Hot water heater question

[blakers213]

Say I go camping and use hot water heater. Get home and not going camping for 3-4 weeks. Should I drain it or just leave it.

[chuckster57]

your fine to leave it alone.

[Bushman512000]

I drain mine every time and be sure to turn the Electric to it off so the element will not fry if You have the switch for elect. I like to drain all water so bugs do not grow .add some bleach about a cup fill and drain the water tank and it will remain clean and fresh ....Bushman happy camping:D

[GaryWT]

My tank gets filled in April sometime and will get drained in Oct/Nov. we camp most weekends between that time or at least every other so no issues.

[silverbullet18]

Personal preference. I'm with Gary WT. Fill mine in spring drain when I winterize. Won't hurt to drain just a pain to keep putting plumbers tape in plug.


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[slow]

............... just a pain to keep putting plumbers tape in plug.


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FYI: If you were to add a valve to your low point drains, it is easy to drain your hot water tank by opening the COLD low point drain and lifting the pressure relief lever on the hot water tank. Not intuitive, but it works because the cold water enters at the bottom of the tank. Draining of hot water tanks was discussed previously with many view points: http://www.keystonerv.org/forums/showthread.php?t=23178&highlight=draining+water+tank

Whether to drain your hot water tank after every trip or not probably depends on how hard your water is and if it is a Suburban steel with anode tank or an aluminum Atwood tank. Our water is hard and leaves deposits if left full too long in our Atwood tank, so I drain after every trip which is every second weekend.

[14george]

Don't drain mine until I winterize


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[Overloaded]

I open low point drains after breaking camp. That will drain water heater and maybe save anode? I just do it cause I don't want to drag an extra 40lbs. It may seem minor when pulling 8400lbs but...

[Mutt]

I only drain mine during long time storage. Here's my thinking on that.

If I accidently turn on the water heater switch or someone hits it by mistake. I don't want my water heater to get heated up while empty. It's only an aluminum tank and could quite easily be damaged. So ... I don't drain it. However .... I don't want that old water sitting there so I run the hot water for a while to clean out the old water that has been sitting in the lines.