Outdoor hot water cylinder

[chillibean]

I am upgrading my hot water cylinder. I currently have a low pressure cylinder in the ceiling and am wanting to change to mains pressure. There is no room inside the for a cylinder unless it remains in the ceiling and an outside cylinder has been suggested. This would be electric as gas is currently not an option.

Does anyone have any experience with outside hot water cylinders and an idea of their efficiency?

Thanks

[DazRaz]

Apparently the heat pump ones are very good, but I imagine very pricey. My concern would be the potential theft (for the copper) with an outdoor cylinder.

[Krish Van Colombo]

Energy inefficient

Having it outside will be very energy inefficient though. Imagine heating up the water during winter. I once opt out from a deal because of this reason. The property used the original space of the cylinder to have a new cupboard and installed the heater outside.

Saying that there might be new solutions out there.

Read the bellow link of similar issue.

http://www.ecobob.co.nz/forum/ForumPosts/1241/Re-Replacement-of-my-current-water-cylinder.aspx?ShowForumPostId=1336

Good luck.

[Jumpin]

The obvious solution is to have instant hot water. Then you only heat what you use. It will save you hundreds each year.

[Unicorn]

Hi chillibean,

We replaced our low-pressure electric cylinder with a mains pressure electric outdoor one 5 years ago. I think it's a Rheem. It's under the house for exactly the same reasons as yours - not much cupboard space.

The cylider is very well insulated internally, but there's heat loss from the exposed copper pipes. I'm happy with it, but our electricity bills are reasonably high, so maybe it's not so cost effective to run. We're by the sea, and there's no rust on the unit as yet, so it's obviously well made.

cheers,
Unicorn

[Rolf]

We too replaced our old low pressure cylinder with an outdoor mains pressure one about 1 1/2 year ago. The new cylinder is now under the house. Interestingly enough our electricity bill have not gone up noticeably, probably because the old cylinder wasn't very good in the first place.

[MarkButThis]

I've just boxed in my outdoor cylinder yesterday. (for cosmetic reasons)

Not sure about efficiency as such, but the marketing for the outdoor ones seems to point to extra insulation etc for efficiency to match internal ones.

My personal opinion is that you shove the cylinder outside to gain extra space. That is what we did and it worked immensely.

If you have one in the ceiling already, why would you go to the extra lengths of changing all of your plumbing to put one outside? Why wouldn't you just stuff one in the ceiling again?

MBT

[CJ]

If you have one in the ceiling already, why would you go to the extra lengths of changing all of your plumbing to put one outside? Why wouldn't you just stuff one in the ceiling again?

We would need to remove the roof to get to our cylinders I think.

We are on mains gas so dont use them so they just sit there, too expensive to remove.

[chillibean]

Thanks, I think I will replace the one in the ceiling.

There was a bit of a push to get it out of the ceiling - ease of maintenance and risk of it tipping over in an earthquake.

I assume that if a new cylinder is faulty and needed replacement under warranting the installation would also be covered???

[MarkButThis]

We would need to remove the roof to get to our cylinders I think.

We are on mains gas so dont use them so they just sit there, too expensive to remove.

One last comment...

You are on mains gas right? So why not have one of those instant water boilers strapped to the side of the house? (or in a cupboard inside with a flue outside)

Small, super efficient and hot water whenever you need it?

My only hesitation there would be price, because I think they are a touch expensive here in NZ. Standard issue in the UK and Europe etc.

I saw a house in Glendene, Auckland with mains gas controlled water like this and you could electronically set the temperature in each of the water areas. It was quite a feature.

My 2 cents

[twoandcounting]

If you were to go with an outside solution, efficiency can be improved by wrapping the cylinder and pipes in insulation material.

The risk of it being stolen will vary depending on where in the country you are, and can also be reduced through having a secure casing around it.

Warranty conditions vary, but installation should be covered. Make sure you read the small print!

[One]

We just made an interesting discovery about our ceiling hot water cylinder.

Post-quake, we're among the lucky people with running water. We've had the cylinder tap turned off to make sure we didn't drain it. Today, we decided to turn it back on.

No water flow.

The hot water only flows if there's enough pressure from the cold water to force the hot out the top. At the moment, there isn't.

[graemeh]

The hot water only flows if there's enough pressure from the cold water to force the hot out the top. At the moment, there isn't.

I'm assuming you've got a mains pressure hot water system. If it is like ours you will have a "drain" valve you can use to drain water out of the tank and into your house plumbing. You might be able to use this (with the cylinder power off) to get hot water out and then let the tank slowly refill before turning the power back on again.

[Teropita]

We changed to instant gas hot water heating and were left with an electric cylinder in the ceiling. About 12 years later, I needed the space for a ducted heapump so I removed the cylinder. Took the old cylinder to the metal scrap merchant and received around $300 for the copper. So I pocketed some cash and removed a hazard from the ceiling - well worth doing.

[AMR]

So how much would it cost to replace an indoor cylinder with an outdoor one? Is this a viable solution for a second floor unit?