[Fulltiming]

Check the anode rod and change it out if it is consumed. Without a good anode rod, the interior of the tank will rot out much faster. Having had RV's with propane/electric water heaters previously, I have found my 20 gallon Raritan to be an excellent water heater. I had to replace mine not long after I got the coach (it was 13 years old at the time) due to the anode rod not being maintained and the liner rusting out but it has worked flawlessly since. When you stop you have really hot water as the heat exchanger has been circulating engine coolant through the water heater. I know Tom put a tempering device on his to keep it from getting too hot. You will find numerous items on your coach that are available from the marine community. West Marine is your friend.

[Newton88]

Thanks i'll be checking the anode then. Is there a flush valve to purge any sediment? I was told there are 3 1600 btu elements. If true, that would be about 1560 watts

[Fulltiming]

There is a drain valve at the lower edge of the side of the tank. At least for my Raritan (20 gallon, model 172011), the anode rod part number is 1790010.

[encantotom]

as far as i know there is only one element in the raritan. but anything is possible

tom

[khpaladin]

Alex,

Tom and the rest have pretty much covered everything. We had a Raritan 12 Gal 120VAC/OffEng water heater in our '81 when we got it, and it was 16 years old then. Service it every year and it ran great, until April of this year. As the others have described the inner liner finally gave up the ghost and the bottom rusted out and started leaking. Since it is a marine grade water heater, it ran from $690-$1000 dollars. Since we did not use the off engine very often and pretty much used only the 120VAC, we researched and decided to replace it with a Kenmore Model 153.316050 10 Gallon water heater. It did not take long to change out and Wyn likes the 15-20 minute cold to shower ready hot water. I have included Raritan pdf info for 12-20 gal water heaters.

OM2-5e_WHtr_Info.pdf Size: 191.45 KB  Downloads: 6

This was for our previous 12 gal Raritan it should cover everything everyone else has said.

Best Regards,

[Fulltiming]

Thanks Ki, I have added that to my electronic files. Although we keep our coach plugged in all the time but do not run the water heater unless we are actually using the coach. When we drive it after it has sat for a few weeks, it is nice to have hot water heated by the engine so when we replaced ours, we went back with the original 20 gallon marine unit 172011. We have very hot water after a fairly short drive.