Water Heater Bypass Stuck

[DunnYet]

This past weekend in Texas we got what is hopefully our last cold snap of the year. Since I had the materials in the garage, I decided that I would winterize just for safety since the weather guessers could not agree on how cold it was going to get. Hull #1030 LE I with the Truma Water Heater.

However, when I started the process, the Water Heater Bypass valve would not close. I have opened and closed it lots of times and it’s always turned smoothly. This time it would start to turn and then hard stop about a third of the way through the normal rotation - almost as if there was something in the way of the valve.

The only thing I did differently was drain the water heater before closing the valve - just happened to be outside and decided to let the water run out. So there was no pressure on the system when I was trying to close the valve.

Any thoughts or ideas? 

We ended up just putting an electric heater inside and opening all the under seat hatches. Kept the inside nice and cozy and it didn’t get down below 34F. So all good on that front. Will re-pressurize the system next week and see if that changes anything. 

Appreciate any thoughts or ideas.

[Frank C]

I had a somewhat similar problem with the bypass valve.  Turned out to be degradation of the seal inside the valve.  Seems that some of the winterizing or disinfecting solutions can attack the seal material in the valve   It’s an easy replacement   Link to the old thread discussion below.