Turns out someone is liquidating a bunch of these on e-bay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Taco-Bronze-Car...ryZ46547QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
They're going for $35-$50 which is a bargain compared to the ~$350+ retail price on them. I bought one and it works great. We get hot water in seconds instead of 2-3 minutes and we're no longer throwing ~7 gallons of cold water down the drain to do so. All you need to add is a doorbell button for a wired on-demand install and get the fittings needed to interface to your plumbing. It is also pre-wired for a ~$50 kit you can buy to have wireless on-demand triggering. Additional wireless buttons can be added for ~$20 if desired.
I was originally going to install this under a sink upstairs, but after some more looking around the basement, I realized there was a better spot where I could bridge the main 3/4" hot and cold lines running right up to the shower, which also gets the water primed up for the kitchen and bathroom sinks in the same general area. It is very quiet so you could easily put it under a sink and it would never bother you.
I also took some of Eric's advice from another thread and checked out the SharkBite fittings. Man do they make the job easy - saves a lot of hassle trying to dry pipes completely! I inserted a tee into the 3/4" mainlines with 1/2" quick-releases coming off the tee. Then I was able to adapt the pipe threads on the pump to 1/2" PEX and used PEX in between the two. This provides a much bigger internal diameter than flex hoses which keeps the pump flowrate really high.
I have to say, PEX is pretty awesome to work with - I would bet the days of copper are numbered. These kinds of quick connect tubing/fitting systems have been around for years in very demanding high tech applications and it's great to see them coming to household applications. Not sure I'd put the SharkBite fittings behind drywall yet, but for a place that you can access for retrofits like this, they are really nice.
-Colin
http://cgi.ebay.com/Taco-Bronze-Car...ryZ46547QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
They're going for $35-$50 which is a bargain compared to the ~$350+ retail price on them. I bought one and it works great. We get hot water in seconds instead of 2-3 minutes and we're no longer throwing ~7 gallons of cold water down the drain to do so. All you need to add is a doorbell button for a wired on-demand install and get the fittings needed to interface to your plumbing. It is also pre-wired for a ~$50 kit you can buy to have wireless on-demand triggering. Additional wireless buttons can be added for ~$20 if desired.
I was originally going to install this under a sink upstairs, but after some more looking around the basement, I realized there was a better spot where I could bridge the main 3/4" hot and cold lines running right up to the shower, which also gets the water primed up for the kitchen and bathroom sinks in the same general area. It is very quiet so you could easily put it under a sink and it would never bother you.
I also took some of Eric's advice from another thread and checked out the SharkBite fittings. Man do they make the job easy - saves a lot of hassle trying to dry pipes completely! I inserted a tee into the 3/4" mainlines with 1/2" quick-releases coming off the tee. Then I was able to adapt the pipe threads on the pump to 1/2" PEX and used PEX in between the two. This provides a much bigger internal diameter than flex hoses which keeps the pump flowrate really high.
I have to say, PEX is pretty awesome to work with - I would bet the days of copper are numbered. These kinds of quick connect tubing/fitting systems have been around for years in very demanding high tech applications and it's great to see them coming to household applications. Not sure I'd put the SharkBite fittings behind drywall yet, but for a place that you can access for retrofits like this, they are really nice.
-Colin
