The water temperature in the water heater in your house can be adjusted using a device called the aquastat. However, before you start making any adjustments to try to find the ideal temperature—either to save energy or for comfort—we must caution you about what can happen if the water heater is set too low or too high:
- Too low: Both we and the EPA recommend you never set the aquastat lower than 120°F. The water must be hot enough to kill off bacteria and other disease-causing microbes that may develop in the tank.
- Too high: You create a risk of scalding temperatures in the house. We don’t recommend a setting any higher than 140°F.
When you turn on the hot water faucet, you expect hot water. In fact, you don’t really expect it, you just take it as a given. But if you wait for the water to heat up, and it only gets to “lukewarm,” then you may have a problem with your water heater.
A water heater that leaks is almost always a problem. If you have a tank water heater and you notice water is pooling around the base, it’s time to call for a licensed professional plumber to look at the system and find out what’s wrong. Leaking water can indicate a number of major problems that require repairs or, in some cases, a full replacement of the water heater.
When you turn on the taps in your house, whether for a sink faucet or a shower head, and the water pressure feels weaker than normal, there are a number of different possibilities. In most cases, this is a municipal issue that will soon be remedied. But it could also be leaks, hard water build-up, or problems with the water main to your house.
When people ask our experts this question—and it’s a question we hear often—what they usually want to know is if they should have their current aging 
A hot water heater is a heating device that works in all seasons. Here in Southern California, where the mild winters mean home heating systems that work only for a short time, a water heater does the same steady work as always, no matter the month on the calendar.
When the fall starts, HVAC companies remind their customers that it’s time to have maintenance done for their heating equipment. Even Southern California can get the winter blues! But plumbers also ask their customers to arrange for maintenance as well, and it’s for a heating system that Californians need every day, no matter the weather: the water heater.
If you are considering replacing your old, inefficient storage tank water heater this fall, first of all—good for you! No reason to keep a power-draining and unreliable old water heater around longer than necessary. Second of all, we recommend giving serious consideration to replacing it with a tankless water heater. You’ve probably heard about some of the great advantages of going with a tankless system: they cost much less to run, have lengthy service lives, take up little space, require fewer repairs, and best of all they won’t run out of hot water!
As professional plumbers who work on everything from small leaks in homes to large scale commercial plumbing installations, we’re used to encountering one of the biggest enemies of all plumbing systems: corrosion. Corrosion is a chemical reaction between water and metal in the presence of oxygen, resulting in a weakening of the metal. There are different types of corrosion, but rust is the most familiar. No matter the type, corrosion is straight up bad news for metal because it eats into it and eventually causes it to flake away. (In fact, the word corrosion comes from the Latin word meaning “to gnaw.” Corrosion gnaws away at metal.)
