How To Flush A Tankless Water Heater The Easy Way | DIY Plumbing
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- Опубликовано: 24 мар 2019
- How To Flush A Tankless Water Heater The Easy Way | DIY Plumbing - Everything You NEED to Know About Water Heaters
Tankless water heaters are rapidly increasing in popularity. Tankless water heaters have a lot of benefits that can make your life easier! To maximize those benefits, you need to flush your water heater at least once a year. In this video, I'm going to show you a quick and easy way to flush a tankless water heater, with a bonus at the end to save you some money!
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Thanks for watching! I'm Roger Wakefield, The Expert Plumber, and welcome to my channel. On this channel, it's ALL about plumbing. We play games, we experiment, and we have FUN here, talking and learning about all things plumbing!
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I am a new HVAC tech and I really enjoy your videos to see how the plumbing side goes. Since we do tankless and tanked heaters it is always nice to see how someone else does it too.
Been plumbing for 15 years and always watch your videos. You definitely got a lot of experience thanks
Quick note I’m a tankless technician and there were a few steps missed when descaling this Rinnai unit each manufacturer has certain steps to take before descaling or flushing the tankless. On Rinnai’s there’s something called a bypass valve that has to be in the fully open position this units bypass valve wasn’t fully opened. The steps you take to open the bypass is you unplug the unit from the outlet for atleast thirty seconds and you have to have the front cover off when doing this. After thirty seconds you plug it back in and you’ll hear a buzzing type of sound coming from the valves and you have to wait for the buzzing to stop once it stops that means the bypass is in the fully open position and you can go ahead and rapidly unplug the tankless. And now you have allowed for the unit to be fully descaled at every possible location within the unit. With rogers current procedure there’s a few spots that didn’t get descaled. And same goes for other manufacturers like Noritz but not so much Takagi or navien on those units you can just take the current steps roger did. And also be aware if you are planning on descaling a unit that hasn’t been descale in over 8 years it may be prone to a Heat Exchanger leak and that will ruin your unit so if your unit has never been descaled I would advice you to call the manufacturer so they can recommend your nearest professional tankless company to come inspect the unit before it could possibly get damaged.
Noritz procedure is different than Rinnai’s
Wow…some great advice….thank you!
Modern noritz models have a wire that needs to be connected to the left of the motherboard to time and record the flush in the unit history. Im most familiar with Noritz here in Utah. I see Navien a lot too though.
Thx man, I was about to proceed and after reading your comments I watched a video from Noritz which says to leave the unit ON!
David Mancilla, The AO Smith electric water heater doesn't come with two drains underneath. My lines and tank were recently flushed and so much calcium comes out hot side only. Why flush the cold side? Also, how does the vinegar help?
thank you.. am considering going tankless and heard this was necessary but no details on how. Great video. Now I know if we do this we should have those extra valves
Great video really helpful. I do HVAC for a living so I have installed a few of these units. And I have replaced units that are only 3 to 5 years old because they were already rotted out and emitting CO from not being cleaned yearly.
Again! I tried without watching this, then watched it to make sure I wasn't doing anything wrong. Always fun and informative to have your help. Many thanks!
nice video - makes the process easy to understand. it's 2021 and i'm having my plumber replace my 20-year-old hot water tank with a Rheem tankless hot water unit next week.
Thanks I will be doing this next weekend. Took me awhile to find a good video on this.
Excellent video, thank you!
As always I did enjoy your video. You always make everything easy to understand. If I'm ever in need of reminders I just flip out my phone and refer to your knowledge.
Great explanation. First I've heard leaving the unit energized. I'm going to do that! Thanks!
Very good friend of mine Bob spent a chunk of change to covert to a tankless upon remodeling a 1979 home he purchased.
He did not flush the new tankless ever ( didn’t know he was supposed to )
It went belly up ruined the thing so Bob went back to a conventional tank water heater and boy was he pissed that flushing the thing was so important and he is extremely handy!!
Now I have one on a brand new home and for sure will be flushing the thing out the recommended once per year!
Thanks for the tip I’m not very familiar or comfortable with tankless systems yet but hopefully in time I will. A huge thanks from apprentices everywhere 🤝
Roger, your video is very easy to understand , you voice is clear. I like it !
Thank you sir. I help with maintenance on several newer townhouse apartments, and they have an all Electric Tankless Water Heater and have one that is not staying hot when being used.
Really appreciate your video. I had a pretty idea of how to do this, but I learned a few things off of it. About to flush mine for the first time.
Thanks for the video, looks easy enough. I just ordered the kit needed to do this, should be here in a couple days.
We have crazy hard water and a new 2.5 year old build with a tankless water heater. This winter our tankless heater kept losing flame and lately has had terrible pressure and takes a significant amount of time to "warm up". So I just ordered all the stuff I need to flush it since it hasn't been done yet. Unfortunately, our builder was cheap and it was installed with no flush valves so I'm going to have to add those myself. Thankfully I'm handy enough to know how to do that kind of stuff! Thanks for the guidance, looking forward to our tankless being back to normal!
I use a Home Depot bucket with two garden hoses and I taped a pond pump on one end and run vinegar through it for a couple hours. Works great!
Thank you very much for sharing this knowledge. I am purchasing a new home which comes with a tankless and was wondering how to maintain it.
Thx man appreciate that always wondered how to.
Thank you for all the work you put in for showing us how to do the work and why we do it!
- An Apprentice Plumber
Jorge Coronel I love plumbing and I really enjoy teaching it to others. I hope you learn well. How long have you been doing it?
Watched several videos on this subject. You were best at covering ALL aspects of cleaning a tankless water heater. Especially adding the comment regarding vinegar. Natural products all the way!!
@Bugsy thank you so much. Did you flush yours?
This was very useful and I followed it step by step to flush my tankless. So thanks!
A few things that could have been better:
- tell me to fill a bucket with water before I turn off the water, man! Haha
- there's a bunch of "oh don't forget this" after you've told me to do it. It would be better if it was all in chronological order so I didn't have to watch it all the way through every time. I had already watched it all the way through a few days ago to decide this was the video I was gonna use.
Thanks again!
Roger i love this video this is a spot on for all that don’t know how to flush tankless water heaters …… i see that you didn’t talk much on the Vinegar trick which i teach it to the guys but i had a issue where one of the tech didn’t know the mix. Would love to see a video touching up on this……. Keep up the videos bro.
Great video! I have 2 tankless WHs at a rental duplex that I flush yearly with vinegar.
Excellent instructions! I’ve been flushing my Navien tankless water heater this way for 5 years using vinegar. I bought a cheap sump pump and washing machine hose kit from amazon and an orange bucket from Home Depot for my flushing system. I’ll isolate the heater and drain it then take out the small screen filter on the inlet side and wash it out. Finally I’ll circulate vinegar for 1.5 hours. I do unplug the heater and have found that the pump over the course of the flush will heat up the vinegar nicely. Upon completion of flushing, I’ll just drain what I can out of the heater and put it back in the plumbing circuit and run several gallons out the nearest hot water tap to purge any remaining vinegar and air. Works like a champ. Finally, I’ll write on the side of the heater the date of flush with a sharpie so the history of flushing is readily apparent.
Very helpful video, Roger. I have a 20 year old 50 gallon water heater that I know is about to throw in the towel, so I"m researching the ins and outs of tankless.
Very clear and easy to understand. If I had more teachers like you in high school, I'd have probably graduated with a higher GPA
Just my two cents. We recently got a tank-less water, it is terrible. It is very slow to heat the water and they did not install the isolation kit. The maintenance is ridiculously more difficult. I cannot wait for it to break. This is a big step backwards in technology.
Probably installed incorrectly. They work quite well.
Ours works great. I got the isolation valves and a pump and bucket. It takes me about an hour, every six months or so. Very cheap. The plumber wanted $500.00. Yikes!
@@warrenb2856since you don’t have isolation valves, investigate using food grade SHMP (Siliphos) as a way of disrupting calcium and magnesium crystallization inside the tank. This is done extensively in industrial boilers. I don’t know why more plumbers don’t use SHMP on the cold water inlet on all homes with high mineral content. Guess they would prefer to install a whole house water softener instead.
Thanks for the video, a lot of great comments also, everyone appreciated the video .the main things I liked about it not just a fact there I can clean my own water heater out ,its the fact that he didn't spend 15 minutes Explaining himself away ,,he got straight to the point and the video was done and now i can get to work
Wow!!!! Roger, I am a C10 contractor and I am going for the B License, you are a really good Business mentor, the best videos I ever watched, thank you .
Thank you. I appreciate that!
Appreciate this & others. Clear, Precise, Proffesional video. Business Owner myself Absolute Water Consultants, Fl. 💧 Enjoyed watching (Correct) information shared. All to often wrong informative / incorrect information is instructed! Nice Work!
Thanks for the great tips!
Another fall season comes and here I am cleaning the unit. Always feel confident with your help. Thank you so very much! 2 thumbs way up, if I had more thumbs you'd get those too!!
Glad I was able to help! Thanks for the kind words
@@RogerWakefield is there a diy kit for a homeowner that you would recommend?
This is a great easy to understand description of flushing a tankless water heater. Thanks Roger!! . . . and I do use vinegar and leave the pump circulating for two hours. Peter Castaldi
Thank you for filming this. I very much appreciate it
Brian Ralph did you flush yours? Fantastic! Thanks for the feedback...
Thank you for this video. Because of health reason my husband couldn’t help me , BUT , I just accomplished the flush. Couldn’t have done it without this video. My only suggestion is that when you turn something on or off have the camera show us up close what valve you are working on. For an amateur just calling it by name is confusing. Since there are 4 valves we have to do something to. But again thank you. I got it done.
Fantastic instructional video! Ordered the pump and washing machine hoses from Amazon, used distilled vinegar. I also added an old sock attached to the discharge hose to prevent sediment from running back through and flushed for two hours. Saved a bundle. Thanks again!
Kory M. I hope the old sock doesn't make your water smell funky... Thanks for watching and commenting! I do appreciate it!
Awsome if made video on your technical flush.
I don't see that he shared which pump to buy? Do you mind sharing what you ordered?
@@davidgeske9715 0:56 explains it's a haymaker product
You can also add a garden hose filter screen into the coupler at the end of the hose that connects to the hot water outlet. That way any particulate doesn't go through your pump, potentially damaging it. I got a dozen of these on eBay, I think. They were actually a rubber garden hose washer with an embedded stainless steel screen for not a lot of money. Good to add to any hose that provides water to a machine, like a pressure washer.
doing the happy dance!!! thank you for helping me, tackled it and got it done!
thank you for this vid
Great video ...thanks for the advice and thorough instructions
You bet
Sir you have alots of knowledge for this work i always watching your videos it's really help my work .thank you
Glad I could help, Zafir
@@RogerWakefield thank you sir ) you are nice person 🤩
Thanks, you help out a bunch.
Roger keeping America strong, awesome info. Saving people a lot of time and hassle
Thank you for this! How much of that cleaning solution do you use with one gallon of water? Just bough everything from amazon, I think I got the right solution but could you provide links? Very helpful video.
My favorite tool those 428 Channellocks.I worked there once shovelling pliers with a pitchfork and pulling sledge hammer heads from the oven with a 12' steel pole.
What a well made video. Very thorough and informative. Thank you, sir!
Lando G we are trying to teach people how to do things that can save them money. Where are you located? What do they charge to flush tankless water heaters there?
@@RogerWakefield i'm living in a new developement in hawaii. Companies here are charging 700 on the low side and up into 1000 on the higher side.
@@RogerWakefield FYI - I just paid $840 for a flush w/ white vinegar in the Seattle area....compare that to the December 2010 total cost of removing my old tank heater, and installing a new tankless for $2450...glad I now know how to do this myself!! :)
Thank you for this video. I live in Alpharetta, GA and called 5 plumbing companys. They all quoted me #$325.00 to $375.00 bucks. I watched this video and went to home depot. I got a pump 1/6 HP 28gpm, a home depot bucket, CLR cleaning agent. I already had the washing machine hoses. Did it myself and saved myself $325-$375 bucks - the cost of the pump and bucket - Thanks, Thanks, Thanks. Now I can do this myself every 6-8 months and have the pump to use to drain my hottub too. Very happy
Glad it helped! I was just in Alpharetta a couple weeks ago for a conference! Love it there
Great video Roger! Thanks so much.
My system has one (cold) shut off/close water supply, must videos show a shut off/close valve on the hot as well. Your explanation of using the service valves over the flush valves kept me from pumping vinegar through my lines. Thank you
Watched the video prior then ordered what I needed on Amazon (don’t purchase the descale bundle... it’s cheaper to buy separate) it was about $50 for the hoses & pump which now I’ll use for future de-scaling & the solution was about $20. I just de-scaled my Rinnai RL94 Tankless Heater..watched the video again to walk through the process while Roger was doing it & it went seamless..So easy & plumber was going to charged $250. I would recommend giving it a try...you’ll be surprised how easy it is & you’ll save yourself lots of money!!!
Thanks so much Roger!!!!
what pump did you buy?
Where is the list of stuff to buy?
what pump did you buy? what pump did you buy? what pump did you buy? A stupid omission from the original video. The jackass doesnt tell us which pump to buy out of over 500 choices.
Thanks for the video instruction, very helpful. Is it imperative that you be a certified plumber to offer it as a service to homeowners in Texas?
Thank you. I do this every Daylight savings change. This will be my second flush and I WILL flush with Vinegar for 90 minutes.....
Was very glad to see your final minute. The (major) manufacturer of my 4-year-old tankless water heater specifically warned against using anything but food-grade white vinegar, 4 gallons in a 5-gallon bucket. Using harsher cleaning chemicals can void some warranties, not to mention presenting potential health issues if the final water flushing is inadequate. Some people use hot tap water for drinking or cooking...why present them with this risk? I flush my heater annually with vinegar (food grade @ 5% acidic) at a cost of less than $20, and it is safe.
What I did not see addressed was an installation like mine where immediately below the water heater and in-line with the cold water supply is a thimble-sized water filter that needs to be removed and cleaned after every flushing...or more often if your supply water is unfiltered or otherwise prone to have fine debris, sand, etc. Recirculating "contaminated" or particle-heavy cleaning solutions is asking for such a filter like this to clog and fail. The typical homeowner is then stuck with having to call a plumber to remove and clean the internal spinning flow-control device needed to inform the heater of flow demands. Fouling the filter would be a major whoops.
agreed, I do this for a living and there is so much wrong with this presentation, food grad vinegar, cleaning the filter before flushing the unit, checking the flow, I could go on and on
Great video👍
Thank you sir, very informative!
Excellent video, clear and concise. Thanks!
Gordon Evans I am normally as clear as mud. Thanks for watching and commenting! I do appreciate it! I hope that you subscribed!
Thank you , I needed this
Good! I'm hoping it worked out for you?
Hello and thank you for the informative video I purchased a flush kit for my tankless water heater and quickly realized one end of the flush kit has a threaded side the other side is just smooth so how am I supposed to adapt that to my threaded lines that go to my water heater..?? Thank you kindly 👍
Thank you I live off-grid and my shower is gravity-fed this was the perfect thing to help me clean it out I use vinegar cuz that's all I had and it worked I did go from the out spout to the in spout after disconnecting everything because I knew whatever was blocking it was near the end spout so I went backwards and it worked
Thank you Sir. Very well explained!
Thank you @Robert B. Where are you located?
Using vinegar, cleaning the filter, and turning the gas off during the flush was how I was taught to flush tankless water heaters. We would also take the front cover off to blow out the combustion chamber with an air compressor to get out sediment left over from years natural gas burning. Inspect the heat exchanger and just clean the inside of the unit. Really help with outdoor tankless unit to get bugs and other crap out of the inside of the unit. But watch for wasps lol it was and a good 90 minute plus job.
Great video!!! Much appreciated.
Hi Roger, it is a very good and informative video. What kind of pump do you use in the video? Rinnai said the pump should be 4-5 gallons per minutes, what kind do you suggest that is not too expensive. Thank you.
Great video thank you! Any link to this pump and chemicals used? Does it come in a kit?
Good info. Thanks for sharing your knowledge
@Dustin I hope it helps you!
Nice review. Went to tank less and never looked back. I received the same recommendation from local plumber on use of vinegar 5% food grade verses de scaling agent. First time took about 2 hours and was told leave unit off. We have "hard" water and clean ours every year, some have said I don't need clean every year? It seems $7.00 of vinegar is cheaper then ruined heating elemets, yes our is electric.
Good job brother. I'm a Master Plumber and luv yr channel. I have never tried letting yr w/h run while u are flushing unit. Ty for the tip.
No problem! Where are you located?
@@RogerWakefield I'm in Harper, close to Fredericksurg.
Great video Roger..I do have a question. I am on a water well, I have a big blue r550 bbs whole house filter (coarse filter), that supplies a Culligan Gold series water softener do I still need to flush, and if so how often (ie... same, or 50% less?) if I am using a water softener..? 0 Grains per Gallon using a Hach 145300 Total Hardness Test Kit, Model 5-B...but I have an inline TDS meter that still shows particles (267?) before going into my Reverse Osmosis (7 coming out?).
Vinegar definetly sounds like the more environmentally way to go. Thanks for the video!
One reason I like the Nivean tankless is because it's one of the only water heaters that have stainless steel innards. So it works great with hard water, etc. I have now had it for over 10 years and it works like a charm. It comes with a metal filter that I take out and reverse flush the water (let it just drain out from the how water side). No problems at all.
Allowing water to drain out the hot side does not do anything unfortunately and with your unit being over 10 years old with no descale maintenance I would not advise descaling the unit because it could cause a potential leak to happen with the heat exchanger of the unit.
Excellent video, thank you! I personally would not leave the unit on when flushing. heating those chemicals, heating the hoses.... it's putting potentially a lot more problems. i just read in the rinnai manual recommends shut off of heat or warranty could be voided.
I read the same thing. I don’t get it when many you tube videos tell you to leave on, but turn down the heat to 98 degrees. To me it makes more sense to leave on for a better flush and the fact the water will be warmer and better for the flush. Any advice?
Great video as always! Would you ever consider adding links to the products you use in the video? I'd love to buy the chemical and pump kit you used if I could find it. Thanks
Got my tankless back when they did not flush them (90s)so I do not have the hookups for that. I do have really clean great lakes water so it is still going strong. Only issue, was one time after a 2 week vacation, the water flow sensor stopped spinning and had to be opened and spun. I learned that day that even 1/4 turn ball valves leak (main and at heater) when turned off.
Thanks! Great job and easy after you showed me how!
Thank you!! Broke that down in Laymans terms🙏🏼
Awesome video!
Wayne, thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience. A great help for what I am about to embark Thank you, stay safe.
Who’s Wayne?
@@idontmindpineappleonpizza8825, your right😂. My apologies Roger, sorry was viewing several other videos and don't know why Wayne stuck in my head. Thanks for the heads up, be safe. FYI, I was able to complete the process without difficulty, great help.
This is a real Texan. Great video Roger. Really appreciate it.
Plus you can tell it's Texas at the end by the color of the grass (or the lack of color, lol)
And.....here’s some tips also, when you’re flushing a tankless, after about 15 mins of cold flushing, turn the unit on and get it hot, shut your outlet valve off and let the pump run and pressure up the exchanger and let it soak for 15-20 mins. While the exchanger is soaking, go around the house and pull off all the shower heads and faucet aerators and throw them in the bucket of hot solution, clean them with a brush if necessary. These tankless heaters rely on good flow for steady operation so if any jets are plugged in shower heads or aerators you may notice inconsistent temperatures. Pull out the inlet filter and clean it, re-install it. Rinse the unit with a hot rinse into a nearby floor drain preferably, turn the hot outlet back on and run tub tap for 5-10 mins. And if you’re a licensed plumber and gas fitter like me, clean the burners, replace igniter and sensor, check and adjust gas pressures as specified on rating plate. You’re welcome.
Sir, Really appreciate the video. I have a Flowmax unit and I have to change my water pump as it get wasted. I have never flushed the unit though. Do you think the reason of water pump damage is not flushing the package? Thank you very much
VERY IMFORMATIVE VIDEO, THANKS MUCHO!!
Thanks Roger, I will be doing this soon.
Question: Our Rheem tankless is making a thunk backfire noise when turned on. I see online that tank sediment is most likely the culprit. Any ideas on what else that could be, it still heats the water fine, but makes loud backfire noise. No obstruction on vent to outside, gas is full, I cleaned the water filter screen. Doesnt always do the backfire but most of the time.
Any info would be appreciated, Thank you.
Thanks for making process easy
Great vid, very informative
Great video,I have used vinegar before,& its time to do it again. I use a dc bilge pump,same set up as your electric pump.pump was here so I Plummed it & just let er go! Just refresh my set up watching your vid.quick ques,just recently kids noticed water gets cold for no reason,(Rheem tankless) temp on display shows 120,& no error codes,I go full hot on shower valve & heat comes back up. That's why I'm cleaning it but I'm wondering if a flow valve is going,thoughts?
Great video. Thanks. I wonder if anyone knows why my flush pump loses pressure after a minute or so? All fittings are tight with good seal. Pump is completely submerged. Bought new pump but same issue to it is like the Rinnai is blocking the flow after a bit. Too much pump pressure? Pump is rated at 28 gpm.
The Rinnai tankless water heater in our daughter's house was so clogged up with solids that it had stopped working entirely. There was not enough flow through the heat exchanger, so the logic board would not turn on the heat.
I flushed it for 45 minutes with one gallon of stronger 9% vinegar, and it was so green that you could no see two inches down into the bucket. I threw that vinegar out and then flushed in the opposite direction with another gallon of 9% solution.
Then after rinsing it out, the heater now works perfectly again. Thanks Roger!!
Glad you got it working!
Thank you for this. Just saved me $200 by doing this myself!
I just paid a plumber 285 bucks to do this......how ridiculous. new construction so I'm tankless, this will save me in the future, thanks!!
Thank you for this video! Any reason you don't use your hands to turn off/on the valves? Are they hot to the touch?
thanks, that was great!
how do I know how much scale was in there? I supposedly live in an area with soft water, and I don't run a lot of water through my tankless...and I don't want to descale unnecessarily. Any thoughts there?
Thanks for the video. I still am not confident about install mine. I have a rheem rtx-18 and I live in Dallas. 2bedroom 1 bath house. Is this thing going to still work when it gets cold?
Great video! I'm trying to find a pump comparable to the Haymaker one that you're using but all the pumps I see on Amazon are too strong for the purpose of flushing a water heater and Haymaker does not sell their pump separately. Would you be able to recommend a comparable pump (approx. 550 gph max)? Thank you.
The thing that blows my mind is that my tankless instructions said nothing about doing this flushing so I think I'll be going out this weekend and picking up a pump and some vinegar to flush mine out since it's a few years old.
same here, bought my house 3 years ago and the builder told me nothing about flushing the tankless water heater every year. I better get to doing this soon!
@@joeymesa4952 Know your equipment!
You dnt have to do it just will make your unit last twice as long same with traditional tanked water heaters supposed to be flushed yearly it cleans all sediments and minerals in the units.
Vinegar has chewed through 2 of my pumps. Apparently it will slowly eat certain plastics. I've switched to a citric acid mix.
@@homealone5087 what formula do you use.
Omg I had no clue this was a thing until it was recommended to me today
I'll so do it
Great video. What pump is that
I the tank man in my neighborhood. 75.00 created my own little business. Our water heaters also have a small screen filter that i remove to check for debris or calcium build-up
Well done thank you
Thanks for the video. I enjoyed it. can you explain more about the pH test?