Hot water heater wiring

I'm not new to hot water repairs and wiring. If what I have in my home is normal, then I missed the how to do it upgrade. I have a modular home manufactored by one of the better companies. I recently, yesterday, had problems with my hot water heater. We had NO hot water. Of course being the good dad, I take my shower last. Ooops.

When I got off of work I started troubleshooting the problem. I had

120V on one leg and 20V on the other? Coming out of the breaker I had 120V on both legs and 240V between. Sounded like a bad wire. To make a long story short, the wires leaving the breaker did not go directly to the hot water heater. They go accross the house, then toward the other end of the house, makes a "U" turn somewhere, and comes back to the hot water heater. I'm sure the wire is most likely daisy chained to something and that something probably has a weak connection. Nonetheless, I made a command decision at mid-night to remove sheet rock and wire it up like I thought it should be wired. Of course this made the hot water heater work. And, since I wired it parrell to the existing wire, I haven't found any outlets not working, "YET".

My questions are: Is it normal to indirectly wire the hot water heater? If it's daisy chained with something, what would that something be? I'd appreciate any feed back.

Have a good day.

Reply to
Randyman
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hot water tank is ALL it should service

likely candidates....

electric dryer, or furnace. or AC.

it might be wired to something you arent using or even own

I would run a new permanent line from the breaker directly the tank and just disconnect the existing line completelty

Reply to
hallerb

If the water heater in the same "module" as the panel? There may be a connector at the joint. Call the manufacturer.

Reply to
gfretwell

NO! Normally, a water heater is served with 10 gauge wire and a 30 amp breaker.

No Idea. I suppose someone could have hooked up one of the hot legs to something to get 120V somewhere else, but that would be silly. Perhaps you just have an excessivley long wire that developed a break in it somewhere. The only way to know for sure is to chase it and tear it all out and see if it's hooked to anything else.

Reply to
J.A. Michel

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