Rheem RTG-95DVLN-1 Water Heaters, Gray

I've been using this for over a year now, and I love it!= TL;DR =Rheem is a great brand with an excellent reputation, and so far, I see why!This water heater is awesome, and tankless is great! If you're using a tank water heater, I recommend switching. Come for the lower bills and longer-lasting hardware, stay (…and stay …and stay!) for the loooong, relaxing showers, because you won't run out of hot water!= BACKGROUND =I bought this unit knowing it was overkill, but I'd rather have more than enough hot water than not enough. I'm in the midwest, and I needed to make sure it could raise the temperature from water that can be as low as 45ºF and heat it to at least 120ºF, possibly 140ºF. I also wanted to be able to run multiple appliances using hot water at once -- which this water heater can easily do, but in my house, the bottleneck is actually my water pressure. This water heater can heat literally all the water it can get in my house.I was switching from a tank water heater with a pilot light. I wanted to stop running out of hot water and stop reheating the same water when I wasn't at home using it. I also wanted to get away from having a pilot light, though I don't think any modern water heaters have those.I had mine professionally installed. I haven't had any problems, so I haven't had to call the plumber or Rheem, but I love the fact that Rheem has a great reputation for customer service and honoring warranties even when the hardware was purchased through Amazon. I love even more that they're great quality to begin with, so I haven't had to call them!= USE AND OBSERVATIONS =Some people complain about the "cold water sandwich"… Frankly, for me, it's rarely a "sandwich"; I'm not using hot water every 5-10min, so the water in the pipes is simply cold every time I start using it again. Since I read about this ahead of time, I actually timed how long it took for a faucet to get hot water from my old tank heater and then with this new tankless one. The tankless does take longer. In my house with my length of pipes, the tank took 15-20sec to get hot water to the faucet (timing it with the first use of hot water in the morning), while the tankless takes right around 30sec. This really only takes a minor adjustment in behavior: simply turn the hot water on full when you first come into the room if you're about to use the faucet. As soon as it warms up, adjust the hot/cold mix. (My washing machine is closer to the water heater, and I haven't timed it, but it probably takes under 20sec to get hot water.)I read ahead of time that although you can override the 120ºF max and go up to 140ºF, people didn't need to do that with this unit. They were right! I had my tank heater on 140ºF, because when taking a shower, I'd have to bump the faucet up to a hotter mix every couple minutes as the hot water from the tank was depleted. Now, I set it at one temperature, and it stays there, and it can go hotter than I want even at 120ºF -- basically, it's a real and consistent 120ºF max, not just an instantaneous max. Some people even set the controller at something like 108ºF so they can just turn the hot water on max and have it be their perfect, preferred temperature.= CLEANING =You're supposed to clean this once per year; I've put a reminder on my calendar and am doing it every six months. It's pretty easy, really. You can get a cheap submersible water pump, a pair of washing machine hoses (or garden hoses), a 5gal bucket (I use 6gal; 5gal might cut it close), and 4gal of vinegar each time. (I used 3gal the first time, and it worked, but the pump got a little warm; it relies on the liquid it's pumping for cooling. With 4gal, it stayed cool.) IIRC, you're supposed to run it at least an hour; I run it for two. I have ball valves to make it easy to shut off the main inlet and outlet, and to open the drain/cleaning hookups on the water heater. And the little metal filter unscrews easily for rinsing.= COST (BILLS AND SAVINGS COMPARED TO A TANK WATER HEATER) =I didn't buy this water heater to save money and didn't expect it to quite pay for itself (including installation cost), but it looks like it actually might, in probably 12 years. Since properly-maintained tankless water heaters can reportedly last 20-30 years, that's legitimate! (Heck, the tank water heater it replaced went a whopping 24 years with no cleaning, so I do expect this one to last. We have good local water.) My only two gas appliances are the furnace and the water heater. The furnace is, of course, the bulk of my gas cost.My average monthly gas bill for the prior 10yrs (prior to buying this water heater -- i.e., 11 years ago through 1 year ago) was $54.66, and average for the prior 5yrs (6 years ago through 1 year ago) was $49.25. My average this year, with this water heater, was $34.29. (Note that we did have a warmer winter, though.)My minimum bill (for any month, ever) prior to installing this water heater was $15.10, and bills under $20 were rare, even in the summer when the water heater was the only gas appliance used. Since switching, I had six consecutive months with bills under $20, and four were under the previous minimum of $15.10. My new minimum is $9.97. Those were basically the months with no furnace use, so I think it's safe to say my hot water is now costing me only $10-17 per month. Even taking longer, relaxing showers every day, I'm saving money.I'm living alone in an 3br house. So larger families switching from a tank water heater may not see the same savings if they're using the hot water a lot more throughout the day. OTOH, if you're switching, you should still see at least some savings, and being able to have people take consecutive showers and run the clothes washer all at once could be well worth the investment. This is also easier to clean and should last considerably longer than a tank water heater, which could save you a lot more money in the long run.= UPDATES =27 Apr 2017: Original review (above).16 Oct 2020: Just read this over, and everything is still accurate. Over four years with this heater now, I'm still cleaning it on the same schedule, bills are still low, and the heater still looks and works like it's new.Oh, it's also easy to turn off if you're going on vacation (and on again when you return). Just turn off the gas valve next to it (at least, that's how it _should_ be installed) and push the power button on the digital controller. Hopefully you also have a whole-house ball valve to shut off water for the entire house, or at least new ball valves going to this heater when you install it; shut off the water, too. When you get home, just open the water valve, open the gas valve, and push the power button on the controller again.

RTGH-95DVLNThe unit was self-installed last week and it has been working like a charm. The unit is quiet, quick to deliver hot water, and I see no perceivable difference in flow-rate from old water heater to this new tankless unit.As far as installation specifics, it took a full 5 hours to remove the water heater and plumb in the new tankless unit. A lot of that time was spent re-plumbing the water lines, switching from the standard top input and outputs on the water heater to the bottom connections on the tankless unit. Additionally some time was spent on the gas line, removing the ¾"x½"x½" tee [input, W/H, Furnace] and replacing it with a ¾" sediment-trap connected to a ¾"x¾"x½" tee, since the tankless requires a ¾" feed and can use 199,000 BTU/H. [Note: I called local gas supplier and verified my meter supported 350,000 BTU/H, so no change was needed.] Other connections were more trivial in my garage installation, as the it was mounted on a wall where the vent pipes could go directly out through the wall. [One note on product deliver; the first unit was delivered by FedEx all beat-up and damaged and was not accepted. The replacement from Amazon came via UPS and the package arrived as one would expect.]One of the things that made the installation go a lot easier for me was the purchase of the RTG20220 valve kit including hot water pressure relief valve. This is a smart assembly of shut-offs, drain valves and screw-on connectors (plus a pressure relief valve for the hot). In my opinion, there would be very little savings purchasing these components all separately and if separate, there would be more connections and more of a chance of leaks.As far as the input and exhaust goes, the brochures touts the 3" PVC connections as a benefit, however locating any PVC over 2" at the local hardware stores is problematic. However, the installation manual mentions that ABS, Schedule 80, or galvanize steel can also be used. I ended up using a bushing reducer to 2" PVC as I only need to travel less than a foot out through the wall. I purchased the Rheem SP20285 Vent Termination Kit, and after painting it to match the house, it looks very clean.Operationally, the unit couldn't be simpler to use. There is a remote control panel used to set the output water temperature and subsequently could possibly display fault codes. The default water temp is 110degF, but up and down arrow buttons makes bumping the temp to 120degF just a few clicks away. As an aside, the need for having this remote panel is at a loss to me. Once initially set I can't imagine going back and tweaking the temp and should a failure occur, seeing a code 10ft from the unit or on the unit would make little difference. At least in my installation I would have rather had this extra contraption just built directly into the cabinet front. That would work just as well.As far as operations, the unit kicks on the instant the hot water flow rate is over 0.40 gpm. Initially the internal fan kicks on and can be heard in the adjacent room, though not loudly. However, once the unit has got fully fired up and is delivering hot water, the fan shuts off and the unit is ultra-quiet. Even standing next to it, it is hard to hear that it is still on and delivering hot water. Actually, the old water heater made more noise with its banging and popping noises during water heating, though that could be a model specific issue. The old W/H was void of sediment and fed by a water softener but it still made a racket while the burner was on.A strange behavioral side-effect of owning this new unit is that initially now when rinsing a single dish or other times when one would not normally wait for hot-water, I now only turn on the cold or leave the mixture handle on cold knowing that I am using energy for no reason. Knowing the unit is turning on to deliver hot water that will never make to the faucet in the back of the house seem wasteful, albeit the same thing was happening with the old water heater but I never thought about it before.It will be several months, if not a year, before I am able to really quantify the long term cost benefits of tank vs tankless. The old tank of mine was rated at 240therms/year, this new one at 159. 80 therms/year at $1.20/therm makes for a long payback period. However, I don't think the cost of keeping the standing water hot is factored into the W/H sticker, just the efficiency to heat a specific volume [.62 vs this unit's .94]. Anyway, maybe I'll update this in a year with my real world factors, assuming other gas uses for heating remain fairly constant. Also, if this unit lasts 20 years versus more than one W/H in that same period would also make a difference. Bottom line is that overall I would recommend this unit and if one is marginally savvy at plumbing (gas & water), installing the unit yourself is quite feasible.