Water Heater Issue
Hi - I'm having an issue with my Atwood propane on-demand water heater. When we turn on the faucet, the water cycles between very hot and cool. It's like the hot water heater works for a few seconds...
Forum Discussion
Might have figured it out...I'm away from the RV at the moment but had my son test out a few things.
- When the kitchen faucet is on full hot, it doesn't cycle.
- When the bathroom faucet is on full hot, it doesn't cycle.
- When the shower head is on full hot, it cycles.
That leads me to believe that it's a flow problem...the water needs to flow at 1.5gpm (I've read...assume it's the same on mine) to keep the hot water heater turned on.
But here's the weird part.
- When the bathroom sink AND the shower head are on full hot, it still cycles...even though the sink apparently had enough flow by itself to prevent cycling. I'm going to test this again when I get back just to confirm that my son understood correctly what I was asking.
- When all three faucets are on, it doesn't cycle.
I thought one possible fix to this would be to reduce the temp coming out of the heater, so that a comfortable water temp would require more input from the heater...but that didn't work. My son said he couldn't feel any difference in hot water temp when the thermostat was turned all the way up and all the way down. That may just be b/c it was too hot in both positions, so I'll confirm with a thermometer. That could be an indicator that the thermostat isn't working correctly.
Still welcome any input or suggestions!
- When the kitchen faucet is on full hot, it doesn't cycle.
- When the bathroom faucet is on full hot, it doesn't cycle.
- When the shower head is on full hot, it cycles.
That leads me to believe that it's a flow problem...the water needs to flow at 1.5gpm (I've read...assume it's the same on mine) to keep the hot water heater turned on.
But here's the weird part.
- When the bathroom sink AND the shower head are on full hot, it still cycles...even though the sink apparently had enough flow by itself to prevent cycling. I'm going to test this again when I get back just to confirm that my son understood correctly what I was asking.
- When all three faucets are on, it doesn't cycle.
I thought one possible fix to this would be to reduce the temp coming out of the heater, so that a comfortable water temp would require more input from the heater...but that didn't work. My son said he couldn't feel any difference in hot water temp when the thermostat was turned all the way up and all the way down. That may just be b/c it was too hot in both positions, so I'll confirm with a thermometer. That could be an indicator that the thermostat isn't working correctly.
Still welcome any input or suggestions!
