Got rid of standard water heater for a tankless years ago....one of smartest decisions I’ve ever made....endless hot water and I only heat it when I use it!!!
Lowes carries a water heater timer made by intermatic - cost is about $50. I installed one, it runs from 5am to 9am and again from 4pm to 9pm. I don’t need to have hot-hot water available 24/7 so I don’t pay for it. The weekend settings are different from the weekday settings.
In Ohio here. I rent an electric heater from AEP, pay 18.00 p/month. I have nothing to do with the heater. They hook it up, free repairs when needed. When the heater needed replaced they did it all. Hauling in, hauling out. 105 gallons of hot water. Don’t need that now, but it sure came in handy when we did. If I had to do it over, I would do the same thing. Great deal for me. Good luck
Drip Pan,what, 10 bucks, why not?
It has a port allowing it to be plumbed to a drain.
If you don’t utilize that feature and cap it only holds a few gallons and if the heater goes and you aint around for days or weeks its the same as not having one. If its a slowwww leak, the port is capped and you look at it daily you’ll be ok.
Its good if you are in a mobile home(particleboard sub floor)or an apt/condo 2nd floor,but ya still need a place for it to go so no floor drain,cap it and keep an eye on it.Condos and apts usually have the h2o htr in the same closet as the ac and maybe plumbed to the AC condesate drain,Maybe.
Mine is in the cellar and I still dont want water playing out on the floor so I put the heater on 3 bricks in the plastic pan,keeps it up and you can see under,plus the unit will displaces quit a bit of water in the pan.Its plumbed over to the floor drain. It can leak all day and I don’t care. I do shut it off when out of town,power and H2O
Be sure to make the pressure relief valve come over the top and down the side into the pan.
H2O heaters usually start to go slowly as the leak through the rusted out portion so monitoring a capped drain pan will do the trick.If the relief vale goes its a different story.
I once saw a mobile home in Melbourne Bch Fl that the heater leaked while the were up N for the summer.The entire floor swelled up to twice its thickness and need to be removed.All the funtirure and appliances were damaged at the base.
The next day I went to the folks winter mobile home and drilled a 3 inch hole in the floor next to the heater for drainage.That was a quick fix and easier than uninstalling and reinstalling to place the pan.
Your probably done by now.
I think you should record the entire event and post the clip here..
Have you considered a tankless on-demand system? Big electric savings if what I’ve heard is correct; ours is gas and savings have been dramatic over the past couple of years.
Watc hing this thread because I need to replace mine also.
Well, is it a success?
Consider a tankless water heater.. Navien or Rheem comes to mind. A little pricey but you make for it in your energy bill.
Got a new one toward end of 2011. It’s gas and in the attic. New drip pan that if leaking happened, is attached to a pipe that goes outside the house. That set up was expensive but not nearly as expensive and horrible if the water went in the ceiling and it crashed down into my upstairs bedroom. That whole thing done was close to $1,000.