When you are making a decision on a brand new hot water heater, one of the primary concerns is size. You dont want to get too large of an unit because you will waste energy heating water that simply sits in the tank. Conversely, you don’t want to run out of hot water part way through a shower, either. The guidelines for getting the suitable size heater for your own home may be calculated by determining what FHR or first hour rating of the water heater you will need. To get this number, you should figure 12 gallons of water per person in the household, plus one more. If you have 5 people, afterward you would take 6 times 12 to get an FHR of 72.
A large number of brand new house construction will take the number of bedrooms and add one to calculate the size of the unit, so if you’re buying new construction, you’ll be able to figure that a four bedroom home was calculated by taking 5 times 12, giving you an FHR of 60. Where the problem could come in is when you have got more occupants that take long showers, you might expect to use up all your hot water if you all get up and take showers the first thing in the mornings.
When it comes to calculating bills for energy efficiency, you are going to want to get the unit with the highest EF rating, or energy factor, for the FHR number you will need. The FHR number was created by the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act, as a guideline for contractors. The FHR is often a more realistic number that is tied to usage, yet is not overly generous in capacity to contribute to energy waste.
It used to be that the majority of property owners would purchase a brand-new hot water heater bigger than their previous one, if they run out of hot water frequently, but it may not necessarily be the specific size they need plus the energy they waste with too big of a hot water may far outweigh picking out schedules for the household to shower. This is specifically the case with households with children that can waste a lot of hot water within the bath or teenage girls that waste lots washing hair and messing around within the shower.
If you opt for a water heater with the appropriate FHR for your household, most likely heat is being wasted through other means, or hot water usage is not evenly distributed. Obviously, if you’re running the dishwasher, doing laundry and taking showers within the same time, you are going to run out of hot water with any size of water heater. Energy conservation involves common-sense and flexibility, but you can conserve a lot of cash by ordering the water heater that is the correct size for your home and you will then start to see the savings inside the power bills, as well.
Dalem Samson is a local senior employee of Best Buy. He’s an expert on home appliances and is knowledgeable about all household electronics. Mr. Samson is also the author of the highly debated buyer’s review of Countertop Microwave Ovens. Mr. Samson currently lives at Virginia with his twin children and wife.