If you're in a part of your house that's on the opposite end from where your water heater is located, it can be frustrating having to wait for hot water before you can comfortably wash your hands or take a warm shower. The larger your home and the more plumbing your water has to travel through to reach all your fixtures, the more frustrating this can be.
Luckily there are several options available to produce hot water on demand. A tankless water heater is different from a traditional water heater. It produces hot water on demand rather than storing the hot water in a tank that has to travel all the way to where you want it.
Another option to consider is a hot water recirculating pump. Normally, when you finish using hot water, such as when washing your hands, the hot water that remains in the pipes slowly cools back down. When you turn on the hot water again, all that cold water has to come out of the faucet before a new batch of heated water can come through.
A hot water recirculating pump alleviates that problem. Instead of letting the water continue to sit in your pipes and cool off, a recirculating pump keeps that heated water circulating. So when you want hot water again, you have instant access to it when you turn on the faucet.
There are two main types of hot water recirculating pump systems. A dedicated loop and an integrated loop. A dedicated loop usually needs to be installed during construction, because an additional set of pipes are specificially dedicated to providing instant hot water to all your fixtures throughout your home. This system would be a challenge to retrofit into an existing home.
But an integrated loop is much easier to add to your existing plumbing. The hot water recirculating pump is positioned under the plumbing fixture that is farthest from the water heater. Hot water is recirculated occasionally in this system, and hot water is returned to the water heater through the cold water pipes.
While this somewhat elevates the temperature of the cold water, it quickly returns to its original chilly temperature.
There are several benefits to having a hot water recirculating pump integrated into your existing plumbing. The most obvious one is having hot water whenever you need it. Since you don’t have to let your water run for an extended period of time waiting for the hot water to reach the other end of the house, you will conserve a significant amount and save money on your water bill.
If you'd like to upgrade your plumbing to have hot water whenever you want it, give us a call at United Plumbing. We'll walk you through all your different options and help you pick the solution that works best for your family.
Call the professional plumbers at United Plumbing today, and you'll have instant hot water tonight.