Hi Everyone, My wife and I just finished a complete remodel on our home including all new copper piping. A few months after we finished, the older water heater started leaking so we bought a new 50-gal Whirlpool gas unit. At that point we started noticing that our faucets were being plugged by some sort of sediment. I drained the WH through a mesh and collected about 3 tablespoons of this stuff. It's white/blue and is water-soluable. It does not have any taste. There does not appear to be any of this crud in the cold water. I am not sure if it makes a difference but we have an older water softener and gravity-fed recirculation system and everything was installed by yours truly. Any ideas on what this stuff is? Our water is pretty hard but we have the softener on the water main coming into the house and the softener appears to be working fine. Victor

Hello - I have rather an odd problem lately. The hottest water that comes from my hot water heater varies in temperature. Most of the time the water is nice and hot. Sometimes, though, it just won't get hot enough for a hot shower. The water is still warm enough not to be uncomfortable, but I love *hot* showers and it just feels lukewarm to me. It hasn't always been this way. It started happening in the past few months. Usually morning showers are plenty hot. It's the shower in the evening that is at risk of not being warm enough. However, this isn't always the case. The lack of hot water seems to strike at random times. We run no water-using appliances during the day and never use hot water for cooking. I used to think it was because someone ran the washer or dishwasher on a warm cycle before I took my shower, but it happens when no one has washed clothes or dishes for days. There's only 2 of us living in my house and I know when my other half showers so it's not that either. Besides, when the water is hot, the two of us have never been able to make the tank run out of hot water. We have a US Craftmaster natural gas water heater of indeterminate age (probably 10 years old or less) which was professionally installed. There are no leaks to speak of. The heater is set to the lowest temperature setting. We've lived in our house for two years without trouble from this appliance. Do you have any ideas as to why this might happen? I turned the heat setting up one notch this morning to try to head off the problem, but I'm worried the heater might be ready to die. Thanks! Em