Quick question for plumbers.

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

fido666, if your BIL is in the SE Burbs, that'll be great. I noticed it was a little wet under the my tank and it is about 14 years old so it wouldn't hurt to replace. But I've been suggested lashing out on an instant hot water system and would like an honest opinion from a plumber before we go ahead and commission the work.

If your Freeloader is leaking than it's most likely time for a new unit, the older storage types only last about 10 years. We had one of those at our last house and it burst about 10 years into it's life. If the boiler has split it's not advisable (and IIRC not legal) to repair them as they are a pressure vessel. My BIL's company services all of Melbourne so I will send you the contact details.

I have a Rinnai Infiniti 2600 instantaneous same as SteveM and I have 2 controllers the same as his on mine. I believe you can have up to 3 controllers on the 2600, they are not wireless but they have very long leads on them. The only thing I don't like about it is there seems to be a fair lag before the hot water comes through to our shower (may be the length of the pipe it has to travel from the unit), you waste a bit of water at the start. I used to collect it in a bucket and use it to flush the toilet. I gave up on that as the buckets get mucky from the soap and you end up wasting more water washing them. Not a problem if you have a grey water collection system set up but I don't. I do have a water saving shower head on mine and it's fine as long as you keep a fair flow going, the one we have is just one from Bunnings.

I don't have the Preheat tank on mine or the fancy fill the bath alarm SteveM mentioned, didn't even know the latter was posssible.

What Bourkey said about upgrading the gas line is correct. My gas meter is at the front of the house and the HWS almost all the way down the back (it's a long skinny house), replacing all the copper wasn't exactly cheap. IIRC you need to upgrade the line as the old one won't supply enough gas flow to keep the unit firing when it's in use.

[Bourkey Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close Bourkey]

fido666 just so you know Im a Registered and Licensed Plumber an Gasfitter with over 25 years in the trade. I dont recall any mention of repairing the tank. The older units can last up to 20 years if your lucky and change out the Sacrificial Anode every few years as they rust away before attacking the tank. The new units are lucky to last 12 years. As the manufactures of the units have done there testing homework and offer a 10 year warranty and they now seem to last a year or two past that.

[r4ndll Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close r4ndll]

My BIL has a the same Rinnai Infiniti system. His kids keep burning themselves when they visit as they don't know how to use mixer taps. Eldest is 10 and he just turns the hot water tap on

[Bourkey Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close Bourkey]

With mixer taps becoming popular and more affordable about 15-20 years ago. There were more incidents with children scolding themselves so the PIC (Plumbing Industry Commission) governing body in Victoria. Made it law that all new home's and Hot water renewals needed to have a Tempering valve installed at the Hot water service. This gives a mix of hot and cold water regulated so as that the water temp is not above 50c to bathrooms to prevent scolding. You are still able to have un-tempered water available to the kitchen sink and laundry. Unfortunately with a change over when you add a tempering vale the whole house ends up tempered unless the customer is prepared to pay to have a tempered and straight hot line installed. I am fairly sure that NSW would be the same as the Plumbing Regulations are now a Code that is Australia wide and not separate states as it use to be.

[Steve M Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steve M]

Na RanJ there not wireless. If the one in the bathroom is set at
say 40 every hot water tap in your house will come out at 40. As Bourky has said don't let the daughters know because yes you will have unlimited hot water while ever you have water, gas, electricity.... We were on electricity before so can't comment comparing it to your current system but it was certainly cheaper the our old electric tank... Cheers Steve

[RanJ Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close RanJ]

Hehe.... I've noticed it's not the teenage girls that are problem in our house.... it's the teenage boys! But I just shut off the water to the tank for about 10-15 seconds.

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

fido666 just so you know Im a Registered and Licensed Plumber an Gasfitter with over 25 years in the trade. I dont recall any mention of repairing the tank. The older units can last up to 20 years if your lucky and change out the Sacrificial Anode every few years as they rust away before attacking the tank. The new units are lucky to last 12 years. As the manufactures of the units have done there testing homework and offer a 10 year warranty and they now seem to last a year or two past that.

Fair enough, I was just going off past experience and what I'd been told. When I talk about repairing the tank I meant where it has split rather than just having a part like a pressure relief valve go. There are some who get these units and weld them up then flog them off on eBay, I wouldn't risk one.

The Vulcan Freeloader unit we had in our last house which blew was about 10 or 12 years old (was in the house when we bought it) and just started spewing water out of the bottom one day. The first Rinnai I had in this house was a 2nd hand one my BIL got from one of his jobs and it died on us about a year later. The next one was bought new as I wasn't taking chances on another 2nd hand one.

[rags Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close rags]

With mixer taps becoming popular and more affordable about 15-20 years ago. There were more incidents with children scolding themselves so the PIC (Plumbing Industry Commission) governing body in Victoria. Made it law that all new home's and Hot water renewals needed to have a Tempering valve installed at the Hot water service. This gives a mix of hot and cold water regulated so as that the water temp is not above 50c to bathrooms to prevent scolding. You are still able to have un-tempered water available to the kitchen sink and laundry. Unfortunately with a change over when you add a tempering vale the whole house ends up tempered unless the customer is prepared to pay to have a tempered and straight hot line installed. I am fairly sure that NSW would be the same as the Plumbing Regulations are now a Code that is Australia wide and not separate states as it use to be.

Just to clarify the regs re heated water services, plumbing/gasfitting regulation and education being my vocation here in NSW . You will find all Rinnai [and other instant hws brands] are typically supplied factory pre set at 50deg unless ordered otherwise,so a tempering valve would not be required .It is a requirement for all ablution points be supplied hot water at 50deg ,if the heater is not preset then a tempering valve is required. The use of touch pads are not considered an acceptable form of tempering device as a child can still be scalded in a bath room as the kitchen could be running at plus 50deg and although if a bath tap was turned on and the bath touch pad was set at 40deg you will still have an amount of water that left the heater at plus 40deg before the bath was turned on which could arrive at the bath as the outlet has been now opened,[hope that makes sense]. The requirements are pretty much the same all over Aust as covered by the PCA plumbing code of Aust which adopts the AS3500 as the standard for plumbing. The code is part of the BCA building code of Aust. It is a plumbers duty to ensure any exchange of Hot water unit is 50deg tempered .

[Bourkey Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close Bourkey]

Correct rags. AS3500 for sanitary and AG601 for gas. You can change the temp of the hot water coming out of instantaneous hot water units yourself if you know what you are doing. But im definitely not going it to that here.

[RanJ Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close RanJ]

Where you bloody plumbers when i needed you last night eh?

[Steve M Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steve M]

Ours can be set at 55 maximum. Its been like this since it was installed..... Cheers Steve

[Steve M Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steve M]

Yes Bourkey the bloke that installed ours did say it could be overridden but I didn't bother asking how etc as 55 is heaps hot enough. Can I say it certainly was handy when filling our spa up when we first got it (outdoor type) as other wise it would have taken 24 hours to heat up, so wacked the hose in, connected to the hot water outlet (tap) which was where our old hot water was and wacked it in the spa and used it that night lol....Cheers Steve

[Steve M Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steve M]

This is maximum setting on ours, the little red light at the top right indicates its in use.... Cheers Steve [IMG][/IMG]

[Steve M Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steve M]

This is what we got.... http://www.gstore.com.au/rinnai-infi...FcQhpQodLEIAYA we didn't buy it from these guys just so you can see the outdoor unit. We got ours from AGL and the installation was covered by them, some deal they had going at the time. Its pissing down here so couldn't be bothered to go outside and take a pic lol....Cheers Steve

[Geoffury Find all posts View Profile Close Geoffury]

You can get wireless control pads, which are great as you don't have to fiddle with running the cable back to the unit.
There don't cost much more than the wired ones.

http://www.rinnai.com.au/hot-water/c...ss-controller/