Paragon 8145-20 is a 240V defrost timer
It is probably not best choice for water heater timer
Timer initiates defrost cycles each 4 hours.
A water heater timer should have more scheduling options.
-For example estimates show average run-time for water heater is 3 hours per day, depending on incoming water temperature, thermostat setting, and number of gallons used.
-To save money using water heater timer, you have to schedule times carefully so water heater runs less than 3 hours per day.
-Now your average electric water heater heats about 20 gallons per hour.
-Average shower uses 4-9 gallons hot water, so water heater needs to run 15-30 minutes (15 summer, 30 winter)
-Average bath uses 12-15 gallons hot water so water heater runs 45-60 minutes
-But lets say you run water heater for 1 hour and make 20 gallons of hot water. Then you take a shower, expecting hot water to remain in tank.
-Here's the problem ... cold water entered the tank to replace the shower water ... and the new cold water is cooling the rest of the tank.
-So a timer means scheduling hot water to match shower and bath events. For example taking shower and bath in immediate succession.
-Or set the timer for each individual hot water event ... for example set timer for 1/2 hour for shower, and later timer turns on 1 hour for bath, or 1-1/2 hr for 2 baths, etc
-> The flexible programming described above is not a characteristic of defrost timers.
I suggest Intermatic WH-31 240V or Intermatic T-104 240V or GE 15207. These are mechanical repeat-24 hour timers with manual override where each day has same schedule.
Digital programmable timers like Intermatic EH40 offer 7-day, 40 event programming. Weekends and weekdays can be different.
To see several box-type timers:
http://waterheatertimer.org/Boxtype.html
I programmed it to run daily from 8-8:02 am ,12-12:02pm & 4-4:02 pm. Unfortunately I have gone out to check on it 3 times in a row and found it running off schedule. Wed at about 4:30am,then Wed night at 8:30pm it had been running long enough to waist about 20 gallons and tonight some time between 11pm and midnight it started again and emptied 50 gallons. There are no timers scheduled after the 4:02 pm shut off. I notice there is a letter A on the left side bottom edge of screen and the on off beside the A keep fluttering on and off and then the timer trips on again off schedule. After going through the 10 possible timer setting options the screen has a C off 00:00 but instructions don't mention that screen or the A on the left side of the screen. The instructions do not cover trouble shooting the device and I can't start feeding the plants with the hydroponic feeding solution until I can get this blasted timer to work properly. I have tried to reset it and reprogram it but this has failed to resolve the problem 4 times so far.
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