Help fix water heater flue!

[Hass]

When I purchased my house, I had my propane guy come out to help me redo the 1/2" lines to 3/4" lines so I can run more appliances at once. When he was down in my basement, he said that the previous owners were not very smart in continuing to use the flue set up they had and he advised them to get it fixed previously. Obviously they didn't get it fixed. The propane supplier was one of the guys that actually placed the water heater in it's current spot about 4 years ago... So when I bought the house he was a big help in telling me about what I didn't already know. He knew these people for the last 15 years, and was out here every other month so he knew a lot about the house and the previous owners habits of not keeping up with ANYTHING. I already knew that much... Since I was gutting the house anyway

But I never replaced the water heater. I planned on going tankless, but I think I'm going to keep the traditional water heater until this one breaks since it's rather new and I don't think I'll make much money back by switching to tankless... Especially since I don't know how long I'll be here for!

The reason I want to fix it is this.
1. It's STUPID.
2. It will lose flame in the winter months about once a week, and about 95% of the time when it's windy out. The flame when lit will be very... erratic. It will stay lit, but act like it's about to go out. The only way I can describe it is that it acts like a flame on the stove top on high, with the wind blowing on it. Half the burners go out, then relite, then 3/4 of them go out, then relite, then half again... etc... This results in a lot of unburned propane being dumped in to my basement. The smell is so thick sometimes, and my basement is only 10'x8'. A lot of propane in a small basement is not a good mix!!
3. I also posted in a CO thread about thinking this may be making me not sleep well and feel.. "not myself" I'm sleeping in the laundry room which is right next to my basement (also another 10x8 room). There are holes in the wall for the water drain and hot/cold lines... So the air is able to infiltrate in to the laundry room no problem. My CO detector highest reading is 34 PPM so far... Which probably was when I'm sleeping since I take a shower then go to sleep afterward. So the propane tank will be on then possibly cause the CO in to the room I'm sleeping in.

But mainly... I very much despise getting home at 3am after a 14hr day... Turn the shower on, get undressed, only to realize the water is ice cold. Sometimes I just take a shower in it and freeze to death, sometimes I hop my naked butt down in the basement, climb over the cistern wall (about 4ft high), stand in mucky water from my leaky basement and relite the pilot, then sit upstairs until the water warms up.
Sometimes it will be fine for me, but then go out afterward... So the girlfriend will wake me up at 6am saying she needs me to go turn on the water so she can take a shower before she goes to work... Cutting in to my sleeping time.

Sorry about the rants and unnecessary info, it's just really been bugging me. I was going to deal with it until the summer, but I gotta fix it now.

How on earth do I fix this?
Is my best bet to just pop a new hole in the wall straight out, and then I'll only have 2 90 bends inside the house. Will that really make that much of a difference? Eliminating one elbow?
Don't forget there's one more elbow outside of the house, making the pipe go straight up the side of the house. So there's 4 90 bends within about a 2 foot distance.
I might be able to use a 45 on top of the water heater, then a 90 to get out of the house using the existing hole

It runs 8ft high outside, that places it one foot above my root eave. not counting the cap.

edit;
I see people using flex pipe... Is that acceptable by you guys?
http://www.nachi.org/forum/f22/water-heater-flue-pipe-43719/

 

[semipro]

Why do you think it is that the water heater flames out? Where's the wind coming from?
Is the basement its in open to outside air other than through the WH flue?
If that's a cold basement it seems like a tankless gas unit might be worth the investment.

 

[Hass]

Why do you think it is that the water heater flames out? Where's the wind coming from?
Is the basement its in open to outside air other than through the WH flue?
If that's a cold basement it seems like a tankless gas unit might be worth the investment.

I can't get a draft, then there's a little switch that you press in like a breaker that gets tripped. I'm not sure what actually trips the sensor.
It draws air from a drafty crawlspace, so it can pull enough outside air I think.

Anyway, it went out a few mins ago... I put a CO detector in the basement, to measure the CO down there... It was beeping, so I open up the basement door to see the CO detector LED in the 150s and flashing. it's peak CO level was 182 PPM
Got 41 up in the living space right now, windows open. It's strange because it didn't go out at all yesterday when it was windy... now it's just chilly and no wind at all and blew out.


this is it.
http://www.whirlpoolwaterheaters.com/learn_more/flamelockwaterheateroperation.aspx

except it's a tank made by american water heater company with "flameguard"

 

[fishingpol]

I'll just throw my .02 in here. Newer hot water tanks that have a closed combustion chamber at the bottom of the tank use a double wall flue set up. I have at my job Bradford White tanks that use a side wall vent attached to the side of our buildings. The inner pipe is the flue to the outside, and the outer pipe is the fresh air intake that goes to a plenum and delivered to the bottom of the hot water tank at the combustion chamber. This set up has very rigid piping to the outside, but the cap on the side of the building is nice as you don't need a vertical run up unless you have to be a certain height off the ground. Usually it is around 7-8 feet off the ground. These tanks work great in windy conditions. You would need an optimal set up and not much room for jerry rigging. It looks like a tough situation what you have there, a tankless may give you more options for mounting and venting.

(broken link removed to http://www.bradfordwhite.com/products/detail.asp?id=1&product_id=9)

 

[don m]

If you have a sealed combustion chamber, there is an air inlet screen on the bottom. If this gets plugged, you get incomplete combustion, so you can try to brush it, or pull burner, & blow it out. If you get water to the screen, you may have to junk it. More info needed......don

 

[Hass]

If you have a sealed combustion chamber, there is an air inlet screen on the bottom. If this gets plugged, you get incomplete combustion, so you can try to brush it, or pull burner, & blow it out. If you get water to the screen, you may have to junk it. More info needed......don

I'm willing to bet water has reached it before....
There's definitely a screen down there. I took a shop vac to it once before, I can't figure a way to remove it. I can't really even see it... the heater is only 3-4" off the ground. The previous owners had a semi non working sump pump in the basement so I'm willing to bet it flooded pretty good before. The pump would work, but only when plugged in. They were fairly lazy, so probably never bothered to check unless they had to relite the heater I figure. I can see the water line up almost a foot from the bottom of the PT wood stairs.
The heater is new from about 4-5 years ago... So maybe the water rose too high and junked their old water heater. This one seems in decent shape for the most part minus this problem.

You saying the whole heater is junk? Or the screen?

I should've known there was something up when the homeowner told me about the new heater... and said how nice it is because it has an automatic lighter on it so you don't have to go down there with matches. I just brushed it off, figuring it's when he runs out of propane or something. Because I knew you rarely ever have to relit a water heater... I should've caught it, but I didn't. Hindsight is 20/20 they say.

I'll just throw my .02 in here. Newer hot water tanks that have a closed combustion chamber at the bottom of the tank use a double wall flue set up. I have at my job Bradford White tanks that use a side wall vent attached to the side of our buildings. The inner pipe is the flue to the outside, and the outer pipe is the fresh air intake that goes to a plenum and delivered to the bottom of the hot water tank at the combustion chamber. This set up has very rigid piping to the outside, but the cap on the side of the building is nice as you don't need a vertical run up unless you have to be a certain height off the ground. Usually it is around 7-8 feet off the ground. These tanks work great in windy conditions. You would need an optimal set up and not much room for jerry rigging. It looks like a tough situation what you have there, a tankless may give you more options for mounting and venting.

(broken link removed to http://www.bradfordwhite.com/products/detail.asp?id=1&product_id=9)

I like these heaters, they're near the top of my list if I end up replacing. Figure it'll be the safest way.