Hot water pressure!

Recently I have noticed a substantial drop in hot water pressure , the cold water is fine , hot is down to a slow stream! I live in Canada so there is cold weather , I don't believe this to be a factor , the house is five years old with plastic piping , the water heater is still heating water just fine. I have checked the taps for build up and blockages , as well I flushed the hot water heater of sediments , of which there was very little. One note on draining the hot water heater , it didn't drain as I figured it would , I had to let air into the tank through the release valve at the top of the tank , simply having the taps open upstairs didn't seem to matter. Unless I pulled the release valve at the top of the water heater the water just slowly ploped out like not enough air was getting in to drain any faster! Please help! Thanks in advance , Rybo.

Some valves have inlet filter screens, there could be some crud caught there. Same thing on the inside of the valve.

How to fix?

Thanks for the reply , if it is infact a blockage in an inlet filter , how would I go about unclogging the filter , or would this be better left to the professionals?

Is this everywhere in the house?

With the supply valves open, if you open the drain valve of the WH, do you get a good flow? That would tell you if the inlet was plugged. If you get good flow, what about at the first faucet that uses hot? Can you take the supply hose off of that faucet and run the water into a bucket to see what the flow is? If it is low, and it was good coming out of the drain, then it's the outlet.

Some WH have heat traps on them...or, if they are galvanized steel, the trap could be stuck or the steel all corroded. Are the supply pipes to the WH solid or flex? If flex, can you remove them and then try poking something down the opening to see if it is clear?

If it's only one faucet, try the supply line and see if you have good flow.

All of this fails to locate the problem, then, I guess it's time for a pro.

your water heater is blocked off

what is going on is the nipple on top of your waterheater is clogging up...

you need to cut the hot line comming off the heater and rheem out the inner pipe...it will be built up with calcium
and other forms of "dialectric debris"

get a big screwdriver and hammer and punch a hole through
the calcified funk inside the pipe.....

90% of the time it happens on the hot side,
sometimes it happens on the cold inlet


if theheater is 15 years old I would suggest changeing it out

"dialectric debris"


I like that, well put.

What is the stuff anyway????

nhmaster said:

"dialectric debris"


I like that, well put.

Click to expand...

thank you

I have always wondered what the heck the stuff
actually is, its not really metal, its not really calcium.

its basically some sort of reaction between the two dis-similar metals......like a bi-metal of some sort???.

Thanks for the replies guys , in responce to Jadnashua's reply: All hot water faucets/showers are affected , I do not get good flow when I open the drain valve at the bottom of the WH , I do however get good flow when I open the pressure release valve at the top of the WH. I don't know what a heat trap looks like but I highly doubt one exists on my system. All pipes are plastic , except for the last 18-24" coming out of the water heater.
From your reply I gather that the inlet to the WH is plugged! Is this correct?