Eccotemp i12-NG Tankless Water Heater

Call me crazy, but I installed this in a 4000 square ft home with 4 bathrooms. It is just 3 of us though. So I think I can answer some questions people have in a larger home. I gave this thing 4 stars originally because of the lower power, but then UPDATED moved to 5 stars since it does so well for us. It looks awesome, sounds good, small, light weight. Most people in reviews talk about showers. Well our household take primarily baths. For filling a bathtub, you need to play with the settings. At 48 degree F water here in MI, I found turning water heater down to 1.5 gpm works. I set the temperature at 131 degrees at the water heater. By the time it gets to my huge Jaccuzzi, it goes down to 115 degrees. That is hot, so I was able to add a tiny bit of cold and got a Jaccuzzi tub full at 97 degrees in about 30 minutes. Not too bad. Plus it is hotter and can fill to any higher level than my previous 50 gallon water heater. Next test, a regular small bathtub, but at the far end of my house. The water lines run through the garage ceiling. By the time it gets there, it is at 106 degrees and takes about 10 minutes to fill the tub. This small tub actually was the hardest to get just right. Originally I had the water at 2.4 gpm, and it was fine for the big tub, but terrible for this far smaller tub. This is why I set the flow to 1.5 gpm right at the water heater. I think I will just leave it there, rather then keep having to adjust. Ok, 1.5 gpm is really low and 2 people cannot fill a tub at the same time, but it works for us and you can fill the 2nd tub immediately after. For your closer bathrooms, you can get a bit more gpm by adding some cold water. We had a 50 gallon direct vent gas water heater. This was not perfect either. We could never get more than 1/2 a tub before cold water started coming out. So even though this tankless water heater takes a longer time to fill a tub, it can keep going until it is full. So we just set the timer on the Jaccuzzi to 20 minutes and then come back and check on it. Compromises but the benefits are how efficient it is, how it never runs out of hot water, and since it is lower power, it has to be safer. It is safer than having a tank, that is for sure. Check water heater mythbusters on yout. So I am not necessarily recommending someone with a 4000 square ft house to buy this. Although for a conservative family that has no problem with compromising a little time for filling a tub for efficiency, you can definitely get by. Next test, faucets. You can run 2 faucets at the same time at my settings. I imagine at 2.5 gpm maybe 3 faucets but I do not want to keep changing the flow rate. I really love the touch screen and the looks are nice. Btw plan on a dozen trips to buy pipe parts. I also bought more exhaust vent. The exact same. Basically China makes these vent kits the exact same size so I can extend mine. Under 20 bucks online. Also plan on spending another 300 bucks on pipe parts. This is because you have to get the pipes from where your tank water heater was to where your tankless water heater is. I think it is worth it. It will save $250 a year. Btw, it felt good getting rid of that big bulky and ugly tank water heater. 7/6/2017 Update: I just want to add that as the summer comes, I was able to lower temperature on the water heater to 113 degrees. So in the summer this thing has extra capacity available. I still just leave it at 1.5 gpm. Use of this water heater has become normal for us.

Ecotemp hot water heaters are great , very efficient, easy to connect , very easy to operate . I have two of them one in the laundry room the other in the main cabin. Great value !!

Update ony last review. This is my second unit and the second one that burst. I've lowered my rating to a 1 star. I thought the units burst from freezing...but now I'm not sure. I took this unit apart and found that in the water coils on the top right side (by temp sensor) there are two coils that bend back 180°into the heat box. These coils looked VERY grainy, like pebbled leather instead of smooth copper (besides the obvious open split) and they are PAPER thin. I STRONGLY suspect the reason they look like this is because they heat/treat or mold them to make this very tight 180° bend and used substandard copper. I took my old unit apart (I kept it) and viola...EXACT same thing. This is a VERY OBVIOUS DESIGN FLAW in these units that the company HAS to know about. I'm guessing that those of you that sprung leaks when you flushed your heater simply eroded the miniscule amount of copper on these two bends. If you still have the unit around...check it out? I was able to repair these units by using a torch and lead free solder and built the surface up about 1/8". I now have a spare unit. This unit heats water and works well...but seems to be designed to fail. I recommend that you be wiser than me and buy a unit that has a built in heater to prevent unit from freezing and definitely don't buy this one.

Purchased i12-lp several months ago. I am remodeling a beach front retirment home. Installation took most of the day, running for parts ect.....Im not a spring chicken anymore....was not in a rush. Not any difference from the 50 gallon electric heater I removed (except way cheaper to use). Can easily handle a high power shower head. Wife always removes water saver. Cant do 2 showers at once, nor could 50 gallon elec. Can take as many showers or chores as you wish one after another and never run out of 140 hot water. Water temp in is about 58 degrees. Water out 140 degrees @ 1.5 GPM +-.. Please note, I am an experienced home builder of 30 plus years. Never install LP gas lines if you are not a pro. This unit works great for my wife and I and the occasional visit from kids and grandkids. I recommend it. UPDATE Purchased in 2018. Still working perfect. 5 stars. In the interest of being fully honest, One time in 5 years it had an error code. I unplugged and drained the unit. Still the error code. Then I unplugged and drained, smacked it with open had on the front, working perfect ever since....lol I stand by my first review. Buy it. Dont give into the Hype on Renni tankless.

The temperature control is excellent; ours is set at 108F which allows mixing with a little cold water at the shower control valves to get the temperature perfect. I like the temperature and flow rate displays. My wife uses only about 0.9 gpm of hot water and has had the heater go off due to low flow. She has to increase the water flow rate a little from what she is accustomed to avoid the problem. The vent is round single wall stainless steel, factory bent over 90 degrees to allow any condensation to flow to the exterior. The furnished thimble pieces create a double-walled pipe as it goes through your exterior wall. My heater is on an interior wall, so I did a custom transition to a Class B vent that goes through the roof. Yes, I provided for drainage at the low spot on the vent, where the factory vent meets the vertical Class B system. It is working great. But there may be no code-approved fittings to do this; I couldn't find any. So if you need to connect to a Type B vent and must pass inspection, do your homework before ordering this heater! We try to use cold water for hand washing, to prevent the heater from starting when there is no hope of getting hot water at the faucet in the brief time the water is running.

I'm very happy with this product, but I also had a valuable learning experience. If you plan to replace your tankless gas heater with this guy, it will install in no time. BUT...If you plan to replace a TANKED gas water heater with this tankless heater, get ready for a lot of trips to your Home Depot. This heater is designed to mount on an outside wall and vent directly behind the unit and through the wall. The vent pipe is pretty small, around 2 inches diameter and 18 inches in length. My initial pan was to remove the gas heater, install this guy on the wall, then use the existing galvanized 3 inch pipe to vent. NOPE! This will violate the warranty, your local building codes, and possibly test your fire insurance claims department. Due to the high heat output (80,000 BTU) and the condensation issues that occur with this heat, stainless steel piping is required. Just try to find someone local that sells 2" Stainless steel vent pipes! The manufacturer sells a vertical vent kit for another $200+ but that pipe cannot fit inside of your current roof vent. You will need to remove the old vent and install the new one. For me, it was easier to cut the pipes and relocate the heater to an outside wall instead of creating roofing issues.

This is a fantastic water heater. Very easy to use. Allows you to set the temperature you want and delivers it quickly. Automatically shuts down with no water flow. No manual lighting required. Looks great. Note: the photo shows the unit mounted but the propane line is not yet installed.

This is the best one yet! I have had several over the years and they keep getting better. The last one I had was a battery operated starter that I had outside. Now, this one is much nicer ( I have a shop now as opposed to a temporary shop) and no longer have to have the heater outside on the wall and the hassle of draining it every night to prevent freezing. This is mounted inside, (easy) and plumbed it with gator bite connections. I also recommend the installation of a flushing unit just below. This helps with hard water as you can circulate the vinegar through the heater without damage. I purchased that separately from this unit. Heats water fast and keeps it hot! Quiet operation and a real energy saver. If you haven't gone to a tankless system yet, it is high time you did!

What a great and cheaply priced water heater! I live above 3000 feet and there are no problems with heating infloor pipes. You won't find a simpler system than this one! Perfect for my application!

Easy to install. Looks classy and elegant. Love it!! It needs adequate water pressure to function so I have had to buy a booster pump, but it is a well made, well functioning water heater.

For us the unit worked fine for one year. After a year it started to leak water from the copper heat exchanger. I contacted the Eccotemp for warranty. Sent them the info they requested. And they rejected my warranty. They claimed it was frozen without inspecting it. It was very disappointing because they did not do an inspection to actually find out what is wrong. They pre-judge you to be a liar and claim a bogus reason to deny your warranty. Last time I checked nothing freezes in the month of June. My wife and I along with our kids live in our house full time. Nothing has ever frozen in our house. And the mechanical room where our Eco temp water heater is has never dropped below 19° C. With the warranty rejected, took the water heater to have it repaired. After the technician took it apart, he found out that on the back side of the heat exchanger up against the back panel, there was one spot where there was a lot of green corrosion and it had turned into one pinhole. HE CONFIRM THAT IT WAS NOT FROZEN.... Something I was already 100% sure of. So if you like to buy an Eccotemp product go for it, but if something happens to it, most likely Eccotemp Will judge you to be a liar and reject you warranty. It seems like they will do little to help you if it's going to cost them. Also keep in mind that there is no phone number to call these guys. Everything is done by email. And when you request for a phone call they don't call you. They have an option on their website to have someone call you back. No matter how many times you fill that in they don't call back.

Mon chauffe eau ne fonctionne pas bien le système électronique a l'air défectueux..je viens de le faire installer il y a une semaine et je connais des gens qui on le même chauffe eau qui me disent qu'ils ne rencontrent pas les problèmes que j'ai avec le mien très déçu il ne se règle pas pour avoir l'eau chaude pour être confortable

Looks like someone has returned, it got re-packaged, but not even in new packaging. That said it works well.