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Tankless Hot Water Heater?
- Thread starter Jim_S
- Start date
I have had 3 tankless water heaters for about a year and a half. So far, so good. There is a noticable savings in energy and with a family of 7, it's nice to never have any issue with running out of hot water. One of my kids spent the night at a friend's house and was talking about some problem there where people had to wait for about a half an hour after taking a hot shower before the next person could get in. I have 1 commercial unit and 2 residential units. The only difference is that the residential units are limited at 120 degrees for the max temp and they put out somewhat less BTU's.
The “Pros”:
1) Lower energy consumption because water is only heated when it’s needed.
2) Never run out of hot water (within design limits).
The “Cons”:
Aside from intial cost..........
1) Tankless must be sized for needs.
2) With GAS, consider the ignition system.
3) With ELECTRIC, requires much heavier electric supply than conventional water heater. Confirm your service panel can support load and cost of installing cables.
1) Lower energy consumption because water is only heated when it’s needed.
2) Never run out of hot water (within design limits).
The “Cons”:
Aside from intial cost..........
1) Tankless must be sized for needs.
With a tank type heater, hot water can be used at any rate until the tank temperature drops. You can have several showers drawing water at the same time.
With a tankless, it will only heat water as per design. If your tankless is designed for 1 shower, it can not heat water fast enough to support more than that at the same time.
With a tankless, it will only heat water as per design. If your tankless is designed for 1 shower, it can not heat water fast enough to support more than that at the same time.
2) With GAS, consider the ignition system.
Standing pilot is always lit, but it is the cheapest and is foolproof.
Electronic ignition lights only on demand, but needs electricity to operate.
Hybrid ignition (usually a small built in water turbine) lights only on demand without electricity, but is most expensive and can be subject to hi-tech failures.
Electronic ignition lights only on demand, but needs electricity to operate.
Hybrid ignition (usually a small built in water turbine) lights only on demand without electricity, but is most expensive and can be subject to hi-tech failures.
3) With ELECTRIC, requires much heavier electric supply than conventional water heater. Confirm your service panel can support load and cost of installing cables.
jim slagle said:
Jim ,
Stay away from the electric units . You will be disappointed. I have 4 gas tankless units in my homes . Get a multi station or 14 liter minimun unit . I love mine and the water is almost steam when set on high heat . I paid $140 a piece for mine in Panama . I brought it through Customs with no problems . The prices in the states are crazy . No one in Panama uses a tank type water heater . A real gas hog . Make sure you vent it just like any other gas appliance.
Edit : My units do not use 120 v electric for pilot . It is 2 d cell batterys so I can still use it when the power is out .
Av8r3400 said:
There was no real difference in the cost of the units. I'm not the type to go to Big Lots to buy my water heater, so for a properly sized natural gas fired tank unit, the cost was within a few hundred of the properly sized tankless unit. The price difference was made up for me in less than a year.
After using the units for a while now, I would have to say that the only legitimate "con" to the tankless water heater would be if you used it with a low water consumption front loading washing machine. Most tankless units have a switch that does not turn them on unless there is a call for around 1 gallon of water per minute. I still have a 60 gallon State tank style water heater that serves that area of our house.
Otherwise, with the larger of our 3 tankless units, you can easily have two showers running forever without any temperature drop. Each school day the one tankless unit supplies two showers, two sinks, and a bath tub every morning. The other big plus to the tankless units is their proven life expectancy is much longer than a tank unit. Also, every single part in a tankless unit is replacable. The tankless units seem "new" only in the U.S. They have been the standard in the rest of the world for decades.
When we built the House,we put in a Takagi gas fired on demand water heater(TK1).
It's been trouble free for over 5 years . It has a remote (hard wired ) control that lets You select water temps between 108 and 167 f . The only downside that I can think of is if power fails the heater has to be reset to a selected temp.
It's been trouble free for over 5 years . It has a remote (hard wired ) control that lets You select water temps between 108 and 167 f . The only downside that I can think of is if power fails the heater has to be reset to a selected temp.