Hot water smells like rotten eggs

GPBurke

How do I get rid of the stinky rotten egg small from from my hot water? Do I have to flush out out my water heater? If so, how do I do it?. We bought our home through a builder 7 1/2 years ago and just realized we do not have a owners manual for our water heater. Can you steer to the right resource? Hopefully this is something a layman can do. --Greg

canadaclub

I was just listening to a handyman show on the radio and someone called in with that very problem not 10 minutes ago. The answer (apparently) is to change the anode in the water heater. It is made of magnesium and is used to control the calcium buildup. When it breaks down it smells like rotten eggs.

jogr

Do you have a well or city water?

Mr. Green

I agree!!!

It happens with well water around my area frequently.

AllanJ

The magnesium anode rod is replaced with an aluminum one.

The purpose of the anode is to retard the rusting out of the tank. The lesser? of evils is that the aluminum rod doesn't retard the rusting as much.

The anode rod must make electrical contact in the form of good metal to metal contact with the tank (at its screw threads) so you need to go easy on the Teflon tape or pipe dope.

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The Engineer

After you replace the anode rod, you want to disinfect and flush the water heater of the odor causing bacteria, then after its flushed, refill the heater and turn the temp up all the way to 160 degrees or higher for several hours, then flush the heater again, and you should be all set.