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I always ask my husband his opinion when I see these types of questions since he works with gas appliances and FWIW- he hasn't worked with Noritz but between the Rheem and Rinnai he recommends the Rinnai (he has never had to replace one) but recommends you go with the R75 because it costs a few hundred less and all you lose is a 1/2 gallon per minute. He said unless you routinely run 3 faucets at once or something the R94 is overkill and because of the water pressure in a house it would probably realistically be closer to 5.5 gallons per minute rather than 9.4
He mentioned that $3000 sounded a bit high and to contact your gas company for a quote.
Good luck
Thanks for your input.
It could be overkill. I'm not sure. I'm afraid to go smaller though because most of the complaints I've seen regarding tankless heaters are due to the units being undersized for the application.
My house has three adults, and three bathrooms, so it's possible though not likely that we'll be running three showers at once. Two showers in the morning at the same time definitely happens frequently. I could see occasionally throwing in the clothes washer or dishwasher too, but that's probably not that likely either.
My understanding about the gallons per minute rating is that you won't ever get 9.8 since that rating depends on both the temperature of your incoming cold water and the target temperature you're trying to hit for the outgoing hot water. The 9.8 rating is for the scenario where your cold water is 70 degrees, and your target hot water temperature is 100 degrees, a 30 degree rise. I know that my cold water is definitely not 70 degrees, and the target temperature out of the box is 120, and I may bump it a little higher.
Assume that my cold water is 50 degrees (which is likely in the winter) and my target temperature is 120 degrees. That's a 70 degree rise. The R94 can only deliver 4.8 GPM in that scenario. If you assume two showers, both with 2.5 GPM shower heads, you're already over the capacity of the R98. Assuming my math and understanding of how it works is correct, I don't think going smaller is a good idea. Especially when we're only talking about a few hundred bucks difference at most.
I have the Rinnai R94 installed by Poole's and it's pretty awesome. I never have temperature fluctuations, which is something that plagued us with a GE tankless we had in a previous home. I highly recommend the Rinnai.
Just a followup to my earlier post. I ended up getting the Noritz NR98-DVC tankless water heater installed by Schwartz Plumbing. I'm very happy with the unit and the installation was very clean and professional. They extended the warranty of the unit to 12 years for both parts and labor, and included descaling service every 3 years at no charge.
One bit of advice however... If you get a heater installed and they run new gas piping, you may want to ask them to run "hard" pipe the whole way if possible as opposed to using flexible gas line. According to the building code, if they use flexible gas piping, they're then required to install a "bonding wire" between your gas meter and the grounding rod near your electrical meter. In my case, the meters are quite far apart from each other, so running a bonding wire would be somewhat difficult and the end result wouldn't be very attractive. The guys at Schwartz Plumbing were very accommodating and had no problem using hard pipe for the whole run.
I currently have the target temperature set on 110 degrees and it is plenty hot enough for showers. I have read that some people have issues with dishwashers that require a minimum of 120 degree water, but that doesn't seem to be the case with my current dishwasher.
When I turn on the shower, I get hot water in about 30 seconds, definitely less than a minute. That's totally acceptable in my opinion. Never running out of hot water is awesome.
I took some "before" pictures, but I still need to take "after" pictures. Once I do, I'll post some here if anyone is interested.
I have the Rinnai R94 installed by Poole's and it's pretty awesome. I never have temperature fluctuations, which is something that plagued us with a GE tankless we had in a previous home. I highly recommend the Rinnai.
Poole's installed our Rinnai as well. Not sure what model, but think we went with one jump up from what they determined we needed. 3 showers in the house, washer, and dishwasher. When the kids are all home, the washer is running constantly and everyone is showering and washing their hair, never run out of water. Love it. Thought Poole's did a good job. Would recommend them.
As promised, back with some observations. ...
Cheers!
Another update. Over Thanksgiving, we had a full house for a week. 9 adults. Apart from the logistics (is there a shower free?) there was no coordination of showers or laundry. Didn't hear a complaint about lack of hot water.
Now if the unit is reliable, count me in as a very happy customer. I've appreciated what I've learned from this forum, hope this helps someone else.
In my personal home we checked the energy costs and within four years saved enough to offset the additional two thirds the cost for the difference in equipment and installation. From now on, my family will ALWAYS have a tankless water heater.
There are many brands. We will only use Rinnai and have installed quite a few over the past few years as they have become more and more affordable.
In my personal home we checked the energy costs and within four years saved enough to offset the additional two thirds the cost for the difference in equipment and installation. From now on, my family will ALWAYS have a tankless water heater.
There are many brands. We will only use Rinnai and have installed quite a few over the past few years as they have become more and more affordable.
MOD CUT link
Gas water heater to gas tankless??? Or electric water heater to gas tankless?
Gas water heater to gas tankless??? Or electric water heater to gas tankless?
Tankless. Hands down.
Poole's Plumbing installed a Rinnai several years ago. Has been a boon. Every few months we have a house full. Three showers, dishwasher, washing machine going constantly. So nice to never run out of hot water.
In between, we are not paying to heat and keep hot a lot of water we aren't using.
We got the slightly larger size, it was only a few hundred more. Our gas bills went up a bit, but not nearly as much as our electric bill went down.
Only drawback is that the hot water heating system needs to be flushed once a year. You can do it yourself with a pump, a couple buckets, and white vinegar.
We have hired Poole's to do it every year. Apparently, they use a more effective flushing agent than white vinegar. However, their charge for doing this has gone steadily up. Last time we got the bill, I was astounded. It was north of a hundred dollars for less than an hour's work.
Anyone have a service that charges less to flush out their tankless system?
Overall the conversion costs can be hard to pay back. With natural gas prices low it seems that paying off the installation cost in 4 years would be a unique situation.
Poole's Plumbing installed a Rinnai several years ago. Has been a boon. Every few months we have a house full. Three showers, dishwasher, washing machine going constantly. So nice to never run out of hot water.
In between, we are not paying to heat and keep hot a lot of water we aren't using.
We got the slightly larger size, it was only a few hundred more. Our gas bills went up a bit, but not nearly as much as our electric bill went down.
Only drawback is that the hot water heating system needs to be flushed once a year. You can do it yourself with a pump, a couple buckets, and white vinegar.
We have hired Poole's to do it every year. Apparently, they use a more effective flushing agent than white vinegar. However, their charge for doing this has gone steadily up. Last time we got the bill, I was astounded. It was north of a hundred dollars for less than an hour's work.
Anyone have a service that charges less to flush out their tankless system?
I like properly designed and installed tankless systems but actually I was questioning the payback time as it seemed pretty quick to me and my experience. I just wanted to know if you were going from a typical gas water heater to a gas tankless or an electric water heater to a gas tankless. Traditional gas water heater to gas tankless (in my experience) would take a very long time to pay back (about 10 years or so)although there are certainly other advantages. Switching to gas tankless from an electric water heater would pay back much quicker.
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Tankless water heater
