Sounds like I have a problem exactly as this:

http://www.askmehelpdesk.com/plumbin...?highlight=hot

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Think it's been a ongoing problem for a long while. I just never noticed it before ... what basically used to happen was ...

I'd run hot water to draw a bath on the first floor ... after a few mins, I noticed the water would get cooler then cold (etc). At the time, I thought my water boiler wasn't meeting the demand ... but, that was cleared up yesterday because we left the hot water in my basement running for half an hour and it was steaming hot the whole time.

So, anyway, the pipes on the first floor bathroom would sometimes squeal or rattle. Yesterday morning, it squealed for one last time and stopped running hot water. The sink in there must be connected to the same hot line as the shower/tub. As, they both get no hot water now ...

The sink does have a small flow of hot water if I turn it on low after a long while ... if I open up the knob all the way, it instantly squeals and stops.

After reading the forum, there might be an airlock or something clogged in the hot water line to the first floor bathroom. My uncle and I let out about half the water in the hot water boiler and heard a lot of air coming out ... stopped at that point and it didn't seem to help the water flow.

Note, the hot water to my first floor kitchen is fine. It's very hard/impossible to get to the values for the hot water lines in my basement that lead upstairs ... since the basement was renovated and they blocked up all the lines ...

Any other suggestions to try (what does flushing out the supplies mean and how to do it?).
Can I attempt to snake it myself ... or try one of those "air drain decloggers" on it somehow?

Thanks.

atknight

Check The Hot Water Risers To The Bathroom. The Bathroom And Kitchen Risers Are Usually Different.

speedball1

Do you have a boiler or a hot water heater?

pandy

hi,

i have both a boiler (furnace for heat) and a hot water heater. they connected the hot water heater's pipe to the hot water pipe from the furnance. furnance at the moment has been off.
there is no valve on the parts of the pipe closest to the furnance/hot water heater.

pandy

I tried letting all the water out of the water heater tank today ... now the hot water on all the floors seems to be sputtering when there's more than one faucet on ...