View Single Post
Old 05-12-2017, 05:05 PM   #21
jeffk
Senior Member
 
jeffk's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Center Harbor
Posts: 1,125
Thanks: 198
Thanked 417 Times in 237 Posts
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by ITD View Post
He talked of a recirc system with a button. You want hot water, you push the button for a few seconds, then open the spigot. I'm sure the circulator pushes the hot water through much quicker than it coming out of a 1.25 gpm faucet. It sounds like a great idea, especially for an instant heater where you don't want the thing firing until you want water.
An instant heater doesn't fire until you start drawing water anyway. A recirc system keeps the water in the delivery pipes hot so you don't have to wait for it to get from the heater to where you are using it. However, pumping hot water around the pipes full time is going to waste heat to keep the pipe water hot, even while you are sleeping and not using water.

As to a push button recirc system, if it hasn't been running, it is still going to take some time to heat the water in the pipes, probably just about as long as if you just turned on the faucet. The only advantage would be that you wouldn't be wasting water down the drain while it heated up. You could push the button, do something else for a minute or so, then turn the water on.
jeffk is offline   Reply With Quote