slow hot wtr delivery !!!
 

slow hot water @ kitchen & mstr bath sinks - copper piping 4 yr old house suggestions ?recirculating pump - under sink elec? may be the only 2 viable choices tnx in adv!!

Homes here in The Villages have your water pipes in the slab. They are not insulated and there is not a return loop. The slab is a huge heat sink and will quickly remove the heat from the hot water pipes. A 4 year old Villages home does not have copper pipes...so perhaps you are speaking of a home outside The Villages...but it does not matter the type of pipes you have. You do not say if you have a water heater tank or tankless.

If you have a tank, you can add a recirculating pump rather easily. The two main brands are Grundflos and Watts. A plumber will install these for around $600-$700, or you can do it yourself for about half that.

There are MANY threads here on TOTV on this subject.

QUOTE=DangeloInspections;1960062]Homes here in The Villages have your water pipes in the slab do they think copper's as good as steel rebar ??. They are notinsulated no surprise labor & mtl $ not in code either there is not a return loop no surprise either. The slab is a huge heat sink and will quickly remove the heat from the hot water pipes WOW does it everlose heat fast?. A 4 year old Villages home does not have copper up thru sink cabinet floor to sink fixture-plastic delivery in bathrooms ...so perhaps you are speaking of a home outside The Villages...osceola hillsbut it does not matter the type of pipes you have. You do not say if you have std 40 gal water heater
thanks frank alwaysgood talking w/ you. appreciate your time too !

I just wait on it, mine takes about 35 seconds.

I think it is the same in all houses. We just turn the shower on first and then get ready to shower. It is usually hot by the time we are ready.

If you're in a hurry, you can cut the time by more than half by turning on the sink faucet and the shower faucet at the same time.

Four years is a long time to wait for hot water:bigbow:

If it's only in the kitchen and master bathroom sinks, you better take it up with them... sounds like they might be trying to drain you.. whatever the issue , remember the washing machine may be the agitator...

Take the flow restrictor out of the faucets. You can turn on the shower to full hot and the water will get hot faster at the sinks, it flows more water.

Hot water heater recirculator. Lowes carries them for under $150. Mounts on top of the hot water heater but must be piped in. Works off a timer and works like a charm.

My charm doesn't work as well as it used to.

I'm a small-government person, but it's obscene that insulating hot water pipes through a concrete slab is not part of our building codes. The lifetime energy waste is huge. I would gladly pay a few hundred more for a house that had insulated pipes.

I find it interesting that we seek/demand perfection and yet in reality, it does not exist.
I expect waiting for hot water to arrive is different in different model homes. Distance from the hot water heater.

If you want to save energy, you will save a lot more by installing a fiberglass blanket around the 40 gallon water heater tank. You can buy an insulation kit for about $30-40 on Amazon. There is only about 2-3 gallons of water in the pipes, and it will cool down in an hour or so, even if they are insulated.

As I've said nothing is perfect. Circulating hot water on a timer, my schedule is not that predicable. Hot water in the pipes, there is the cost of running the pump but usually not considered is your AC bill for pumping that paid for heat, at water heater, out of your home. Worth it-your choice. It is a choice. Not a particularly expensive one.

Mine always worked the same. No recirculator pump. Only an on off switch when fools
demand it they have no doubt I have turned it off.

If it’s an electric WH, it may be a bad element. Easy fix, as my mother has done it. If it needs replacement, I would consider a tankless when pricing new ones.

Ohiobuckeye
 

120,000 people living in TV, can you amagine how many people that are on your water line. Yes, you better spend the 6 or $700. & buy what you said.

try removing the faucet screens and cleaning them. you'll find a lot of minerals block the screens thus making delivery slow. also turn up heat on ho water tank

So turn on your shower and go make the bed.

Hot water
 

Installing a hot water recirculation pump. You put the crossover under the sink furthest from the hot water tank. It pumps constantly through the hot from the tank and returns through the cold water lines. When you draw cold water, you get cold water. When you draw hot water you get HOT water. No waiting. Mine runs constantly.. It a small pump that uses very little electricity and I don't think it's worth trying to set the times it should run. Live a little...let it run. Be happy, don't waste water, recirculate. It sooo worth the small expense to have hot water when you want it.:coolsmiley:

Check this out at Home Depot: Never wait for hot water again; The Watts Hot Water Recirculating Pump provides hot water at every faucet or shower when needed, eliminating wasted water. It is easy to install on any water system and requires no additional piping. The unique design of the pump ensures quiet, maintenance-free operation. The system includes a built-in 24 hour, a dual setting programmable timer to activate the pump only when needed.

depending upon the design of your home you may experience a delay in hot water reaching different locations in the house.

we never had any issues with our shower or bath room sinks, but we'd waste a good gallon at the kitchen sink waiting for hot water when we did the dishes (we like to cook, and yes we do wash a lot of the big stuff by hand). We also would turn on the hot water at the sink and wait for it to run hot before starting up the dishwasher

finally we decided to have a recirculating device put in at the hot water tank...from 6am thru 8pm the hot water cycles and the wife is now happy

cost me about $$650 between a plumber and electrician....so what, what the heck good is money if you can't spend it and be happy about it

Hot water
 

We have a tankless water heater. It used to take 2 and a half minutes to get hot water in the master bedroom. I turned the thermostat up to 125. It cut the time down to 1 minute and 15 seconds.
Not the end of the world.
😎

Just a quick FYI, the water pipes are in the dirt UNDER the slab. They only make an appearance when its time to go vertical into a wall, or into a plumbing fixture.

Recirculation pump
 

Up north, installed a recirculation pump in Master Bathroom. I could set time of day to run. It would pump the "colder hot water" into the cold water line, and thus recirculate. When the sensor in the pump reached the preset temperature it would shut off, and then recycle as necessary to keep water hot. This causes the "cold water" temp to increase, so you are now getting hot water, but your cold water is warm. I like the earlier suggestion of turn on the hot water in my case 42 seconds prior to getting into the shower. Probably waste 2 gallons of water max.

Recirculating pump. I installed mine and it takes 15 seconds for the hot water to get to the shower as opposed to 45 plus.

No kidding? You've got COPPER pipes? I'm so jealous! I didn't think you could buy a house in the Villages without plastic plumbing. The first $500 I spent on our house was to replace all those 15-year-old plastic shutoff valves and hoses that were ready to pop at any moment. But there was nothing I could do about the plastic stub-outs from the wall, silently waiting their chance explode the minute someone crams too much stuff under the sink.

Anyway... here's my tip for slow hot water, at least for the shower. Open the sink faucets on hot while you're running the shower. It'll probably halve the time it takes to deliver the hot water, because they're probably all fed from one main 3/4" line. The individual branches to the sink and shower are only 1/2". So you need to run them all to get maximum flow from the tank.

Turn timer off
 

We put in a recirculating pump but turned the timer off because our schedule is definitely unpredictable. We just turn the hot water on and VOILA !

Yes but...
The continual heat loss of the circulating water requires the water heater to run a great deal more.
That is the larger expense part.
Consider a point-of-demand flash heater addition instead.

Ohiobuckeye
 

Just me but I really think a recirculating pump isn’t a waste of time & money. I really think there’s to many people on your water line coming into your peticular Village. What if you spend $700. & that’s not the problem?

Their something that a DIY cannot do because it require knowledge of hot water system
 

To save you time and money have a lic. plumber look at your system and then get 2 or 3 estimate. otherwise if you try to do it yourself it is mostly likely be wrong take it from a master plumber that deal with DIY like you.

The recirculating pump has no affect on other houses. It only pumps water from your water heater through the hot water piping inside your house and returns it to the water heater. The purpose is to prevent hot water from sitting in the pipes and cooling down. So, when you turn on the shower, the water in the pipe is already hot. I'm not a big proponent of recirculating pumps, but it does allow the shower water to be hot faster than if you don't have a pump.

Of course I always recommend having professionals do any work, especially if a person is not skilled in doing this. This project involves both electrical and plumbing skills. I guess I assumed that anyone here reading this thread has had at least 5-6 or more decades of life skills to know enough to hire a professional if something is beyond their skill set.

Perhaps I am taking your post wrong, but you replied to MY post saying "DIY like you".
Really..? I have years of construction experience. I have designed and built complex houses, installed complex multi-zone boiler systems, in floor radiant heat systems, picked up and moved a two story building, installed many tank and tankless water heaters, wired whole houses, etc., etc. I even delivered all three of my sons myself. My company does over 700 home inspections a year in The Villages and we are well versed in all home systems.

I suppose I should have added that because a circulation pump involves both plumbing and electrical expertise if a person does not have copious amounts of experience and skill with working with these systems that we advise deferring this to a licensed, qualified Plumber. My Bad.

Respectfully, Frank D'Angelo

When my pump runs I get hot water from both the hot and cold pipes. Reason is the hot water is returned to the hot water tank through the cold water pipe. Guess you have a separate return pipe?

Slow hot water in kitchen
 

I called warranty dept and they sent a plumber who said that is just how it is since the kitchen in my new Woodside is " so far" from the water heater. "So far" in my NY house that was 4578 sq ft was from one corner of the basement to the second floor diagonal corner ! Still annoying that it takes so long here.

I don't know how it works in The Villages but when my house was built in 1997, the copper tubing was laid in the dirt and buried before the cement was poured for the slab. Blue and red Vinyl sleeves were placed around the cold and hot water tubing where it was routed through the concrete to protect the copper tubing from corrosion.