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Old 08-03-2019, 10:31 PM   #1
bradreedthompson
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Melted electrical connection to water heater thermostat?

Hey all,

Was wondering if anyone has seen this before. I've linked to a pic of the electrical connections in my water heater. Smelled a plastic-burning smell earlier in the day, but couldn't trace it. Noticed the water heater had stopped heating later in the day and reset it. The plastic-burning smell returned immediately so I shut off power and pulled the cover to the thermostat since I couldn't see anything else. The picture is what I found: the wire insulation melted severely around the reset switch. I also realized that neither switch was attached with the little nuts so they were loose in there. Wondering if it might have touched something and shorted or if this is a sign of something else?

Newbie full-timer here, so any help is appreciated. We're in a 2011 Mountaineer 295RKD.

Many thanks!

URL to the pic: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1epE...ew?usp=sharing
 
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Old 08-04-2019, 09:08 AM   #2
Carl n Susan
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Unfortunately, the burnt wire is not all that uncommon. Usually it is due to the thermostat shorting out. The hard part is cutting the wire back and adding additional length. The stock wire is very short with little slack. There should be lock nuts on the posts holding the two thermostats to the tank.
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Old 08-04-2019, 09:09 AM   #3
BB_TX
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That is caused by a poor electrical connection. A poor connection causes resistance, and resistance and electrical current causes heating. The more current the more heat and that is high current circuit. Possibly the terminal was crimped partially on the insulation. In any event, you will need to replace the thermostat/hi temp cutout (surface mount so that is easy) and clip the wire and put a new terminal on it.
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Old 08-04-2019, 12:34 PM   #4
rohrmann
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In the manual, the left thermostat/Hi-limit switch is the 120 volt and the right one is the 12 volt switch. The 120 volt switch is part number 232306 and the 12 volt switch is 232282, and they are not interchangeable.
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Old 08-05-2019, 01:44 PM   #5
bradreedthompson
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Thank you to all those who chimed in! We decided to have a service tech come out and look since we bought a service plan with our RV, and I'm glad we did. We'll have a new water heater in a day or so. He said the sheared post was not replaceable and that the burned wire also is not designed to be replaced. So, another day or two without hot water, but at least we won't be worried about a repeat situation.
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Old 08-05-2019, 07:29 PM   #6
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If the post sheared off started the problem, then the thermostat not being in contact with the tank caused power to stay on continuously to the heat element and probably what caused the connection to burn up.
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