Water heater is too small…

[Charles Patrick Bodner]

I recently moved into an old beach cottage and found that the water heater is inadequate. It fits under the bathroom vanity and appears to be only 20 gallons. The house inspector said he’d never seen anything so small before, it must be a boat water heater. It’s electric and runs on 120 amps.

I don’t have enough hot water to take a shower and wash the dishes (no dishwasher, obviously) on the same day, but there’s no place to put a full-sized water heater except in a closet about 20 feet from the bathroom, and laying all new pipes to there will be expensive.

Are there any water heaters on the market that are small enough to fit under a vanity? I’ve heard about the tankless ones but don’t you need a separate one for every faucet (i.e. sink and shower?)How could I use one for the shower if there’s no room to put it nearby? The walls are too thin. Can one be installed under the sink on the other side of the room and pipes run under the floor to the shower? I could keep the present water heater just for the kitchen and bathroom sinks.

And if I wanted to install a dishwasher at a later date could a tankless heater be added for that under the kitchen sink? Would it be expensive to run?

Thanks.

[GuestParticipant]

Electric water heaters can be mounted high on a wall or under a cabinet.

Electric instant water heaters do save money by not losing heat as does a 40-gallon vessel sitting all day throwing heat away.

Unless the electricity is produced by a dam or atomic energy, the electricity is produced by burning a fuel. the line losses transmitting the electricity are high; so most electric rates are 3 times the cost of providing the heating by burning fuels in the home. Cutting the electric bill in half by making the electric usage more efficient still makes electricity more expensive.

The typical family bill for gas or oil hot water is $250 per year. The typical electric bill for the same hot water use is $800 per year. Cutting the electric bill in half still makes it $150 per year more expensive – and the cost of installation of the point-of-use electric heater is very high.
http://www.korient.com/16Elecwat/Elecwat.htm
http://www.termotronic.com/termoi/
http://www.plumbingproducts.com/eemaxso.html

[SylvanLMPParticipant]

Harold in a medical unit I installed a 440 V instantaneous electric heater.

Of course this person could always go for a 220 commerical unit BUT the flow rate would be much slower (GPH) demand unless they have enough storage.

About the size of the electirc heater bein so small I did a 6 story one family brownstone with a 4 gallon 110 V heater under the vanity.

The origional plumber on the job failed to bring the return circulation line to the top floor thus this family had to wait a full 22 seconds for hot water to reach them.

What I did was install a 4 gallon H/W point of use heater hooked up to the hot water line by the time this electric heater did run out of hot water the main hot water was already in this tank so there were no loss of time.

Hey for the right price almost anything can be accomplished.

[Author]

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