Silly idea? Hot water heater drain tub.

[Btseagle98]

Hot water heaters are notorious for leaking and potentially causing major damage in located in a finished space.

I personally know two people who in the last 12-18 months have incurred thousands of dollars in damage when their water heaters burst and flooded their finished basements with 75 gallons of water.

This led me to having a brain fart as I’m starting to shop around planning to replace mine within the next 12-18 months.

would it be feasible to set up a very large tub underneath the water heater to catch all of the water should it fail/leak?

I actually envisioned having something the size of a small kiddie pool underneath mine. Or even something like a water trough.

It sounds, and will look, ridiculous...but I have room around my heater to accomplish something like this. Why not attempt it, just to potentially save a lot of water damage to the surrounding finished rooms?

Your thoughts? Yay? Nay? Feasible?

 

[Jeff Handy]

Sounds crazy and ridiculous.

First of all, if a water heater actually “bursts”, you won’t get 75 gallons spilling out.
You will get many hundreds or thousands, because more water is flowing into and out of the burst heater.

But heaters usually leak slowly, then gradually faster, but yes they can leak suddenly and with high volume, just not that often.

And having a big tub or pool around your water heater will make maintenance difficult.
It is likely a code violation to not have clearance and access all around it.

A much simpler safety plan is to install a water heater catch pan underneath, with a drain line from the pan to a floor drain, sump pump, or outside.