Hot water system

[GKuffner]

What am I doing wrong?

Last fall when I winterized my drinking water system, which uses Whale lines and fittings, I disconnected the 2 brass fittings on each end of the hot water tank, where they enter the boats cold and hot water lines. I then ran a short length of whale tubing between the female connectors on the cold (blue) and hot (red) water lines. This allowed me to flush the system with antifreeze – bypassing the hot water thank. Everything worked well and I flushed the water system and drained the hot water thank.

Today, I reconnected the 2 brass stem adaptors (one has a check valve on the cold water input line to the hot water heater) to their respective cold and hot water lines. Now I only have cold water coming out of the tapes. No hot water comes out of the hot water tapes.

See attached schematic of my water system (mine has no accumulator tank).

I thought that the check valve on the cold water line was not connected correctly or was not working properly, so I removed the check valve and checked its installation. I also blew on the valve and it let air through but didn’t when I sucked on it. So it seems to be working.

The only thing that I did was to change the rubber washer in the brass stem fitting with the check valve where it mates with the steel covered line leading to the hot water tank. The original washer was totally crushed and some of it was missing.

I also confirmed that there was no blockage in the hot water tank (when air pressure is applied to the cold water input line water is freely expelled out the hot water output line).

Does anyone have any thoughts on what I’m missing?

Gary
C309 - Glory Days

 

[Don S/V ILLusion]

Did you let the hot water tank fill and bleed any air out?

 

[Maine Sail]

Are you trying to heat off the engine or off the shore power. You also have a mixing valve in that system, did you adjust it?

 

[GKuffner]

Re bleeding the hot water tank.... I had the same thought but the tank would purge itself if the pump was on and the hot water tap was open. I tried that and there is still no flow through the hot water tap. So there is no water getting into the hot water tank.

Gary

 

[GKuffner]

Yesterday I solved the problem with my water system. As I said in my original email when I disassembled the brass stem fitting from the steel covered hot water input line (the one with the check valve in it), the washer was destroyed and I removed only see part of it. Well yesterday I found the rest of the washer logged inside the check valve fitting. I removed the left over black rubber washer material from inside the check valve with a pick and reassembled the fittings with a new washer and everything worked as intended. I suspect that when the Catalina technician who was working on my boat during assembly - tightened the brass fitting to the male end of the hot water input hose so tightly that it cut the washer allowing some of it to become logged inside the check valve. It took some time to discover this because the valve seemed to work correctly when I tested it by blowing and sucking on it, but when hooked up to the water system the higher pressure caused the check valve to fail. So in short there was no problem with the Whale components of my water system, rather the problem was with the assembly process.

Thanks to those who responded to my question.

Gary
C309 Glory Days