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Are Rinnai water heaters all they say?

WillieWonka | Posted in General Discussion on February 11, 2007 06:31am

I’ve been hearing that the gov’t gives a $300 energy savings rebate to Rinnai water heater homeowners. I hear their ads all over the place for eternal hot water. So I decide “ok, I’ll get certified to do their installs.” I then got certified.

Then I tried “selling” them.  That is I felt I had a reasonable amount of knowledge to sell the things. So far I’ve run across a FEW people, not all, that say they wished they never installed one, that they’re not anywhere as good as a tank heater, and that a 70% savings is bogus and misleading and that the cost to install one is still far greater than traditional tank heaters replacing them several times over the time it would take to recoup the cost of a Rinnai.

I don’t know what to believe. Rinnai ain’t gonna tell me about problems they may have with customers, so I dunno where to go to get the truth, are they as great and efficient and do they ultimately begin to save the homeowner?

If at first you don’t succeed, try using a hammer next time…everything needs some extra persuasion from time to time.  -ME
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  1. User avater
    shelternerd | Feb 11, 2007 09:19am | #1

    They're all we install since the last five years but the claims are exaggerated, certainly we don't see 70% cost reduction. Your customers will never run out of hot water so they will take longer showers and use more gas just from that fact alone. Plus, they have pressure problems to deal with (not more than 8.5 GPM through put and practically speaking the top is about 5 GPM.) On addition to this you have a slug of cold water that develops in the heat exchanger during the time your wife finishes her shower and you start yours, since the water in the pipes cools much more slowly than the water in the heat exchanger. When you hop in the shower two minutes after she gets out you get a cold water surprise, very short duration, but quite unpleasant.

    We get around this cold slug with a "Tempering Tank," a 12 gallon electric water heater installed between the Rinnai and the house. You can hook it up to the electric and use it's internal elements to keep the hot water hot after the Rinnai does the work of heating it, and then you have a tank of hot water to serve your re-circulating hot system.

    We use a Taco 009 circulator to spin hot water through the Rinnai when the tank gets cold rather than using the electric elements in the tempering tank but that is a complicated and expensive system and probably not what you would be interested in. It gets us past the 5 GPM top flow rate for brief periods and sets us up for using the Rinnai for radiant heat as well as domestic hot water.

    They are all we sell, in most cases our customers will never run out of hot water and they will have lower propane bills than if they had a tank-type gas water heater (no pilot, no stand-by heat loss.) The Rinnai brand measures the temperature of the incoming water and only heats it enough to bring the temp up to the level you set so it is ideal for use with a solar water heater as an assurance that you will always have hot water even when the sun doesn't shine.

    And yes there is a tax rebate, not a big factor in my sales though.

    1. WillieWonka | Feb 11, 2007 05:00pm | #2

      Hmmm, interesting. The "cold water sandwich" as they called them (slug) was discussed in the cert class. As well as other things of course in order to do a good install. They did recommend a tank recirc system as you do in order to eliminate sandwiches.If at first you don't succeed, try using a hammer next time...everything needs some extra persuasion from time to time.  -ME

  2. User avater
    talkingdog | Feb 11, 2007 06:14pm | #3

    Rinnai is the Toyota of tankless hot water heaters.

    However, at this very moment they are embroiled in a
    highly publicized recall of fatally defective heaters in Japan,
    very likely to lead to indictments and lawsuits, etc.

    This follows on even more serious trouble with similar
    defects in Paloma heaters.

    These defects probably don't affect you since the
    models are for unvented indoor use; however, it does
    say something about corporate culture, the decline of
    Japanese quality, etc.

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