HELP!!! no hot water...

Yesterday while i was taking a shower i noticed the water turn cool but I didn't think anything of it until this morning when my husband said that there was no hot water so i came down stairs and checked the circuit board and sure enough the circuit was turned off so i flipped the switch thinking that would solve the problem....low and behold it didn't...when i turn on the hot water i can hear the water coming from the pipes of the water heater but the water comes out cold...can anyone help me as to what I need to do...The unit is a Ruud pacemaker and I've looked on the Ruud website under trouble shooting...it says something about a manual switch needing to be turned on maybe...where is that? If anyone can help me I'd be ever so greatful as I know absolutely nothing about this kind of thing...Thanks
alndom

How are your DIY skills?

1. Why was the circuit "turned off"? Was it in fact turned off, or had the circuit breaker tripped?

- if it was tripped, as is likely, something caused it to trip, probably a WH heating element dying.

2. How old is the water heater?

- these elements do fail after a while. If it's a young WH, replace the element(s). If older than, say, 5-8 years (depends on lots of things), replace the WH.

3. Had you noticed a gradual inability of the WH to recover after the water goes cool? If you wait a long time, does hot water return?

- Most WHs are dual-element; one aids in rapid recovery while the other one maintains the temperature normally. If you turn on the power, wait an hour or two, and there's still no hot water, they're both dead.

There's a good intro to WH operation and diagnosis at Bob Vila's Website. There's another thread in (this forum ) discussing the costs of replacing a WH, but it runs anywhere from $300 or so to $1300, as I remember, if your plumber can walk on the water leaking out of the WH .

Hey mikey,
I believe it was tripped because we infact had not turned it off ourselves...the water heater is a 99 model...it seems to have been working pretty well up until yesterday. there seemed to have been no problem with the water heating back up because after all the hot water has been run out...usually you can turn off the water after all the heat is gone and within 5-10 minutes turn on the faucet and hot water is running again (of course not for long because it hasn't built up a bunch by that time). Thanks for your response

Options

If it was tripped, you would have to have turned it fully OFF before you could turn it on, and there's usually a small red indicator that's almost impossible to see in the dark.

The Pacemaker has a 6-year warranty, so let's see... 2006-1999 equals... hmm. Well, the warranty timer works .

If your water is decent quality, it's likely an element has failed, and in the course of its failing caused a brief short circuit that tripped the breaker. There are lots of other things that could have gone wrong, so I'd recommend checking both elements and the anode rod. Depending on how they look, replace as required. If they're really nasty due to aggressive water, you might be better off replacing the WH altogether. Others with more experience will correct me if I'm wrong, but I'll bet the total cost for a pro to do all this will be greater than just a replacement job; considering the age of the unit, I'd feel better replacing it. OTOH, if only one element is bad and everything else looks pretty good, replace the element.

You had a lower element blow most likely. If you replace the lower and upper elements and T stats you should be set until the heater starts to leak.

The only question I would have B4 you do this is, are you in a hard water area and if you are do you have a softner.