One shower loses hot water quickly

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nrosenberg

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My house was built in the 1930s and we moved in 3 years ago. Ever since we moved in, the hot water in the master shower appeared to run out quickly - if the shower extended past a few minutes, we would continually need to adjust the temperature until the cold water was completely off. However, the shower never got cold; it just didn't stay warm enough.

Fast forward to today. It seems that the other showers and bathtubs in the house are starting to experience the same problem. Our water heater is 9 years old and is an obvious possible culprit for the house-wide problem. However, as mild problems begin to appear throughout the house, the master shower has become almost unusable - it often goes cool within 5 minutes of running. It is worth noting that we recently replaced the shower body and this new problem didn't appear until 2-3 weeks afterwards.

Any suggestions as to what might be going on in the master shower would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
 

Terry

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Ever since we moved in, the hot water in the master shower appeared to run out quickly - if the shower extended past a few minutes, we would continually need to adjust the temperature until the cold water was completely off. However, the shower never got cold; it just didn't stay warm enough.

An old shower head that dumps too much water. Get a new shower head that outputs 2.5 gallons or less. Some of the old heads will dump 7.0 gallons.
With a gas water heater, you're just bumping it along near the end.

Check the recirc if you have one. Is the pump still running? A recirc line adds a lot of heater water volume to a system.

If you have electric, a bottom element being out will reduce total heated water.
If the top element goes, you have none.

If you have hard water, the tank can fill with lime and reduce heating efficiency and volume of heated water.
 
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