How to unlock energy smart water heater
Installing A New Electric Water Heater - Part 3 Filling the new heater, placing it in service.
and we'll verify the drinking shot and
of course electrical is not connected
yet we want to do a fill on this first
we don't want to want to make sure all
of our plumbing is okay okay I already
have the faucets upstairs opened up and
I'm very slowly gonna open up this
Philadelphia
okay here filling and all although I do
have the faucets opened up go ahead and
open up that valve and that will help
vent the vent the air out
there we go she's open all the way it's
going to take a little bit for this
thing to fill one nifty thing is this
new water softener has a capacity
indicator so I think after regeneration
you have like 850 gallons so you can see
that you can see how much we're putting
in that water here it's kind of a kind
of a good gauge solve an idea and we get
close I think we started at 760 so we
get down to 7 tunnel I'll know that
we're close to getting this thing filled
up I also have a flow rate on here
flowing about 10 gallons a minute well
pump kicked on seems to be keeping up
the pressure seems good ok once I
started getting water out of the
pressure temperature and pressure relief
valve I went ahead and dialed back on
the water going into the heater
I have faucets opened up here in the
basement and the first floor and the
second floor is the hot water coming out
right now since there's no bubbles
coming out at this moment or there's no
air coming out I'm going to go ahead and
shut this and it's going to work the air
up going all the way to the second floor
okay now I'm at the kitchen faucet now I
know that's a little water pressure but
that's because it's just cuz I don't
have the valve cracked open all the way
yeah I'm on the second floor no stairs
what all the system here
okay got all the air blood all the lines
you don't hear any hissing on this valve
so that means the pressure is equalized
on both sides of it go ahead and open
that up both on both sides looking at
the fittings here this one looks good
yeah it's a little tricky here on the
water here because I had some water
dripped down in there so that's damp but
I don't I'm gonna have to let that dry
and keep it on it but I believe we're
okay this union here now that's a leak
or just common station line just give
that a little tighten that just a hair
okay I went ahead and removed I remove
this plate which has two screws on it
and what this is for it's a smart grid
or home automation connector and
basically in summer is be it charged
different rates for your lectures
electricity depending on what time you
use it and under periods of high demand
you can shut this water heater off
remotely I believe but we don't have
that here so that's not going to be
connected so I took out these two 3/4
inch screws I got my my romex going into
the water here got my ground hooked up
and since this this water heater has a
microprocessor on it there's a a total
of two red wires and two black wires I
believe one powers the elements and one
power is the microprocessor something
ahead and put this cover back on okay so
I'm going to go ahead and power up the
water heater this this has dry fire
prevention technology if you put power
to a electric water heater and there's
no water in it
we'll blow the elements or element or
elements out believe it just be one
element now I verified we have water in
this water here I've purged all the air
from the system I've checked these
connections no leaks now I'm going to
put this foam insulation back on but
that's not going to happen right now
this is a little damp around here
because I've dribbled some water down in
there but I al and I don't see any leaks
so but I will keep an eye on that over
the next few days just to make sure
we're good okay i double-checked
everything I'm going to go ahead and
power on the water heater now this I
want to say it goes through a series of
self checks and what I want to do let's
see it's 120 degrees we'll leave it at
that for now these buttons here they're
they're like a capacitive locks on it's
a capacitive type button so you don't
actually push you just put your finger
on it so I switched it over to standard
mode for now the energy smart mode will
follow your water to use its petwalk
water usage patterns and say you know
you don't use water at night it'll let
the water get cooler to minimize your
standby losses and I want to believe I
believe the elements having kicked on
yet
oops I believe they say it takes 8
minutes it runs a series of self checks
see how see how that element lights
click it on it's running a series of
self checks and I believe it's 8 minutes
till turns itself on
well set at 120 degrees the element is
on and it's on its way to making hot
water so far so good I'm going to put on
the energy smart energy smart option
might as well save what we can and I bet
a lot of people thought neglected this
put an extension on the temperature and
pressure valve goes down to the floor
it's not required to go into a floor
drain here there is a floor drain in the
basement I usually want to do test them
I put a little bucket under there just
let it go on the floor I mean caramel
burger
I mean really that's not going to hurt
anything so another reason I wanted to
put this puppy up on blocks and I think
it has to be about six inches from the
floor that's a hair high but left two
houses we had this was a plastic far as
I can tell it's supposed you're supposed
to have a pipe on here that can handle
like 250 degrees so I just went ahead
and put copper on there it's pretty
expensive just sort of fitting on there
and I've seen them plumbed into drains
before the drains quite a ways away I
just I don't see the point in that
really someone get it go ahead and roll
with that
um the other option that I had
installing this and maybe I should have
done it this way maybe I shouldn't have
is uh I could have started on some male
three-quarter inch threaded fittings and
I could I actually bought everything to
do it this way but I bought the hoses
they were too short and I didn't feel
like running back to the store so I just
plumbed it and solid I don't know if
there's an advantage I mean these this
is stainless steel braided but I mean
eventually I would figure that would
fail or is the solid copper shouldn't
but I'm sure you know there's plenty of
ways to do it they all pretty much work
as long as it works that's all that
counts
they also make nice little sharkbite
fittings built into the hose so you
slide the hose up over your pipe and you
screw it onto the water heater down here
and I mean galvanized and copper I
suppose there should be a dielectric
Union in there but you know the old one
lasted for thirty years and we'll see
what happens
that's the other way of doing it you
just screw that down on the water here
and then it's real easy if you already
have the the threaded fitting up here
but uh I just soldered it in solid I've
checked everything for leaks I had to
really crank down on this cold water
union here to get it to seal I had just
a very slow very slow accumulation of
water on the top it seems to be okay now
from what I can tell but man I really
had to crank down on that thing so I
don't know if I got a piece of junk in
there or what but that's uh that's where
she's at
I like this because you can you can set
the temperature you be very he could be
very exact with the temperature you may
wonder why in the heck would you want to
do that you just set it and forget it
well maybe it's my nature seem like I
always have to play with stuff but oh
say I'm gonna go hose out the garage
with hot water
i-i've cranked it up in the past I mean
it's just uh it's just nice to have that
now there is some redundancy built into
this if this module fails you just go
ahead and you disconnect this module and
there's just a standard thermostat
behind there I'm gonna look into that
and see how it works but you don't need
the digital controls you can even run it
like the old-fashioned thermostats if
need be well
the water's starting to get warm I'm
getting ready to take a shower and that
concludes the water heater installation
it has a thing this is a 12 year model
and I don't see how she does so far so
good
