Usually when the upper thermostat goes bad you will have no hot water at all while a bad lower thermostat makes itself known when there is only a small amount of hot water before the tap water goes cold.
Electric hot water heater thermostat test.
You will also need to check the water heater thermostat with digital multimeter tools.
Testing is the only option if you want to determine whether or not one or both of them has failed.
Working of a thermostat.
When an upper heating element or thermostat fails the entire water heater stops producing hot water.
You can test them with the power off using an ohmmeter to measure resistance or with the power on using a voltmeter to measure voltage.
When a lower heating element or thermostat fails the top thermostat and element will continue to heat water in the upper half of the tank but you will notice the hot water quickly runs out or is only lukewarm.
Although most of the cases this scenario occurs for the power supply problems.
In this case testing the thermostat is a little bit of a technical task but not hard at all.
An electric water heater uses one or two heating elements to heat the water inside the tank.
If you want to test a thermostat on an electric water heater you will also need to check the heating element.
Electric water heater thermostats are a fairly simple devices that can fail from time to time.
Lower thermostat ensures that the hot water keeps coming and it does not turn cold when you turn on the hot water tap.
When a water heater no longer produces hot water.
To look for faults you will need to use a screwdriver.
The electric heater has a total of two thermostats each performing distinct functions.
This is important especially as open and grounded heating elements result in inaccurate tests.
Structure of water heater.
Upper thermostat makes it possible for you to have cold water supply when you turn on the tap of hot water.
If the thermostats are okay you need to test the water heater elements.
How to test a water heater element with a multimeter.
If the hot water heater is not working one of the thermostats may be bad.
Electric water heaters have one or two elements and each is controlled by a thermostat.
In general there are three main components in an electric water heater.
How to test water heater thermostat this case might happen for the defected thermostat.