Under sink water heater?

When we built our house my wife was all about going with the tankless design. When I looked at the actual energy needs (how much does it use to heat the water to the desired temperature quickly versus the cost of keeping a tank full of hot water) it was a no-brainer. We stuck with a 50 gallon electric water heater. To be fair a part of this decision was also based on the fact we have LP and not natural gas, but even looking at the electric versions wasn't going to be cost effective for the whole house.

Jay we drilled a new well last November. While I was at work my wife and the well driller decided my shop would make a nice place for the pump house.
I built a room in there to house the pressure tank n filters n such.
Wife says it needs a sink so I don’t come in the house with dirty hands.
It’s already wired for it.
Tight on space. An under sink unit would fit best.

Oh yes, Jay, most of us have running water, shower, hot tub and an assistant named Pepper Potts.

For tankless I would go with with higher wattage to keep up with flow rate. Check the specs on the units to see what GPM they are rated for. If you can only get hot water at a trickle, what value is that? The advantage here is you have hot water as long as you want it. A small tank is just that. Small. Consider how you want to use hot water. Tank type also draws current to heat and maintain hot water even when not actually using water so not necessarily an advantage in energy consumption.

Thad. I have had 1st hand experience with both of them. When I built my new tire shop in 2000, we put a 5 gallon electric tank type unit in the back room under the sink, we put in for us guys to clean up. It worked great if I were going to do it again, I would. When we put up our new honey processing building in 2009 we put in an on demand electric unit from Bosch. Not the smallest nor the largest unit. We had seen a lot of bad reviews of the on demand units claiming they don't put out much hot water. When I came home from Germany in the mid 1970's these heaters were in use everywhere over there. I contacted my electrician buddy. He told me 90% + of the problems of with them not putting out hot water was caused by improper wiring.   (IE) too light wiring. He wired the new one we had and it never failed to put out all the hot water we needed. In Oct of 2021 a part on the heater failed and I chose to replace it with a larger unit as I wanted to use hot water through a pressure washer. The new heater puts out more hot water than I'll ever need in the commercial kitchen and works well with the pressure washer. The new heater was $400.00 on sale for $350.00 less 11% Either one will work for you but if you ever want to use hot water in a pressure washer, a small tank type will not work for you.

Edited by 200Tom1 - 23 Feb 2022 at 12:37pm

A small "tank heater" will heat the 5 gallons of water in 10- 15 minutes.. Put a switch on the power and turn it on - off with the lights when you go into the shop if you dont want it on all the time..   They have 3 different models at MENARDS for $200.

Needs to fit under a 30” vanity with sink dead center. Or it would have to be on a shelf up on the wall.
I don’t intend to run it continually.
Like Steve says, switch it.

I’m surprised at the negative comments on the tankless type other than it takes longer to get hot. I have a Rheem in the house. It’s gas and it’s just as hot at high flow as low flow. I also have a Kinnetico softener and filter so that may be why it’s working so well.

plummerscarin wrote: Because of the rapid heat rise they tend to lime up quicker and maintenance can be an issue. Your softener and filter help immensely.

Do you mean the on demand lime up quicker?
The water I plan to tap in to isn’t filtered.

Dave I have removed the bottom element and spooned put water heaters many a time.
Our water here has line/calcium but not near like other places I’ve lived.
What we fight here is clay/ yellow colored water.
A drip coffee maker will last a few years here.
Y old place lucky to get one year and that with often cleaning.
My last water heater was replaced at 18 years of age. Didn’t have to but was doing a major remodel and already had it out.

No matter what- it will never be big enough, just get a big one and never think about it again

DaveKamp wrote: I've had similar sediment, Thad.  On this house, I get reddish silt, and it's heavy enough at times to plug up my supply filters right quick.  My mitigation method, was to install a 3/4" high-flow electric irrigation valve  on the bottom discharge of my water tank, and it's on a timer that emits a 2-second blast every 12 hours.  This causes a short, but violent outflow   I enable that system for a couple days every month, and it keeps the water system pretty clean.

Thank you for this info. I need to learn more. 👍
I don’t mind buying filters but don’t want to go broke doing it.