Interested in hearing stories about your burst water heater. Specifically, if you live in an average-size house, and the heater’s in the basement, how deep was the water?
Ours is about 20 years old, and still going strong… so far.
This has happened to me. About an inch at the deepest point close to the heater. The problem is not the depth of the collected water, though, it’s what the water gets into. Something extreme like 3 inches of standing water in a completely empty unfinished basement is not as big of a deal as no standing water but soaked and ruined carpets and furniture in a finished space.
Modern code also specifies water heaters be installed into a pan that empties into a floor drain for exactly this situation.
I recently replaced the heater in the house I’m in now. It was 25 years old. Besides leak risks, water heaters fill with sediment and become less efficient over time.
I’ve never had one burst, that is, cause a gush of water. In my experience ( 3 failures ) it was that the bottom rusted through, causing a few pin-holes from which water more or less seeped out, and on to the garage floor, through the gaps between the garage door and floor and down the driveway.
Obviously, if ignored or not seen, it would only get worse.
Two words – sump pump.
Leaks on my own water heaters have always been just a small seep, a damp area on the floor. However, I got a panicked 4 a.m. call from a friend recently, hers had sprung a leak so hard, it was spraying up on the ceiling and falling back down like a waterfall, so she thought it was a burst pipe in the attic. The leak was about like if you had a garden hose going full blast. So the answer to your question is, maddeningly, could be minor, could be a disaster.
Never had one burst. Though I’ve replaced about 8 over my life. Not all mine.
Provided that the thing doesn’t just explode because the over pressure valve fails, well, it’s just gonna put as much water in the room as it can. And will continue to do so until the water is turned off.
This is why that I turn off the power to my well when ever I’m gone for a few days. Well one of the reasons. Lot’s of things can fail.
If the pressure valve and the thermostat both fail, the results can be pretty spectacular.
(Video of a Mythbusters test. The water heater blasted through a house roof like a rocket and sailed 500 feet into the air.)
i live in a 12 floor condo building.
one morning i heard commotion outside the door, as it was 5ish and no one was knocking i just went back to sleep. when i left for work at 7:30, the rug in the hallway was pulled up and about 4 biggie fans were going full blast.
the neighbour across the hall had a leak in the water heater (he travels a lot and was away when it happened), we are on the 10th floor, the leak went all the way down to the 6th floor. destroying all in its path as it went. huge repair bills as the water damaged kitchen areas as it went down.
i also know one woman who’s water heater broke when she was at work. she saw the water going out her basement door when she got home. her water bill was insane, like she had filled an Olympic sized pool.
i saw a neighbour have a leak (also away) and the water was flowing like a waterfall down the front stairs. this was in winter and the water had partly frozen with new water coming over frozen. the police and fire department came out for that one. i can not imagine the bill.
Never had one burst, either. We had one start rotting out and leaking, but caught it before any damage was done. My present house has no drain in the basement, so we had a tankless water heater installed.
Ugh, it really sucks. When I lived with my parents, our neighbors went out on summer vacation. During that time, their hot water burst and they returned home to a scene aptly described as a reenactment of the sinking of the Titanic: objects and trinkets were everywhere, water flowed through all parts of the house, and the frame itself was soaked.
Never had it happen to me but apparently, the process takes YEARS to develop and even then, if it’s caught early enough, little damage will occur.
Just my experience with it though.