I've just finished building brand new house and I put standard domestic Hot Water heater with tank. Now I see that Takagi and other manufacturers makes tankless water heaters and they are not that much more expensive than standard domestic ones. My question is, if I ever decide to get rid of domestic ones can I put Takagi tankless water heater instead eventhou I was told It will be bloody expensive because my mecanical room is not on outside wall, it is in the middle of the house. Does that make any sense to you?
That's exactly what I intend to do in the primary zone in my house. Everything is there except the 110v outlet, and there is one I can daisy chain from within 5'. I may not be the final authority on this, but an air intake from the attic is there, gas connection, cold water in pipe, hot water out pipe, vent pipe, blow-off pressure valve drain pipe. What else would you need?. I see it as a direct exchange
I'm not an expert on these but I understand it is not a direct replacement for a standard water heater. The gas line should be larger is what I've seen (like 1" or more....not sure on that). Better keep investigating before purchasing!
Changing from tank to tankless should not be particularly expensive if the two heaters are the same fuel type. If you have an electric tank type and install an electric tankless or have a gas tank type and install a gas tankless.
If you have an electric tank type heater and no chimney or exterior wall nearby, switching to a gas heater, whether tank type or tankless will be expensive.
The Takagi requires special stainless venting, probably the largest expense in an interior installation. I seem to recall wholesale materials cost of our exhaust stack components was over $400 for a somewhat long run from an interior room.
Larger tankless heaters require a lot of gas. The gas guys mistakenly ran a 1/2" line when plumbing for ours, it needed a 1" line because of the length of the run, otherwise 3/4" would have been OK.
With power venting my tankless Bosch can run maybe 25ft, or longer. Replace it you will save maybe 25% easily. They are full btu replacements if you size it right, but the cost is 2-6x that of a tank. I left my old tank in place as a tempering tank for the cold incomming water.
My 1988 Kenmore gas 40gallon has a 40,000 BTU input.
Read the specs for the gas tagaki, its BTU input is several times larger.
In terms of gas usage, the tankless will be the largest single consumer of gas in your house by a LARGE margin at any instant of time. Granted it only runs when hot water is flowing so its total gas use is not that great. But when its on, it uses ALOT of gas.
Whole house Electric tankless is similar. Dedicated circuits must be installed.
To go from natural gas traditional to natural gas tankless, you will need the following 1. New gas line installed from meter or from the distribution line in your house. 2. Stainless steel exhaust installed thru the roof (can't share with furnace, and this baby is HOT) 3. new 115V circuit.
The costs of the install may well rival or exceed the costs of the equipment.
For example, I see a competitor's tankless electric. Depending on capacity, they recommend minimum wire size of 6 guage, and 60 to 180AMPs of circuit breaker capacity (60A, 2x40A, 2x50A, 2x60A, 3x50A, or 3x60A)
In the manual my Bosch states it can be run to a chimney, so it can share it with a furnace. My 117000 btu unit uses and was sized to use the existing Ng pipe. Of course the large 190000 btu units use alot more Ng.
Hallerb, my Bosch 117000 btu unit has a payback of 4 yrs, I save 20$ a month, in summer my total Ng bill is now 6$ and that includes cooking and Ng dryer. I used a 1/2" pipe, no additional work. Tankless are the way to go, to bad few know the facts.
He said he just built the house so it's highly unlikely to have less than a 200A electric service to begin with. Not many homes would need dual 200A service (split 400A) just to handle the house and a tankless water heater.
Living in an area with power cuts regular like, I sure appreciate the natural gas water heater I use. No electric needed. And a hot shower in the morning is nice when the power is off, and the portable heater isn't doing the job.
tankless whole house hot water heaters are the largest single consumer of energy in your house while they are running.
The difference for gas is 40,000 BTU input that runs several hours a day to keep 40 gallons at 125F vs 198,000 BTU input that runs maybe 30 minutes a day.
And yes, an extra 200Amp circuit will have to be run from the local utility JUST to supply the tankless Electric as so few of us will have more than 200Amps already installed, much less as spare capacity. But keep in mind 200Amps is for the largest of the tankless units. The smaller ones can get away with 50 to 60Amps, and we MAY have the spare capacity for that in our breaker panel.
I used to use 26-30 a month for Ng for cooking, HW and dryer in summer with a tank, now I use 6$ Ng a month in summer, cooking and dryer use have not changed, standby loss and heating 40 gallons cost is greater than you think.
rgamon, when you say a tankless is the single biggest user of gas, that is untrue for many users. Ng tankless have true modulating gas valves. My 117000 bosch runs from apx 30000 btu to 117000 btu, I have never needed or used 117000 Btu even with 35f incomming water, I have never set it to high and have hot showers. Now in summer even the lowest setting is to warm for me. The bigger Takagi goes even lower to maybe
15000 btu, Tankless only use the energy needed to reach the temp desired. Tankless have a much higher "Energy Factor" a true rating, than tank.
Shows a pretty large difference between tank and tankless for gas water heaters.
For the electric however:
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There is very little difference. It would appear that stack losses from the tank type gas heater are the largest factor. Heating a large volume of water isn't an issue when you can insulate it well as in the electric models.
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