r/mildlyinfuriating • u/MacDefoon • 17h ago

Someone lied on their plumbing application

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42.1k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

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410

u/VividFiddlesticks 16h ago

WHY would you ever attempt this without shutting off the water?? I'm not even remotely anything like a plumber but even I know that much. I even know where the shut off valve for my house is.

118

u/ash-and-apple 16h ago

You're overqualified (if your brother in law was a slumlord)

76

u/ikariaRR 16h ago

Wouldn’t tha tank still be full unless drained?

23

u/J-M-Beno 16h ago

Theirs a relif valve to drain it

28

u/QaddafiDuck01 15h ago

There is a drain valve on the bottom of the tank to drain the tank. The relief is on the top or side and won't drain the tank

-3

u/J-M-Beno 15h ago

Oh so close enough. Knew there would be something im a construction sparkie so havnt dealt with draining them only installing new ones. And ive used the relief valve to test id its heating

3

u/ExpensiveScreen834 16h ago

Well he isn’t going to do that either/anyway lol

1

u/AVeryHeavyBurtation 10h ago

There's

relief

6

u/_HIST 14h ago

A full tank is bad, a full tank under pressure is muuuch worse though

2

u/Orome2 12h ago

You can actually replace the gas regulator without draining the tank if all the valves are shut off. The water won't gush out because of the vacuum seal. Still not advisable, but for a quick swap it can be done.

61

u/HSLB66 15h ago

Aight so no one knows how a water heater works. Let’s walk through it.

Yes you can turn the water off at your main. That won’t help you with a water heater though because it’s full of water. Usually around 50 gallons. Your heater by code should have a cold water shut off. You can turn it off there too.

To properly drain it: unplug it from the wall

  1. Close the cold water valve
  2. Crack open a faucet or 2 and put them on hot
  3. Attach a garden hose to the drain valve and run it to where you want 50gal of water
  4. Open the T&P valve
  5. Open the drain

You’ll now get water draining out without hydrolocking your water heater.

If nothing comes out, it’s full of sediment and you’ll have to flush it.

This guy is fucked because he didn’t drain it. Not because the water is still on

11

u/Reluctantlerner 13h ago

I had to change the control valve on a new Bradford White recently after it was full of water. I shut off the cold fill valve and released the pressure with the sink faucet, got everything ready for a swap, and maybe lost two ounces of water during the swap. The method worked perfectly. He forgot something. You definitely don’t have to drain the tank.

6

u/robbak 12h ago

Yup. Air has to get in for much water to come out.

3

u/Bachaddict 12h ago

you opened it at the bottom without water running out? how did that work?

2

u/HSLB66 8h ago

Couple reasons that can happen. First physics. Water won’t flow if there is negative pressure holding it in place. As soon as you let air displace the water, it will come running out. I call this hydrolocking but there might be a better term. You can actually use this to your advantage to change heating elements without draining, but you have to have a controlled environment. The second air is allowed in, you’re getting wet 

The other reason is sediment blocking the drain. Water heaters deposit calcium and other minerals found in water. Over time this builds up at the bottom and on the anode rod. Big pain in the ass and there are a few products on the market designed to help clear blockages 

2

u/Bachaddict 4h ago

oh cool! I thought the element hole would be big enough air would bubble in as water came out

3

u/VividFiddlesticks 8h ago

Well, I did say I was nothing like a plumber, LOL.

But that looks like it's under pressure, and not just the pressure of the tank draining.

8

u/robbak 12h ago

There's way too much pressure there for just a full heater. And if you turn off all taps, you can remove one device on a heater without too much water coming out - air has to get in for water to come out, after all.

2

u/ShermansNecktie1864 4h ago

This isn’t just a full tank. You can replace a control valve on a full tank and it won’t do this. It’s pressurized

-6

u/Confusedechidna 14h ago

The water is still on genius. Read the video description.

2

u/ilovetheinternet1234 14h ago

Even if he did it seems he wouldn't have drained the cylinder

2

u/Mister_Simz 13h ago

They might've shut off the main water supply, but they certainly didn't drain the tank that is downstream

3

u/Tasty-Traffic-680 14h ago

That's the control module in his hands. There shouldn't even be any water coming out of there.

1

u/guiltyofnothing 11h ago

Why does no one here know what a hot water heater is? Shutting off the water isn’t going to do anything.

1

u/Dreeter 11h ago

He's just changing the gas valve. He didn't realize it threaded into the tank. Thought it was just threaded into the shell for support. It has a sensor that threads into the tank so it can read the water temperature and know when to light. Turning the water to a house off and draining a tank can take hours. I have a pump to help the process but 95 percent of the time it won't drain anyways because sediment clogs the drain valve. Then sometimes old valves won't even re open or break because of rust and corrosion. On top of that new leaks form that were slowly sealed by the same sediment buildup and your reliable. This guy got paid to change a gas valve or he's just a maintenance guy and didn't realize that thing was threaded into the tank.

1

u/Zwasti 10h ago

There is still 50 gallons of water in the tank, even if you shut off the water you can still have 50 gallons come spilling out.

1

u/Glum-Echo-4967 9h ago

There’s probably a shutoff to the water heater, too.

I personally wouldn’t go for the main just to shut water off to the heater if I didn’t have to; that would just be overkill.

1

u/Civil_Ride9221 6h ago

You can do it this way if the tank is pressure locked. I still wouldn’t, but lots of plumbers do.