Almost had a heart attack..

BRUISER

BRUISER

silent.. but deadly
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Joined
Mar 17, 2005
Location
Raleigh
came home last night from working on projects and smelled a weird smell, was like a burnt wire smell.. Searched the entire house and could not find it.. finally went into crawl space and that is where it was coming from.. then I noticed the entire floor area was covered in water.. so I traced it to the top of water heater where the top was rusted very bad and was leaking.. so quickly turned of power to water heater and turned off water to the house.. everything was good so I went to bed..(this was 1am)

well this AM I get up and start to see what needs to be done to fix it.. I had to replace entire water heater this morning (not fun taking a 32" tall water heater out of a crawl space that is only 40" tall)

what I found was the water was leaking from top down onto the electrical wires which then caught on fire and melted all insulation inside water heater and around wires, but so much water was leaking it then put the fire out.. THANK GOD.. someone up stairs was watching over my wife and kids while I was not at home..

when i figured out what actually happened my heart sank.. very scary situation, and very thankful nothing bad happened.. lesson learned make sure you have smoke detectors in crawl space...

good news was I started at 8am and was done by 12:30pm and at work by 1:15pm..
 
Very lucky..
 
Holy crap.... could have been bad.

That happened to s a few years back. I kept hearing a popping sound coming from the basement. When I went to check it out the wires were arcing between each other because of the water on top of the heater. My tank wasn't leaking but the pipe above was. Scary stuff for sure....
 
I now have new water heater and all new pipes and hoses above it.. I replaced it all this AM.. do not want to take that chance again..
 
i'm glad it all turned out alright! House fires are one of my only real fears. That's one of the reasons I'd really like to get my shop out of my basement and into an outbuilding. Just out of curiosity, what kind of breaker panel do you have? GE?
 
There is likely nothing wrong with the breaker. Water does not conduct enough to cause it to trip (a GFCI yes, but not a normal breaker) and the fire wouldn't have caused the wire to heat up enough throughout it's entire length for the breaker to have sensed it.

Want to test it? Turn the breaker off. Take the incoming power wires off the water heater and wire nut them together. Turn the breaker back on. It should trip instantly. If it doesn't, turn it back off (quickly) and replace it. If it does, rewire your water heater and sleep well at night.

I am an electrician, and a story I've always been told is that you can boil water in a glass with an energized hot and neutral wire inserted into it. I've never tried it, but I do know that water conductivity alone will not usually trip a non GFCI breaker, which in my eyes, makes the boiling water plausible. Maybe I'll try it at work tomorrow if I get a chance because, why would I want to try that at home? :lol:
 
If also seen first hand the water heater in a crawl space short the wiring. It was my sisters place. Seems crawl spaces because of the extra potential humidity should be required to run a gfi circuit. Is that now Code? And the low location and heater height make it a bitch. I always add, no mater how hard to put in, unions and a valve per supply and demand on any water heater I mess with. The eventual later down the road swaps are a breeze. Cut off valves, unscrew unions, remove, and reinstall. Zero mess and half the time. Plus cut offs that close make any sevice work a breeze.
 
Got lucky on that one!
 
13bullets said:
There is likely nothing wrong with the breaker. Water does not conduct enough to cause it to trip (a GFCI yes, but not a normal breaker) and the fire wouldn't have caused the wire to heat up enough throughout it's entire length for the breaker to have sensed it.
Click to expand...

This.

You can melt an 18ga extension cord and never get enough current across it to pop a 15A breaker. The only reason a GFCI pops is because it sees a short to ground (through the chassis of the device).
 
UPDATE: Putting energized wires in water (at least at 120V) will not boil the water. It will not trip a breaker. It will do nothing but get your wires wet.

Maybe one day I'll try 208...
 
shawn said:
This.

You can melt an 18ga extension cord and never get enough current across it to pop a 15A breaker. The only reason a GFCI pops is because it sees a short to ground (through the chassis of the device).
Click to expand...
+1

It's kinda funny trying to explain how abreaker works to some folks. Time/current or time/temp (most of the time...and always in a house) That instant trip with the wires mechanically connected....that 20A circuit probably sees north of 500A for a cycle or two.
 
rroadkilll said:
You can cook a hot dog with the 2 wires attached to 2 nails at each end of the hot dog!!!


Glad things went well at home! HE is looking out for you!
Click to expand...
So that is how your hotdog guy does it lol , Glad to hear everything is ok .
 
13bullets said:
UPDATE: Putting energized wires in water (at least at 120V) will not boil the water. It will not trip a breaker. It will do nothing but get your wires wet.

Maybe one day I'll try 208...
Click to expand...

Thats right. And don't bother w/ 208.
The only reason you'd get heat in the water is if there is resistance.
Relatively clean water = good conductor, thus no resistance, thus no heat.

Otherwise, what would a hot water tank be? Those things operate (elec ones) by having a big resistor in there.

Hot dog = highly resistive but still conductive, thus it will cook.
 
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