Furnace and water heater recommendations

The age of your old furnace and hot water heater may have a bigger impact than you think.

We bought a house just over a year ago, our hydro usage on the old oil furnace was more than double that of the new high efficiency propane furnace that we put in. We converted at a very large cost due to the fact that the old furnace was flagged for a cracked heat exchanger. Before the change in November of last year our monthly hydro consumption was 700 kWh or so, the month of December after the change and our hydro dropped to 250 kWh usage, there is a lot to be said about paying the extra money to get the high efficiency DC motors.

As for hot water, I would never go tankless, your application but that is simply due to how much we use, I forget the numbers but it did not work out to be good for our application.

Good luck, this stuff is a 20 year investment so you cannot screw it up.

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Originally Posted by 35wailin

I have a household consisting of two parents and four daughters ranging from 19 to 12. I went with a tankless after we had to rebuild our basement. I had a 60 gallon tank that I was paying rental on. The tankless cost me $2800 installed plus tax. We've never run out of hot water since. I had heard that repairs can be quite expensive, but there is a 5? Year warranty with I think 12 on th coil. I figured out if I get six years out of it before a major repair, I would have paid that in rental fees over that time period and it would make sense to just replace it if necessary.

everyones situation is different, but talk to people who have owned the equipment you ar considering.

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Do you have occasions when there are more than one hot water loads on at once? People in two showers or a shower and dish or clothes washer being run at the same time? I've always been told that unless you are oversized on your heater, you will have water cooldown in the shower at these times. If you are oversized then the heater will cycle when there is only one load on it...
Been trying to find someone with a real life situation to verify....

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Originally Posted by Splaker

As for the tankless v tank water heater, what i am gathering is that the tankless is not worth the extra costs.... for the measly saving of $60 to $80 per year, you're paying 3 or 4 times more up front.. it'll take 20 years to recover your upfront costs. So looks like I am leaning toward traditional tank!

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The tankless opinion is spot on. The benefit to a tankless is you will never run out of hot water. I would say that is great for very large families with high water use or business' that require a ton of hot water. The upfront cost and yearly maintenance of a tankless just isn't worth it imo. I'm in the industry and I always hate it when they are sold to people on the promise of cutting their gas bill in half.

What side of the GTA are you on? I know a company in Burlington that is top notch and offers Lennox products and service as well as a few other respected brands.

I know a different company in the same area, offers Lennox. Terrible service, know nothing techs, is quick to sue. Online they seem to be maintaining an average rep in regards to reputation but the company is crumbling from the inside out. So be careful.

Dont rent. It's a rip off.
Find a reputable company or get references.
There are a lot of companies that will throw a new furnace in and never be seen again when your furnace craps.
Installation error can result in a shortened life of a furnace or shortened life of expensive parts.
Most furnaces have a 10 year parts and lifetime heat exchanger warranty.
PM me and I can help with any questions and pricing.

Oldbill, I'm in King COunty.

We are thinking of giving Costco a call... I love that company in general b/c the customer service is exceptional... it's like shopping in the 'States. Grabbed their brochure the other day... they send out a company for free consultation, Costco guarantees all the work and offers good rebates... I figure can't go wrong to have them look at it then call up a couple of other reputable companies. Someone mentioned Rolair and they did get back to me... So I'll compare his prices along with Costco and a few others and see where we are.

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Originally Posted by patvetzal

Do you have occasions when there are more than one hot water loads on at once? People in two showers or a shower and dish or clothes washer being run at the same time? I've always been told that unless you are oversized on your heater, you will have water cooldown in the shower at these times. If you are oversized then the heater will cycle when there is only one load on it...
Been trying to find someone with a real life situation to verify....

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We have a natural gas 199,000 btu tankless wh. It is 5 years old, and I haven't done a damned thing to it, though your suppose to flush it every so often. Most nights, when I shower, the dishwasher and washing machine are running at the same time as me having a shower, and there is no cold water in the shower, and I'm the furthest away from the heat vs the other 2 machines. There are 5 of us in the house, and we love it as its a constant temp, not up and down like a tank heater, and we never run out. We've ran 7 people through the shower in series and all hot water..... A tank would never keep up to that.
Where I don't like the tankless is, when say spilling something and you need a quick shot of hot water or you want to wash your hands in the sink, you have to wait longer for hot water vs a tank, but it's not terrible by any means. I have been meaning to install a small small tank heater and plumb it into the system so the tank gets the hot water there quicker and then the tankless takes over .....win win. A tankless is definitely not for every house, but for us, it is.

A tank less wh may not work if your on a well...

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Both of Swamps situations, the varying temperature in the shower and time it takes to come from the tank are more plumbing items than heat source things. Once the water from a tank starts to cool down you are out of hot water and it will take time for it to recover. With a tankless it will cycle and be hot in seconds.
If you are getting shots of hot and cold from a tank heater then you have a pipe problem.

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Originally Posted by patvetzal

If you are getting shots of hot and cold from a tank heater then you have a pipe problem.

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i agree, most likely a mixing valve issue. What I meant was when using a tank and having a shower, when at the beginning the hot water is hot, the longer you stay in the shower the more you have to turn up the mixing valve to keep the same temp as when you started. Basically the result of using most of the stored hot water in the tank and now the tank can't recover and keep up. You could shower for 5 hours straight with a tankless and it would be the exact same temp coming out of the shower head at the beginning as 5 hours later.

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Originally Posted by topher

A tank less wh may not work if your on a well...

Sent from my SM-G920W8 using Tapatalk

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Yes you can use a tankless with a well, we are on a well. You must make sure though that you have enough gpm flow to supply your heater though based on the units requirements