My Water Heater Is Not Heating Water. The Breaker Switch Is Off During The Day To Save Electricity. Now Turned On For 1 And 1 Half Hours. How Long Should It Take To Get The Water Hot?

It depends on too many factors to give a definite answer. What is the ambient temperature where the tank is kept? Is the air cold or hot, there? Is the tank insulated? Immersion heater or gas? Or even oil?

In Southern California hot water tanks are usually gas-heated, kept outside, and they may not even be insulated. They lose a lot of energy... AND they take ages to heat up.

Plus, it depends on the size of the tank. Bigger tanks take longer to heat up than small ones.

For what it's worth, I have a small-medium size indoor uninsulated tank. Temperatures are slightly cool in the house. The tank only heats up twice a day (to 65 deg. C). It only takes 15 minutes or so to heat up again, assuming I didn't use all the hot water the last time it heated up.

But if I had an outdoor uninsulated large tank in California, I would assume at least 2 hours to get a little hot water out of it, and more like 4-6 hours to heat the entire tank. That's for this time of year (mid-April), assuming the water was air temperature (ie, cold) to start with.

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Should be getting hot by now. Sounds like an electric heater, check to make sure you are getting electricity to the unit itself with a VOM or test light. If you are, then the thermostat or heating element is bad. They are mounted on the heater under a small removable panel and are not that expensive at most hardware stores.

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The amount of money you save by what you are doing is only pennies. Set temp. At 130 and leave it on.

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