No Silt When Water Heater Flushed but Coming Out Faucets

Hi All,

I'm back again to seek the expert's advice. I noticed some red silt coming out of the tub faucet and read that I most likely needed to drain the hot water heater. I went and followed instructions, but didn't notice any red silt (rust?) coming out during the 15-20 minutes I let it drain.

When I turned the water back on and turned the faucets around the house on, the red silt was now coming out of every faucet. Is there a reason it would be coming out of the faucets but NOT showing when I drained the hot water heater?

The house was built in 1990. Thanks in advance!

You mentioned iron while talking about silt. They are two totally different things. I assume you drained the heater from the bottom and may have turned the main valve off while doing so. This would have allowed iron that had built up on pipes to come off the pipes and show up at the faucets. This is all assuming you have well water not city water. City water normally has no iron.

Hi Speedbump,

I drained the heater from the bottom and turned the main valve off, correct. The silt is dull red, but I'm not 100% certain if it is rust. I wasn't able to pick it up with a magnet.

I have city water, not well. The hot water heater is on the older side (about 12 years) but hasn't had any problems.

After turning everything back on, I now have low water pressure as well. All faucets except the bath tub are experiencing low water pressure, is there a reason for this or should I just allow the hot water heater to run for a certain amount of time before jumping to conclusions?

Edit* the water pressure was because the faucet screens were blocked by the silt, I should be able to take care of that no problem.

That looks more like sand or softener resin. Do you have a softener? If so, how old is it? City water shouldn't have sand either, so that kind of leaves a softener. If that stuff plugged the aerators on the faucets, it's not silt.

It might be time for a galvised to copper conversion