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Raritan Water Heater w/exchanger FAILED
Had water leaking out of my coolant over-flow with the bus not running for a week or two. I had always wondered about the heat-exchanger inside the water heater. Asking myself, what happens if the coil goes bad. Does coolant mix with the hot water? So you’re bathing and using this to wash your dishes. The answer is yes.
I suspected the heat-exchanger immediately. I pulled the cap off the coolant overflow and it had pressure and it would have a constant flow. I turned off the 2 heat-exchanger valves and the flow stops. Btw, I’m connected to “shore water”. I let everything dry over night and pulled the coolant overflow cap off the next day. Then turned on the heat exchanger valves and you could hear the water flowing. Sure enough, water coming out of the coolant overflow.
So, turned the exchanger valves off again until I get a replacement water heater. (At least you’re not stuck with no hot water). It’s not the highest thing on my list right now either. I’ll get all the parts gathering up before I order the replacement and have that shipped. This is the original water heater in the bus which is a ’99 conversion.
I did call Raritan to see if I was in danger if the coil goes bad with coolant mixing with your house hot water. He absolutely said yes. In his 40+ years of doing this he had never seen one fail in this way before. He said he had heard of it happening but never was able to confirm it. Can’t fault the water heater after 24 years. It owes me nothing.
Just a heads up for others in case you EVER run into this situation.
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4 Replies
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Replaced mine last October as tank itself was starting to leak at the bottom. NOT the coolant line thankfully!
FYI….Here is where I found the best price. Note it is available without the coolant heat exchange
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I bought a Raritan# 172011, 20 gal w/heat exchanger, 15 mths ago on ebay for $1177 to my door. I thought mine had a hole in it. It didn’t. Now I have a spare for when it really does fail.
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Thanks Jeff. And I thought I found the cheapest price on Ebay @ 1,263 with free shipping!
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In 2003 Aqua Hot moved their hot water coils from outside the boiler to the inside the boiler with the antifreeze , That was a good idea but if you got a leak in the heating coil you could drink antifreeze, So that’s when they started using Polyethlene glycol antifreeze just in case. In 13 years I’ve only had 1 Aqua Hot replacement due to hot water coil leak, It did the same thing but overflow was at Aqua Hot overflow tank.
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