I had trouble with the debris in the tank clogging up the drain on the bottom. I ended up unhooking the hose from the back of my washing machine and hooking it to the to drain on the water heater and flushing water back into the water heater to undo any clogs. Then unhooked the washing machine hose and let it drain until it clogged again. Repeated that a half dozen times until i could get all the water out without it clogging. I then vacuumed out that i could get at from the hole where the element goes. Then I opened the fill valve and kept the drain open to flush the tank out even more.