Recent content by DrBoom

Installed mine almost 10 years ago. Works great.

For our purposes, it means that using the pump needs to be carefully timed to match usage. If we just turn it on for a couple of hours around the time we anticipate using hot water, or run for 20 minutes an hour or something to make sure we have hot water all the time, the usage is so high that...

were you able to insulate your lines during the plumbing effort in support of this recirc pump? We just installed the Watts system using the mixing valve at the endpoint (actually, I installed the taco valve since it was way better reviewed) and I'm quite surprised at the heated water drain on...

We've installed a heat pump water heater so that our boiler serving an indirect superstor hot water tank can be turned off in the non-heating season. Should I drain the superstor or leave it full? When/if I decide to use the superstor again, do I need to do anything to the water in it? That is...

Thank you. The existing pipe runs I'm trying to re-use say NSF-pw on them which I think means they are safe for potable water but I'm looking for better verification that I'm correctly understanding the combination of markings and standards. As this run would become part of the potable water...

I'm thinking about adding a heat pump water heater in a difficult to plumb location. We happen to have PEX to/from there for an old hot tub heat transfer system that heated the hot tub from the house boiler. We're never going to use that run for it's intended purpose (hot tub is conventional and...

Why do you believe the boot is at fault? We can go many weeks with the boot fully engulfed in snow without a problem and, then, have a leak for a day or two when enough snow covers the top of the pipe. I'm trying to understand what mechanism you are suggesting would lead to water coming...

I'm reasonably confident that the fitting is not open. The light flare is because that section of attic is very confined and I'm on a telephoto lens connected to my phone with a flashlight pointed down the section. It is very dark down in the confined section with additional light. I cannot...

The below picture is from the attic. Clearly, no trap. That was my mistake as it was a while I climbed to that section of the attic. I can only assume that one of the many connections visible in this picture OR another one not visible in the walls or attic is the problem. The picture quality...

We only have water intrusion when the top of that particular stack pipe is covered (snow height over the pipe completely covering it) with snow (like twice a year). The water isn't coming in through the boot or we would have a problem for the months the roof (and boot) is covered with snow each...

We don't have an ice dam problem. I can say this with high confidence because we did once upon a time and have put significant efforts in mitigating. In addition, we only have this water intrusion when the snow is above the height of the vent and only briefly. We can have lots of snow on the...

We've had a problem with a ceiling leak during larger snow accumulations that I'm reasonably confident is caused by snow covering one of the vent stacks and leaking from one of the vent stack joints in the attic. Unfortunately, the section of attic where I suspect the joint is a problem is far...

Thasnk phog. I have no intention of dismembering a hybrid system. It seems that perhaps there isn't a good option now that the Nyle unit is discontinued. If I find a great deal on a large tank hybrid to run in parallel (valve off the indirect in the summer), then perhaps that would be worth it.

My understanding is that the superstor indirect tanks essentially last forever as opposed to a typical hot water heater that will fail in a decade give or take depending on how effective the anode (w/replacement) is. I use ~200 gallons of oil during the non-heating season in NH even with a...

I was originally hoping for something that would take advantage of the indirect tank with all of the associated benefits. Since that doesn't seem to exist, you are probably correct about the best alternative.