Home Maintenance Advice

*Not really.

We know you don’t care about tankless heaters, but we do. You don’t even have to read this right now. But you should tuck this away because one day, when you least expect it, you’ll need to know about replacing your water heater.

Navien Tankless Water Systems – A Nutshell Approach

Tankless water heaters save energy. Actually, it’s not so much about saving energy, as it is about wasting energy. Water heaters have energy factors. A regular water heater has a factor of .60. This means that for every $100 spent on your energy bill, you get $60 worth of energy. The tankless system has a factor of .97 (read: $97 on every $100).

According to Valiant Mechanical, the Navien Tankless Water System is “as exciting as natural gas gets.” Sure, they could stand to re-evaluate their definition of “exciting” but remember, Valiant Mechanical lives and breathes all things heating and cooling.

“Sometimes we meet people who tell us, right off the bat, that they don’t want a Navien unit,” explains Bryan Rankin, owner of Valiant Mechanical. “That’s because they’ve Googled ‘Navien’ and saw a lot of negative reviews. It’s true that pre-2008, Navien wasn’t the stellar product that it is today. What they did – and I admire this – is they not only rectified their problems and worked out their kinks, but their customer service is second to none: they’ll ship parts overnight and send parts for older units, even if there isn’t anything wrong with them. They’re actually being proactive, which is very rare. They’re standing by their product, and it’s paying off. They’ve installed over 6,000 units since 2009 without any issues.”

Because of their 2-pipe venting system, Navien units can be installed virtually anywhere: in closets, attics, underneath sinks. The biggest benefit of the Navien unit, though, is its Comfort Flow Technology. There’s such a thing as a “cold water sandwich”, which describes what happens when your hot shower is interrupted with a burst of cold (this often happens when you’re in the shower and someone turns on a tap in another part of the house). Because a Navien unit will have your temperature ready immediately, this won’t happen. Your water temperature will remain consistent – a bonus in households with multiple showers (think rental units).

If you’re thinking about a tankless water system, call Valiant Mechanical. They can answer any questions that you may have about hot water, heating, or cooling. They find that stuff fascinating.