, and it was
squishy and it contained some sort of poisonous material, and was
going to explode.... Yep, that's exactly what she told me, as she
squeezed it in her hands and told me to do the same. The tv could not
just be tossed in her garbage, it had to be removed from her property
immediately, and she was willing to pay me $100 to take it away. I
just said "no problem" tossed it in my truck and took it home for a
spare tv along with the $100. I just had to put the back on the set
again.
Not all my jobs were this crazy, or profitable, but this one is the
one I will never forget. That woman really needed to be hospitalized,
but I did my job as both electrician and therapist, took my paycheck,
and got the hell out of there.... Of course before I left, I had to
use her binoculars to look for bugs on the power pole behind her
house. When she told me she wanted the insulators replaced on the HV
lines, I told her she would have to call the electric company. I wish
I could have been there when they came..... I even considered calling
them to warn them....

It takes all types to make this world spin, but there are a few that
spin backwards..... She was one of them.....

Mark

Jeff




On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 12:31:04 -0400, Jeff Wisnia
wrote:


wrote:

I'm just posting this out of curiousity. A woman I used to do work
for, for many years just called me to ask me for advice about her
water heater. She lives out of state now, so I can not actually see
the problem. She claims the electric water heater was smoking, and
said that after her husband turned off the breaker it continued to
"burn". Then her husband cut the electric cable to finally make out
the "fire".

He CUT the cable?

Jeeze, I know you said later that he wasn't handy, but it's a good thing
he didn't electrocute himself in the process.

I started to think, "Hasn't he ever heard of a circuit breaker box".

But then I stopped myself when I realized that if I asked SWMBO to go to
our breaker box and flip off the breaker for our electric water heater
I'd undoubtedly receive a blank stare from her. She has myriad other
positive abilities, it's just not something she's had a "need to know".

*********

Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?

*********

Jeff

On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 16:26:31 -0500, wrote:

(...)

Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?

Friend, the world doesn't consist just of husbands and wives. Maybe
you should have asked "how many women", or even "how many people".

Clueless

wrote:
On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 16:26:31 -0500, wrote:

(...)


Poll: How many husband's here are certain their wives could accomplish
the task I just described without having to receive detailed instructions?


Friend, the world doesn't consist just of husbands and wives. Maybe
you should have asked "how many women", or even "how many people".

Clueless



As polemeister I can damn well ask the question any way I want fella.

I was attempting to see how many handy DIY husbands weren't bothered by
the fact that their wives didn't take an interest in home tech stuff,
while at the same time being great at all kinds of other things.

But since I'm currently residing in the only one of the 50 states which
has legalized gay marriage, I suppose I should have thought about that
aspect too.

You don't like it, feel free to start your own poll.



Sincerely,

Jeff (Who now knows how Larry Summers may have felt.)

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
"Fathers carry photographs where they used to carry money."