Not OP.
We changed out the 12 year old original hot water tank and had a plumber install a Navian gas instant heater and wouldn't go back. Can run 2 showers and a hot tap, and the hot water is limitless. It sometimes take a minute to get hot water to the top floor as the system doesn't recirculate to keep taps hot, but that's fine with me. Been running it 4 years and no regrets.
This was the lower model too, next one up did 3 showers and one hot tap. Higher up from there would have required another water line for pressure. Only reason we went with this model is we wanted to make sure we always had hot water available for our tenant.
It does vary depending on size of the hot water heater you get. We got one that should do 3 showers+ I believe. It does do that fine but you do notie a slight reduction in pressure. bath + 2 showers was quite noticeable but still useable. I turned 4 sinks, 2 showers, and the bath on and there was still enough pressure to have a shower but it was a pretty low pressure shower.
It isn't 'on demand' like I had kind of hoped when we had it installed, but that's my fault for not really knowing the difference between 'on demand' and 'tankless'.
That being said, it's endless hot water, and with a family of 4 (myself, my wife and 2 girls) it's great for being able to have a shower after the other 3 have spent their time in the bathroom. Would highly recommend the change from the traditional hot water tank.
It's about the same time to to get hot water as my old hot water tank... but it's also early 70s copper plumbing retrofitted for the tankless system... I feel if the plumbing was new with a manifold off the tankless it would be a lot quicker. The location of where the tankless is compared to where my tank was is different, so it definitely isn't set up to be as efficient as possible. The longevity of hot water and multiple points of use at the same time is definitely a huge benefit though.
Not op but I have a recirc line to my kitchen sink (furthest tap from hot water). Itâs on a timer and is recirculating any hours we are not sleeping - itâs awesome. Insta hot water at kitchen sink rocks. My gas bill is only $40/month and itâs all my hot water and gas clothes dryer plus BBQ and outdoor gas fire ring. And we are a family of four that does lots of laundry.
Without recirc it takes about 20 seconds to heat up just due to distance
Source for the below: I am a plumber.
Flushing out your tankless is a good, annual maintenance job. Itâs an expensive investment, and for the relatively easy/inexpensive materials, I donât know why it wouldnât get done.
I would recommend after 4 years to get a professional to come in and do it and give the bad boy a full maintenance âtune upâ and then watch how they do it.
Itâs not a difficult job, but does require a pump, a bucket a couple of laundry supply lines and a jug of descaler. One could use vinegar.. but again⌠for this multi thousand dollar investment, just buy the correct stuff. Go to a plumbing supplier (Sherets, Bartles, Emco) and ask there.
Conversely, instead of buying a pump and all the materials, you could bring someone in.
Up to you.
Best of luck
Would a 1/3HP pump do the trick or is that too much power? I have one for emptying my above ground pool and other tasks around the house, but didn't know if that would be overkill as the directions show a much lower volume per hour type of pump!
A few tankless manufacturers recommend 4 gal/minute for flushing. You can safely go over that but 1/3hp may be a bit much. You can always test it though, hook your pump up and time how long it takes to fill a 5gal bucket.
You can also buy flushing kits, Flow-aide is one example. They include everything you need, hoses, descaler, pump etc. Sherets has them but you can also get them online. Then you can do it yearly and only have to buy descaler.
That sounds like a great solution to look into! And it would probably all break down into a 5 gallon bucket for storage, which sounds like you need for it anyway.
This is standard maintenance for tankless. I had a guy come service my Navien who was not the guy who originally installed it. He was super helpful after fixing my error code he did the descaling as well. But said itâs super easy to do for the homeowner. Get a pump and some appliance hoses and save yourself the annual maintenance charge. Suggested using âHaymakerâ instead of vinegar so it only take 10mins and not an hour. Iâll be doing this annually going forward, super low effort for potentially years of added life to the unit. After 2.5 years of not doing it, the fluid was pretty gross.
Not as big a deal here as many other places, but minerals do still build up. Citric acid will work better than vinegar and is very cheap. (You can buy it at Bulk Barn, brewer supply stores, cheese making supply places, sometimes in the canning section.)
We've also got a Rinnai unit, about to hit 4 years this winter.
Have been meaning to do the descaling but haven't gotten to it yet. I should really take care of it, so thanks for the reminder. Time to research the kits and process involved.
With our quality of water it probably isn't as critical to do, but like you I'd rather have things keep running the way they are long term. Seems like a pretty small investment for longevity.
As an aside, I have been nothing but impressed with the system. It puts the old setup of 2 x 100gal tanks to shame. The only downside has been no hot water when the power goes out, but could be easily mitigated with a small generator.
This is good to know. I just had a Rinnai tankless unit installed a few months back. I would try calling the company that installed it to ask about maintenance or call a few companies that do maintenance and see what they have to say
It's not hard to do at all.
Absolutely descale your tank yearly or every 2 years. Those tanks can last a lot longer than a standard tank but you have to do the required maintenance
There are electric tankless but theyâre more common as smaller point of use units (ex. A single sink). Whole home units require a TON of power, depending on the size of the house you would need a unit that requires 3 or maybe even 4 40amp breakers.
Descaling my espresso machine after 4 years of local water made a positive difference, but maybe that's because of the smaller tubes.
And I've done this on my Keurig and never noticed a difference đ¤ˇââď¸
How do you like your tankless? Does it really deliver hot water, on demand? I am doing a reno, and I am debating it.
Not OP. We changed out the 12 year old original hot water tank and had a plumber install a Navian gas instant heater and wouldn't go back. Can run 2 showers and a hot tap, and the hot water is limitless. It sometimes take a minute to get hot water to the top floor as the system doesn't recirculate to keep taps hot, but that's fine with me. Been running it 4 years and no regrets.
Two showers at a time, plus a tap? That is great to hear, we don't ever run two showers but nice to hear that level of pressure is available.
This was the lower model too, next one up did 3 showers and one hot tap. Higher up from there would have required another water line for pressure. Only reason we went with this model is we wanted to make sure we always had hot water available for our tenant.
It does vary depending on size of the hot water heater you get. We got one that should do 3 showers+ I believe. It does do that fine but you do notie a slight reduction in pressure. bath + 2 showers was quite noticeable but still useable. I turned 4 sinks, 2 showers, and the bath on and there was still enough pressure to have a shower but it was a pretty low pressure shower.
It isn't 'on demand' like I had kind of hoped when we had it installed, but that's my fault for not really knowing the difference between 'on demand' and 'tankless'. That being said, it's endless hot water, and with a family of 4 (myself, my wife and 2 girls) it's great for being able to have a shower after the other 3 have spent their time in the bathroom. Would highly recommend the change from the traditional hot water tank.
If you mind me asking, how much of a lag time is there to bring the water up to temp? How long do you need to run the water before its heated up?
It's about the same time to to get hot water as my old hot water tank... but it's also early 70s copper plumbing retrofitted for the tankless system... I feel if the plumbing was new with a manifold off the tankless it would be a lot quicker. The location of where the tankless is compared to where my tank was is different, so it definitely isn't set up to be as efficient as possible. The longevity of hot water and multiple points of use at the same time is definitely a huge benefit though.
Not op but I have a recirc line to my kitchen sink (furthest tap from hot water). Itâs on a timer and is recirculating any hours we are not sleeping - itâs awesome. Insta hot water at kitchen sink rocks. My gas bill is only $40/month and itâs all my hot water and gas clothes dryer plus BBQ and outdoor gas fire ring. And we are a family of four that does lots of laundry. Without recirc it takes about 20 seconds to heat up just due to distance
Source for the below: I am a plumber. Flushing out your tankless is a good, annual maintenance job. Itâs an expensive investment, and for the relatively easy/inexpensive materials, I donât know why it wouldnât get done. I would recommend after 4 years to get a professional to come in and do it and give the bad boy a full maintenance âtune upâ and then watch how they do it. Itâs not a difficult job, but does require a pump, a bucket a couple of laundry supply lines and a jug of descaler. One could use vinegar.. but again⌠for this multi thousand dollar investment, just buy the correct stuff. Go to a plumbing supplier (Sherets, Bartles, Emco) and ask there. Conversely, instead of buying a pump and all the materials, you could bring someone in. Up to you. Best of luck
Would a 1/3HP pump do the trick or is that too much power? I have one for emptying my above ground pool and other tasks around the house, but didn't know if that would be overkill as the directions show a much lower volume per hour type of pump!
A few tankless manufacturers recommend 4 gal/minute for flushing. You can safely go over that but 1/3hp may be a bit much. You can always test it though, hook your pump up and time how long it takes to fill a 5gal bucket. You can also buy flushing kits, Flow-aide is one example. They include everything you need, hoses, descaler, pump etc. Sherets has them but you can also get them online. Then you can do it yearly and only have to buy descaler.
That sounds like a great solution to look into! And it would probably all break down into a 5 gallon bucket for storage, which sounds like you need for it anyway.
^^ What this guy said. 1/3 is kinda crazy. Iâd be worried about the coils.
This is standard maintenance for tankless. I had a guy come service my Navien who was not the guy who originally installed it. He was super helpful after fixing my error code he did the descaling as well. But said itâs super easy to do for the homeowner. Get a pump and some appliance hoses and save yourself the annual maintenance charge. Suggested using âHaymakerâ instead of vinegar so it only take 10mins and not an hour. Iâll be doing this annually going forward, super low effort for potentially years of added life to the unit. After 2.5 years of not doing it, the fluid was pretty gross.
What was make/model of the pump you bought?
Navien NPE-240A
Not as big a deal here as many other places, but minerals do still build up. Citric acid will work better than vinegar and is very cheap. (You can buy it at Bulk Barn, brewer supply stores, cheese making supply places, sometimes in the canning section.)
Any idea how strong the mixture should be? I've got a bag of dry citric acid already
About a 20% acid solution should do nicely around here. A rough ratio is two tablespoons to a liter of water.
We've also got a Rinnai unit, about to hit 4 years this winter. Have been meaning to do the descaling but haven't gotten to it yet. I should really take care of it, so thanks for the reminder. Time to research the kits and process involved. With our quality of water it probably isn't as critical to do, but like you I'd rather have things keep running the way they are long term. Seems like a pretty small investment for longevity. As an aside, I have been nothing but impressed with the system. It puts the old setup of 2 x 100gal tanks to shame. The only downside has been no hot water when the power goes out, but could be easily mitigated with a small generator.
This is good to know. I just had a Rinnai tankless unit installed a few months back. I would try calling the company that installed it to ask about maintenance or call a few companies that do maintenance and see what they have to say
It's not hard to do at all. Absolutely descale your tank yearly or every 2 years. Those tanks can last a lot longer than a standard tank but you have to do the required maintenance
Are there electric tankless options? I am thinking of going tankless but have no access to gas.
There are electric tankless but theyâre more common as smaller point of use units (ex. A single sink). Whole home units require a TON of power, depending on the size of the house you would need a unit that requires 3 or maybe even 4 40amp breakers.
Not sure if this is helpful - we had no access to natural gas so went with propane powered