Improvised Hot Water System

[Steve B]

I am going to make a winter hot water system for my cabin.

In summer, we have spring water, a 1,000 gallon tank, and a 30 gallon propane hot water heater. In winter, we haul up two or three 55 gallon barrels of fresh water at a time. We pump it to tanks in the attic. That lasts us about a week.

On the cold water side, we just use gravity feed to temporary winter spigots in kitchen and bathroom. I want to make a hot water side. I intend to do this with a two gallon hot water heater and a 12V. RV pump. The HWH is

110v. I would hook up the RV demand pump between the tank and the HWH so that as water is used, the pump would refill the tank.

Has anyone ever used a system like this? It will be for light seasonal use, just for some hot dish water and a quick shower.

Steve

[trader4]

Sounds similar to the system used in boats. My boat had a 12V pump that supplied cold water and was controlled by a pressure switch. As soon as a faucet was opened, it would run to bring the pressure back up. Connected to the cold water lines was a water heater that was driven off both 120V and heat from the boat engine cooling system. That heater was probably 7 gal or so. I'd definitely suggest a tank larger than 2 gals. It isn't going to affect electric usage much and will give you more reserve. IMO, 2 gals is gonna be gone real quick. And at 120V it will take a while to recover.

[Steve B]

Only reason right now for the small tank is that I have one and it's free. I may get the thing up and running, then see if it's adequate. It would be very easy to just switch to a larger tank later.

The b***h is that the small 110v tanks cost as much almost as the big 220v. ones.

Steve

[Goedjn]

why don't you just buy A Coleman Backpack Water Heater, or a Zodi?