Tankless hot water heater

Has anyone got experience with tankless water heaters? Your thoughts please. Thanks.

Reply to
Remi
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here we go again:(

The idea sounds wonderful BUT!

The unit will be pricey and so will installation, likely larger gas line directly from meter, larger flue. If you go with a direct vent or any tankless requiring line voltage a power loss means no hot water at all. Electric tankless are a double looser, yu will need a main service upgrade since a decent sized electric tankless takes 150 amps or more Tankless are complex and require perodic service which can cost a lot. Endless hot water is wonderful till a teenager decides to live in shower increasing costs:( During low flow like a faucet cracked open to rinse dishes you may get no hot water or very hot overheated water.

beyond all this current foam insulated standard tanks actually have very low standby loses.

Reply to
hallerb

My plumber laughed when I asked him about them (since he features them in his ads) and said they were made for people who had too much money and he was happy to give them what they wanted. :-)

I got a regular old gas water heater from him. :-)

Reply to
Laurie

only thing i know is that they're pointless for bathtubs. except for the zillion dollar ones, they only heat like 4-6 gal a minute, and in cold weather they don't do even that. that's ok 4 a shower tho. shower runs 2.5 gal a minute, so it's fine. also, most people washing hands or even doing laundry can use em.

but if you want to fill a tub, you probably want more volume. tubfiller i'm installing right now does something like 18 gal min, would max out the tankless.

they say you can run two showers at once though off one of them if the weather's not real cold.

hth

gene

Reply to
Gene Duprés

A family can waist alot of water knowing its always there. Single users benefit most. My payback is 4-5 years on a small Bosch. Takagi and Rinnai are tops. You may or may not need a larger gas supply, you must test gas flow first. A family also saves less since standby loss of tanks is not as great with tankless with constant use. Tanks scale up, tankless realy dont, tankless should last 30 yrs since its a copper coil. You can get a 94% efficient Takagi. True tank efficiency is no the efficiency rating but the Energy rating, then you see they are near 60-70%. A minus to tanless is you cant just have a little hot water since they need a good flow to trigger on. They are worth it for the right situation, But with a bunch of kids I say no, or you will get long showers.

Reply to
ransley

Bravo! Well said.

Reply to
Meat Plow

if the goal is endless hot water go with a larger tank and higher BTU.

a 40 gallon 30K BTU tank replaced by a 50 gallon 75K BTU about doubles the water capacity

Reply to
hallerb

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