Westside Wholesale Frequently Asked Questions

Tankless Water Heaters heat water directly without the need of a storage tank. Tank less heaters are more energy efficient because they avoid the standby heat losses associated with storage water heaters. When a hot water tap is turned on, cold water travels through a pipe into the unit. In an electric Tankless Water Heater an electric element heats the water. In a gas-fired Tankless Water Heater a gas burner heats the water. Tankless Water Heaters deliver a constant supply of hot water, so there is no worry of running out of hot water. Differences in the flow rate determine what size application the heater should be used for. Typically, gas-fired Tankless Water Heaters will produce higher flow rates than electric Tankless Water Heaters.

Tankless Water heaters are designed for either single-point use or for whole-house applications. Single-point heaters are meant to be used at a single faucet, whereas whole-house units are capable of replacing conventional storage tank heaters.

Some smaller Tankless Water Heaters cannot supply enough hot water for simultaneous, multiple uses in large households. An example would be taking a shower and running the dishwasher at the same time. This can stretch a Tankless Water Heater to its limit. To fix this problem, what you can do  is install a “whole house” Tankless Water Heater or install two or more Tankless Water Heaters, that would be connected for simultaneous demands of hot water.

You can also install separate Tankless Water Heaters for appliances as well —such as a clothes washer or dishwater—that use a lot of hot water in your home. An example would for one of these applications would be an Electrical Tankless Water Heater, like our Eemax and Bosch series.

(Additional information)
Homes that use approximately 41 gallons or less of hot water daily, Tankless Water Heaters can be 24% – 34% more energy efficient than conventional storage tank water heaters. They can also be 8% – 14% more energy efficient for large family homes that use a lot of hot water, around 86 gallons per day. You can achieve an even greater energy savings of 27% – 50% if you install a Tankless Water Heater at each hot water outlet.