Water heater repair in Athens, GA

Oconee rivers and Bear Creek Reservoir

Athens-Clarke County Public Utilities treats river water at the J.G. Beacham Water Treatment Plant, with intakes on the North Oconee and Middle Oconee rivers that flow through and around the county. A second major supply comes from Bear Creek Reservoir in Jackson County, built by the Upper Oconee Basin Water Authority, a partnership of Athens-Clarke with Jackson, Barrow and Oconee counties. Bear Creek water is treated at the authority's own plant beside the reservoir and shared among the partners.

Water from these Piedmont streams is soft. Tanks rarely fill with the thick mineral crust found in limestone regions, and tankless units seldom need descaling more than every other year. That softness means the magnesium anode works steadily, though, so a tank in a Five Points or Normaltown bungalow tends to fail when the anode is gone rather than from sediment.

The severe drought of 2007, when the rivers ran low and outdoor watering was restricted, is still remembered locally. Low-flow periods can change water chemistry a little and bring more taste and odor complaints, but they rarely affect heaters directly.

Bungalows, rentals and student apartments

Close to campus, neighborhoods like Cobbham, Boulevard, Buena Vista Heights and Normaltown are full of early twentieth century houses on brick piers or low crawlspaces. Many were converted to rentals decades ago. In those houses the tank might be tucked in a hallway closet, an enclosed back porch, a kitchen corner or down in the crawlspace, where a leak can run unnoticed for weeks and a replacement means crawling through red clay.

Farther out, along Lexington Road on the Eastside and off Atlanta Highway on the Westside, ranch homes from the 1960s to 1990s often have the heater in a garage or a utility room. Apartment and townhome complexes built for UGA students line Baxter Street, Milledge Avenue and the streets toward the east campus, and those often have small electric tanks stacked in closets, one per unit, all of a similar age.

Every August, when tens of thousands of students move in at once, plumbers see a wave of calls for heaters that sat idle all summer, relief valves that stick, and tanks that cannot keep up with four roommates showering before class. Landlords with several properties tend to replace heaters in batches during the summer break.

Georgia heat and winter cold snaps

Athens summers are long and humid, and an unconditioned crawlspace or back porch can stay damp for months. That humidity rusts burner chambers, jacket screws and gas connectors on heaters under houses. Winter is mild most of the time, but arctic outbreaks a few times a decade bring temperatures into the teens, and pipes in crawlspaces or exterior walls of older rentals can freeze, including the supply line to the heater.

Ice storms are another risk. Freezing rain brings down limbs onto Georgia Power lines across Clarke County's tree-heavy neighborhoods, leaving electric heaters cold until crews restore service. Gas heaters with standing pilots keep working through a power outage; newer power-vent and electronic-ignition models do not.

The problems plumbers see most in Athens

• Crawlspace tanks leaking unseen under bungalows near campus until floors soften or a water bill spikes.
• Small closet tanks overloaded by four or five roommates in converted rental houses.
• Stuck relief valves and dead pilots in rentals that sat empty through the summer.
• Rusted gas connectors and burners on heaters in damp crawlspaces and porch closets.
• Frozen supply lines to heaters in exterior closets during January cold snaps.
• Anodes used up after a decade on soft Oconee water, followed by pinhole leaks.

Typical water heater prices in Athens

Athens labor rates run below metro Atlanta. Crawlspace work, steep driveways in older in-town neighborhoods and parking near campus on game days are the usual reasons a job lands higher in a range.

Permits and licensing in Athens-Clarke County

Because Athens and Clarke County consolidated into a single government in 1991, one building office covers nearly the whole county. Athens-Clarke County's Building Permits and Inspections division handles heater permits; its inspectors check fuel hookups, venting, relief piping and, under houses or in attics, the pan and the access path. Winterville, which kept its own small city government after consolidation, handles some permitting itself.

Plumbers in Georgia are licensed by the master and journeyman plumbing division of the State Construction Industry Licensing Board. Landlords in particular should confirm that whoever swaps a heater holds a current license and pulls the permit, since an unpermitted install can become a problem during a sale or after a leak claim.

Gas service in Athens

Georgia's natural gas market is deregulated. In Athens, Atlanta Gas Light runs the distribution mains and meters, but homeowners buy gas from a marketer they choose, such as Gas South or SCANA Energy. If you smell gas near a heater, call Atlanta Gas Light's emergency line, not your marketer. A plumber relighting a heater after a gas shutoff will need the meter turned back on first.

Many Athens homes, especially near campus and in student apartments, are all-electric with service from Georgia Power. Some outer parts of the county are served by an electric membership cooperative. Georgia Power has offered efficiency programs that include water heating at times.

Repair or replace in Athens

On soft river water, Athens tanks often last ten to twelve years. A dead thermocouple, failed element or sticky relief valve on a younger tank is worth repairing. Once a tank is past ten years and shows rust at the base, or water is pooling under a crawlspace tank (see leaking heaters), plan on a replacement. Landlords with several units of the same age often find replacing all of them over one summer cheaper than handling emergencies during the semester.

Around Athens

Watkinsville and the rest of Oconee County to the south have their own water utility and county building office. Winterville to the east is a small town with its own permit process. Jefferson and Commerce in Jackson County draw on Bear Creek water as authority partners but permit through Jackson County or their cities, and Winder in Barrow County does the same.

Water heater questions from Athens