Water Heater on Electric Problem
My 17 year old Suburban water heater quit heating on electric. No voltage at the element or either thermostat/hi limit terminal (and yes it was the AC not 12vdc thermostat). The tank switch has been f...
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Sounds like your WH might be same as ours, Suburban SW6DE. Amazon has the "Suburban 232259 Electrical Element Switch - SW Series." Just looked at a heater yesterday where the switch no longer moves. Ours probably doesn't either, but we have an inside wall switch.
Ours wasn't heating on electric, and I was sure it was the Element. I'm usually a better troubleshooter than this, but I MISSED the open connection in the punch-down splice box in the cabinet, at the rear (inboard) end of the water heater. Suburban puts the heater's connection box where it falls right at the inside wall of the coach body. Jayco ran a short wire from there, to a punch box fastened to the kitchen floor. One of its connections had burnt out. In my case, it was the White/Neutral wire, so I was finding voltage all the way to, and across, the Element. ACROSS should have been my clue. Hot TO it, OK. Hot Across it, Bad. Circuit wasn't complete back to the Neutral side of the Breaker panel.
A new Box, punched down carefully, probably would have been an OK fix. Having Wire Nuts, I simply gutted the Box, cut out the plastic that supported the connections, and used it as a Splice Box for Wire Nut connections. I twisted the solid copper wires together with pliers before putting the wire nuts on, and also wrapped the nuts to the wiring with electrical tape.
Ours wasn't heating on electric, and I was sure it was the Element. I'm usually a better troubleshooter than this, but I MISSED the open connection in the punch-down splice box in the cabinet, at the rear (inboard) end of the water heater. Suburban puts the heater's connection box where it falls right at the inside wall of the coach body. Jayco ran a short wire from there, to a punch box fastened to the kitchen floor. One of its connections had burnt out. In my case, it was the White/Neutral wire, so I was finding voltage all the way to, and across, the Element. ACROSS should have been my clue. Hot TO it, OK. Hot Across it, Bad. Circuit wasn't complete back to the Neutral side of the Breaker panel.
A new Box, punched down carefully, probably would have been an OK fix. Having Wire Nuts, I simply gutted the Box, cut out the plastic that supported the connections, and used it as a Splice Box for Wire Nut connections. I twisted the solid copper wires together with pliers before putting the wire nuts on, and also wrapped the nuts to the wiring with electrical tape.
