[cute fuzzy bunny]

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Originally Posted by JohnEyles Thanks for the comments on tank vs tankless and on tank quality. I find it hard to complain about my 40gal LP unit - I've had it for 19 years with nary a problem - of course, perhaps I'll wake up tomorrow with a flooded house ... It is Penfield brand, made by State Industries (Ashland TN).

Thats what just blew up on me...a State Censible unit. Actually not that bad.

The gist of water heater death is corrosion. Units come with either one or two anode rods made of either aluminum or magnesium that allow themselves to be eaten by corrosive elements in the water. A "six year" heater has one rod, a "ten" or "twelve" year heater has two. They can be replaced, and the hot water "dip tube" the hot water line is hooked to can be replaced with a combination rod/dip tube.

As Nords will tell you, replacing a rod can be an entertaining experience. But easier than replacing the whole HWH.

Now, if you have a fairly uncorrosive water supply, the heater and its rods might last a good bit longer than 5/6 or 10/12 years. On the other hand, if you're feeding it "soft" water with some corrosive elements, you might be replacing a rod or seeing some leaks fairly quickly.

We had crappy corrosive well water run through a softener until a little over a year ago when we got switched to city water. Hence the measly 8 year run on my old heater.

One last aside on the anodes...some indications are that aluminum may be contributory to alzheimers. I got a unit with a magnesium rod, cuz god knows the last thing I need is any further brain decay.

Rich - what model do you have? Some of them require replacing a water valve periodically and a few of the Bosch units made a few years ago used a defective screw that fused itself to the valve housing, requiring a very expensive unit replacement. Many find that removing (if possible at this stage) and replacing those screws with lubed stainless screws for a couple of dollars solves that problem.