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We have one, run on propane, and I love it due to endless hot water as others have said. We set the temp to the desired hot water setting, then turn on the faucet all the way to hot. No sense in mixing hot and cold to get the desired temp.
Of course, all users have to agree on what the desired "hot" setting is. I think ours is set at 115.
We have one, run on propane, and I love it due to endless hot water as others have said. We set the temp to the desired hot water setting, then turn on the faucet all the way to hot. No sense in mixing hot and cold to get the desired temp.
Of course, all users have to agree on what the desired "hot" setting is. I think ours is set at 115.
We set ours at 140. That way the hot and cold can mix together and you get greater net volume of warm water. That means it does not drop off when a second shower starts or someone turns on the dishwasher. However you do have to be careful. 140 is very hot. The shower valves are thermostatically controlled. That means you set a temperature and they adjust the mix of hot and cold to keep the temperature coming out of the shower at that level. It works very nicely. The difficulty is getting people out of the shower.
We have a tankless. It was a high cost replacement several years ago for the original owner. We haven't liked it because we've had so many problems with it. I think after three or four repairs from the original installer, we've had no problems for a year now. The endless hot water is OK, but it takes a really long time to get the hot water. I have to run the taps a long time in the winter to get hot water to the shower or the sink faucets. I don't know if this is a flaw in the design or if this is typical.
We would not have chosen tankless, and DH says he would prefer a tank. We had an electric tank heater in our last house. We replaced it once in 26 years. We replaced it probably in the 1980s and it was still working well in 2012.
Basically, we are not impressed. The brand is Navien. I'd be careful if this brand is what they would install. But it is possible that the product has been improved.
When we investigated and chose tankless we spent a lot of time looking into them and tlaking with contractors, plumbers and consumers. We were told repeatedly do not consider anything but gas/propane and no brands other than Rennai, Norritz or Takagi. That was a while ago, maybe other brands have come up that are good.
I investigated about 2 years ago when my HWH failed. I'm electric, so, my decision making came down on that side.
I decided against. I live alone, so it's generally just a load of clothes a week, a shower every day, run the dishwasher once a week or so.
It didn't make sense. The price of the unit wasn't outrageous... I was willing to pay the extra there. But the problem came in for 2 points.. Reliability and installation. I would have done the install myself, but it would require installing a new breaker box specifically for this thing. I could do it, but a ton of work.
The reliability point.. I'm on a well. There were constant complaints of people with hard water having the thing clog up.. So, I would have had to install a water softener at least.. Perhaps a whole house filtration system. Add all that up.. Not worth it.
I would never go with an electric whole-house tankless. Maybe for point-of-use, but never whole house.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Labonte18
I investigated about 2 years ago when my HWH failed. I'm electric, so, my decision making came down on that side. I decided against. I live alone, so it's generally just a load of clothes a week, a shower every day, run the dishwasher once a week or so.
It didn't make sense. The price of the unit wasn't outrageous... I was willing to pay the extra there. But the problem came in for 2 points.. Reliability and installation. I would have done the install myself, but it would require installing a new breaker box specifically for this thing. I could do it, but a ton of work.
I would never go with an electric whole-house tankless. Maybe for point-of-use, but never whole house.
Our winters here are long and cold, I'd need to upgrade my electric service just to provide sufficient instantaneous kilowatts for a tankless electric to bring the water up to temperature in the dead of winter.
I got a propane-fired whole-house tankless in part because it draws very little electricity (easily powered from a small generator). Even with the power out for several days, I always have hot water.
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I would never go with an electric whole-house tankless. Maybe for point-of-use, but never whole house.
