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Author:
bdaalex (NJ)
Hi,
looking to see if this is possible. I have a largish house where I will have two 50g hybrid heaters on OPPOSITE SIDES of the house. For the most part, one heater will handle kitchen, guest bath and laundry while the other will handle the master and another guest bath. This setup should minimize wait times. They will be about 100 pipe feet away from each other.
My issue is the master tub, at 110 gallons, a single heater cannot accomodate it. I was thinking about running a pipe from the other heater with a check valve to prevent backflow. However, I understand that in this setup the tub will feed almost entirely off of the closer heater due to the lower resistance to water flow. The tub filler will be a kohler K-301-K-NA rated for 30gpm so will be capable of a lot of flow.
Is there a way to make this work? some sort of a valve that draws equally from each line? A pressure reducer in the line from the closer heater? I suppose I could always have two fillers but that would be asthetically pretty unappealing.
thanks,
Alex
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Author:
packy (MA)
run a 3/4 pipe from the further away heater to a point 1/2 way to the tub. put a tee in it and run a 3/4 hot pipe from the closer heater to that tee. so, hot feeds from both heaters meet at a mid point tee making them both approzimately the same length. from that tee feed only the tub fill.
fingers crossed... should work as intended..
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Author:
hj (AZ)
Run a hot water line from the first heater and connect it to the "cold water inlet" of the second one so you ALWAYS have both heaters feeding that end of the house.
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Author:
North Carolina Plumber (NC)
That's the way I'd do it. You'll have at least 100 gallons of hot water which will be plenty to fill the tub.
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Author:
packy (MA)
one heater is 100 feet away from the other..
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Author:
North Carolina Plumber (NC)
Yes, and that will dump a half a gallon or so of cold water into the 2nd heater, which will not be noticeable.
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Author:
bdaalex (NJ)
thanks to everyone who has responded.
running a line from one heater into the cold of the other had occurred to me but then that will be used for all sources of the master hot water heater. I was hoping to do it just for the tub. it seems like it would be energy inefficient to do it for all sources.
the idea of putting a tee such that both heaters are equidistant does seeem like a good idea. Does anyone else have an opinion on whether that will work.
Right now I will treat feeding the master heater from the guest heater as a backup plan.
thanks!
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Author:
hj (AZ)
SO? What is the problem with that, other than getting the pipe installed between them.
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Author:
hj (AZ)
An "equidistant tee" makes sense to YOU, but water does NOT think the same way as you do, so there is no way to tell what would happen if you did it, Most likely NOTHING.
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Author:
bdaalex (NJ)
my issue is only with efficiency and the fact that the "guest" water heater will be doing most of the work. If I am thinking about this wrong and it wont affect efficiency then maybe its the best approach.
I'm not discounting any ideas here, the majority of you know way more than me!
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Author:
packy (MA)
sometimes that is the way i think... i think about nothing.. helps my blood pressure..
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