Water heater repair in Palos Heights, IL

Lake water by way of Chicago and the southwest suburbs

Palos Heights has no wells or treatment plant of its own. Its water starts at Chicago's lakefront intakes, is filtered and disinfected at Chicago's water purification plants, and then moves through the network of pumping stations and transmission mains that carries Chicago water to dozens of southwest suburbs. The city's public works department buys that finished water from a neighboring supplier, stores it and runs it through local mains to homes and businesses.

The region's wholesale systems have been in the news over the past decade, with Oak Lawn's regional system and other southwest suppliers spending heavily on new mains and pumping capacity to make deliveries more reliable. For homeowners, the practical takeaway is that Palos Heights water is Lake Michigan water with consistent chemistry: moderately hard, chlorinated, and similar to what comes out of taps across the southwest side.

Water that leaves the lake in January is close to freezing, and even after miles of buried pipe it reaches Palos Heights homes in the upper 30s during cold snaps. That is the main reason a heater that seemed fine in September struggles to fill a bathtub in February.

Harlem Heights grid, ranch streets and wooded ravine lots

The oldest part of town took shape in the 1930s, when a developer laid out the Harlem Heights subdivision along Harlem Avenue after the new Southwest Highway made the area reachable by car. Real growth came after World War II and especially after incorporation in 1959, when streets east and west of Harlem filled with brick ranches, raised ranches and split-levels. Nearly all were dug with basements of some size, and the tank usually stands next to the furnace, exhausting into the brick chimney or up a galvanized B-vent through the roof.

West of Harlem, toward the Palos forest preserves and around Lake Katherine Nature Center, lots get larger and more wooded, and houses from the 1970s through the 1990s run bigger, with two-story layouts, finished basements and sometimes two heaters. Condominium buildings along Harlem Avenue and near Northwestern Medicine Palos Hospital house many older residents, and heaters there often sit in individual unit closets above someone else's ceiling.

Trinity Christian College, off College Drive, adds a modest number of student and faculty rentals, but Palos Heights is mostly owner-occupied, and many families have lived in the same house for decades. That means a lot of heaters in town are well past the age when anyone remembers when they were installed.

Cal-Sag cold, ravine runoff and storm season

The Calumet Sag Channel runs along the northern edge of Palos Heights, and the low ground near it and along the ravines feeding Lake Katherine collects cold air on still winter nights. Basements in those areas can run colder than the rest of the house, which slows recovery on a gas tank and chills the flue. Below-zero spells, when they arrive, are the worst time for an old heater with a weak thermocouple or a corroded vent pipe.

Summer storms are the other big risk. Heavy rain on wooded lots and clay soil can overwhelm drain tile and push water into basements, and older sanitary sewers can back up through floor drains. A gas heater that has been sitting in water needs a professional inspection before it is relit, and in this town that usually means a new gas control at minimum.

The problems plumbers see most in Palos Heights

• Twenty-year-old tanks in long-held ranch homes where nobody knows the install date.
• Corroded flue pipes where a basement heater shares a chimney with a newer furnace.
• Thermocouple failures on standing-pilot tanks during the first hard freeze.
• Flooded burners after storm water or sewer backup reaches the basement floor.
• Leaks into the unit below in Harlem Avenue condo buildings.
• Weak hot water in winter for big households trying to stretch 40 gallons through a January morning.

Typical water heater prices in Palos Heights

Southwest suburban rates fall a little below the north shore and the Northwest Water Commission towns but well above downstate Illinois. A replacement in an open ranch basement is the most affordable job in town, while a condo closet install or a basement with a narrow stair and a chimney liner adds labor.

Illinois licensing and Palos Heights permits

Plumbing in Illinois is regulated by IDPH, the Department of Public Health, which licenses individual plumbers and registers plumbing contractors. Its online search lets you confirm a Palos Heights contractor before you hand over a deposit.

Swapping a heater inside Palos Heights calls for a city permit from the building department at city hall on College Drive, and an inspector later checks the flex connector, the draft and the relief line termination. Neighboring Palos Hills, Palos Park and Worth each handle their own permits, and a few unincorporated pockets along the forest preserves fall under Cook County, so check which applies to your address.

Venting checks for older basements

Once the old furnace in a Palos Heights ranch is traded for a condensing unit piped out the side wall in PVC, the gas tank is often stranded alone in a flue built for two. A chimney sized for two appliances often will not draft properly for one, particularly on a cold morning when the masonry is chilled. Rust streaks on the flue pipe, water dripping from the draft hood or a CO alarm going off are signs that the venting needs attention.

Remedies run from re-pitching a sagging connector, to lining the stack, to giving up on the chimney with a fan-assisted heater. Your plumber should check draft with the heater running as part of any replacement in these basements. For pilot problems that keep coming back, see Palos Heights pilot light help.

ComEd, Nicor and newer heater types

ComEd supplies electricity and Nicor Gas supplies natural gas in Palos Heights. Most homes use gas tanks, though some condos have electric units. Each utility has promoted efficient water heaters through rebates or instant discounts at times, and the terms shift from year to year.

Heat pump water heaters fit well in an unfinished ranch basement with room around them, and they wring some moisture out of a damp cellar as a side benefit. Tankless heaters suit larger west-of-Harlem homes with several bathrooms, provided the gas line can carry the load. If you are weighing longevity, see how long heaters last on lake water.

Repair or replace in Palos Heights

On a tank still inside its first decade, a worn thermocouple, sticky relief valve or failed gas control is almost always cheaper to fix than to replace. Because so many Palos Heights heaters are original to a long-ago remodel, though, plumbers often find tanks fifteen or twenty years old, and at that age replacement is almost always the better investment. A flooded heater, a rusted base or water seeping from the tank seam all point toward replacing the heater.

Around Palos Heights

Palos Hills to the north and Palos Park to the west receive Lake Michigan water through Oak Lawn's regional system and run separate building departments. Worth, Crestwood and Alsip to the east and Orland Park to the south run water departments and building counters of their own.

Water heater questions from Palos Heights