instant hot water taps - any use?

magicbastarder · 14-04-2014 1:17pm #1

was just talking about these with colleagues, and they seem a good idea on paper:
http://purchase.ie/instant-hot-water-tap

i was wondering how well they do what they say on the tin?
my main concern would be flow rate; i suspect it might not be ideal, and reliability is also a concern.
plus, you can't leave the hot water supply plumbed to them (in case you do have a full tank of piping hot water already).
has anyone here installed them?

Transporting · 15-04-2014 8:48am

I have seen them installed, the flow rate is very low (if you want to get hot water coming out) and would never consider these as being suitable for installation in a kitchen as a main tap.
In my opinion they are fine if you had a remote garage/shed that has cold water with a sink and wanted to have very occasional hot water to wash your hands but that's about it.

magicbastarder · 15-04-2014 9:34am

cheers, when i saw this one, i assumed the one above was a very cheap relative:

http://www.quooker.co.uk/enuk

the quooker costs about a grand.

cgriffin · 15-04-2014 3:41pm

magicbastarder wrote: »

was just talking about these with colleagues, and they seem a good idea on paper:
http://purchase.ie/instant-hot-water-tap

i was wondering how well they do what they say on the tin?
my main concern would be flow rate; i suspect it might not be ideal, and reliability is also a concern.
plus, you can't leave the hot water supply plumbed to them (in case you do have a full tank of piping hot water already).
has anyone here installed them?

Firstly I will declare my interest! I own Purchase.ie.
However I will try to be as neutral as possible when assessing the product.
When installed the Instant Hot Water tap will provide you with hot water up to 65 degree celcius. The kooker on the other hand can provide you with instant boiling water (100 degree celcius) hence the price.
In relation to water flow the way it works is as follows.
Turn it right and you get cold water.
Turn it far left and you get warm water 30 to 40 degree at a strong flow rate.
Turn it slightly left and you get hot water 60 to 65 degree but not at as strong a flow rate (not a dribble either mind you!)
Many customers that contact us and go on to order the product do so because there is a long drag from boiler to kitchen sink and many litres of cold water are wasted whilst waiting for the hot water to come through.
An alternative might be to get a 10 litre under sink water heater but the taps are more efficient as you might not necessarily always need 10 litres of hot water and with the taps the energy costs associated with running them is only specifically when water is flowing.
Sheds were mentioned by another poster and interestingly we did seem to sell quite a few of them to farmers lately during the calving and lambing season, a whole new market for the product I had never thought about before.
All in all this is one of the best sellers of all our product range and I would not say 100% of customers are happy with it but certainly over 95% are.
Hope you don't mind me dropping by

magicbastarder · 16-04-2014 10:57am

cheers - having bought a wood moisture meter from you before christmas, i'd be right in suspecting you don't have a demonstration tap on premises?

cgriffin · 16-04-2014 11:37am

We are an online store and don't have a retail outlet at which people can just drop in. We have a warehouse which customers are welcome to call to and view products by appointment but we don't have a tap installed at this warehouse.
Glad to hear you are an existing customer and I hope you are satisfied with your previous order.
The aim is to keep costs to the minimum right now so customers can reap the benefits of competitive pricing across our product range.

touchdown77 · 17-04-2014 11:04am

I got a Dafi 7.3kw instant water heated last month and took it out after a few weeks because it was a failure.

It was fitted to a mains fed sink tap and never heated the water sufficiently hot, it was barely luke warm on full flow (with aerator fitted) and only warm when flow was reduced to a dribble (not enough to wash your hands)

Luckily it only cost £50 so we refitted our undersink heater and put it on a timer.

random10 · 17-04-2014 1:34pm

touchdown77 wrote: »

I got a Dafi 7.3kw instant water heated last month and took it out after a few weeks because it was a failure.

It was fitted to a mains fed sink tap and never heated the water sufficiently hot, it was barely luke warm on full flow (with aerator fitted) and only warm when flow was reduced to a dribble (not enough to wash your hands)

Luckily it only cost £50 so we refitted our undersink heater and put it on a timer.

we are getting a new kitchen and they mentioned 1400 for a quooker. you think we'd get it cheaper elsewhere. I'm very tempted by it

cgriffin · 17-04-2014 1:39pm

touchdown77 wrote: »

I got a Dafi 7.3kw instant water heated last month and took it out after a few weeks because it was a failure.

It was fitted to a mains fed sink tap and never heated the water sufficiently hot, it was barely luke warm on full flow (with aerator fitted) and only warm when flow was reduced to a dribble (not enough to wash your hands)

Luckily it only cost £50 so we refitted our undersink heater and put it on a timer.

Sounds like the Dafi was literally money down the drain all be it £50 and must have left you with a sinking feeling.
At 7.3KW I would have expected it to produce boiling water!
Our tap is twice as energy efficient and actually works. Of course it costs more as well of course.

cgriffin · 17-04-2014 1:49pm

random10 wrote: »

we are getting a new kitchen and they mentioned 1400 for a quooker. you think we'd get it cheaper elsewhere. I'm very tempted by it

Insinkerator are also now doing a boiling hot water tap and seems to be much more cost effective option to the Kooker.
Havn't seen it yet but if it is something I feel works well when I do see it I might add it to Purchase.ie range at some stage in the future.
In the meantime "Ireland Bathroom Superstore" (based in the UK) have them.
There is a few different models.
See one at
http://www.taps4less.ie/PP/ISE-HC3300C.html

Sleeper12 · 18-04-2014 7:37pm

I've installed them before. They seemed to be fine to me. Great idea if you ask me.

LIFFY FISHING · 19-04-2014 9:23am

Modern Plant have a range of Steibel Eltron instant hot taps, these are the best I have ever seen, they leave the Zip range well behind, you csnt buy a good cheap one....

halosecurity.ie · 29-08-2014 12:28am

random10 wrote: »

we are getting a new kitchen and they mentioned 1400 for a quooker. you think we'd get it cheaper elsewhere. I'm very tempted by it

Hi,

We are a new Quooker agent based in Cork.
If you would like information on them, please let me know.

Regards,

Quookers.ie

halosecurity.ie · 29-08-2014 12:44am

random10 wrote: »

we are getting a new kitchen and they mentioned 1400 for a quooker. you think we'd get it cheaper elsewhere. I'm very tempted by it

We are an agent for Quooker.

We have a working Quooker on display at our offices in Cork. Anyone is welcome to come and test it.

We are currently preparing our online sales site quookers.ie which will allow people to buy any tap from the Quooker range at very competitive prices.

halosecurity.ie · 29-08-2014 12:48am

i was wondering how well they do what they say on the tin?
my main concern would be flow rate; i suspect it might not be ideal, and reliability is also a concern.
plus, you can't leave the hot water supply plumbed to them (in case you do have a full tank of piping hot water already).
has anyone here installed them?[/QUOTE]

If you have hot water already, why are you looking for an instant "hot" water tap? Or, do you want an instant "boiling" water tap?

cgriffin · 29-08-2014 12:53am

halosecurity.ie wrote: »

i was wondering how well they do what they say on the tin?
my main concern would be flow rate; i suspect it might not be ideal, and reliability is also a concern.
plus, you can't leave the hot water supply plumbed to them (in case you do have a full tank of piping hot water already).
has anyone here installed them?

If you have hot water already, why are you looking for an instant "hot" water tap? Or, do you want an instant "boiling" water tap?[/QUOTE]

Hard to beat a bit of late night advertising:D

greasepalm · 29-08-2014 12:57am

i will also be tempted to buy a instant hot water tap like seen on rte1 and at ideal homes as i can see gallons of cold water down the drain waiting for hot water and only needing a plumbed cold feed and power supply already fitted.
wonder how many forget about power supply?
on the flow rate current tap and basin water goes everywhere and is reduced on the hot water tap while heating nice=less splashes.

cgriffin · 29-08-2014 1:06am

greasepalm wrote: »

i will also be tempted to buy a instant hot water tap like seen on rte1 and at ideal homes as i can see gallons of cold water down the drain waiting for hot water and only needing a plumbed cold feed and power supply already fitted.
wonder how many forget about power supply?

The one you are referring to is the one in the original link by OP.
The power output is a maximum of 3KW.
If you look at it in simply terms if the tap was running water at peak hotness for a full hour it would add in the region of 60 cent to your energy bill.
Obviously a tap which gives you instant boiling water will consume quite a bit more energy.

halosecurity.ie · 29-08-2014 1:33am

Instant Boiling & Instant Hot water Taps...

Quooker now offer the "Combi" tank which delivers both instant Boiling & Hot water so one can, for example, make a cup of tea or have hot water for manually washing dishes. The Combi tank has a 7L capacity.

This is ideal for people who have only a cold water supply at the sink or who have a long run of piping to their hot water storage tank resulting in wastage of water as one runs off the cold water in the pipes to get to the hot...

There are 17 other taps on the market which allude to the fact that their taps deliver boiling water but, in fact, they do not. They can't because Quooker have a patent on the technology required to make it happen.

ALL non-Quooker taps fall short of 100C, boiling.

Quooker achieve 100C from the first drop. This is how that happens:

The Quooker tank is fitted beneath the sink. It is "Vacuum Insulated" which gives it very low loss of energy and helps maintain the internal water temperature without having to constantly use electricity.

Because the water is stored under vacuum, the water can be heated beyond boiling. In fact, all Quooker tanks store water at 110C!

Why?

Well, when the user activates the tap, the water must travel from the tank to the tap and there is a loss of a few degrees as this happens. The above-boiling temperature at which Quooker stores water allows this loss to happen but the water at the spout to still be 100C.

So, a full 10 degrees celsius are lost between the tank and the tap?

No. As soon as the water reaches the spout it contacts regular atmospheric pressure where it reverts instantly to 100C.

Why are Quookers more expensive than other taps?

They are quality, European made systems with nearly 35 years of development gone into them. They are a relatively small company and only supply the European market -you cannot get Quooker in the U.S, currently.

You need excellent quality parts, build and insulation to ensure a system handling water at 110C lasts. Quookers last...

Will Quooker save me money?

That really depends on how often you boil your kettle and how much of the water you boil you actually use?

With Quooker, you only draw what you need, then shut off the tap, just as you would cold water for drinking.

If, like most people, you boil your kettle several times a day, Quooker will be more efficient.

However, you have to buy the Quooker day one, and they are far more expensive than kettles, so, as a purely money-saving exercise, you'll have to wait quite a few years to get your money back via ESB savings.

That said, Quooker is far more than efficiency:

Quooker is super convenient: Boiling water at the twist of a tap, instantly.

For cooking, instant water for boiling spuds, preparing pasta etc...

Like coffee? If you make proper coffee using an Espresso machine but like a 'long' coffee or Americano... you'll probably be topping up your espresso shot with boiling water from your kettle! This is time consuming and inefficient as kettles require a minimum amount of water to safely operate and this is more than you'll need for your Americano.

Quooker is safer, especially for kids:

Kettles cause injury every day. Kettles fall off counters and can shower the area in boiling water when this happens.

You cannot knock a Quooker tap over!

If you require more info, to see, use or buy a Quooker please contact us: quookers.ie

greasepalm · 29-08-2014 1:37am

so which is dearer water down drain while waiting to heat from boiler or leccy in heating water to wash hands
memo on tap turn off while not in use.
dont need instant boiling water yet.

cgriffin · 29-08-2014 1:56am

greasepalm wrote: »

so which is dearer water down drain while waiting to heat from boiler or leccy in heating water to wash hands
memo on tap turn off while not in use.
dont need instant boiling water yet.

The thing is most people order the Instant Hot Water Tap to save on their energy bill primarily.
Many people will and do turn on the immersion and heat a full cylinder of water when they just need a few litres to wash some dishes.
The energy saving in some households can be immense when this tap is installed.
But to assess water saving potential of this product here is a pretty conservative breakdown.

Kitchen taps tends to generally have a higher water output than bathroom taps. Typically they have a water output in the region of 15 litres a minute.

Lets say it takes 30 seconds for the water feeding to your tap to heat up it could well mean that 7.5 litres goes down the drain.

Lets say that happens 3 times a day on average over the course of the year.

3 times per day x 7.5 litres x 365 days = 8212.50 litres per annum

Proposed water rate charge published by Commission for Energy Regulation is
€4.48 per 1,000 litres

Water saving per annum based on above €36.79

Here is a pretty comprehensive guide I put together on water charges.
http://purchase.ie/media/real-costs-water-charges

Mods delete above link obviously if deemed inappropriate.

greasepalm · 29-08-2014 2:14am

funny the instant hot water tap was based on the need to save water i thought with this new water charge and maybe not even got a look in if water charges were not there.i was lucky to have solar panel water heating for that area.
bookmarked that guide for future use cheers.

cgriffin · 29-08-2014 2:24am

halosecurity.ie wrote: »

Instant Boiling & Instant Hot water Taps...

Quooker now offer the "Combi" tank which delivers both instant Boiling & Hot water so one can, for example, make a cup of tea or have hot water for manually washing dishes. The Combi tank has a 7L capacity.

This is ideal for people who have only a cold water supply at the sink or who have a long run of piping to their hot water storage tank resulting in wastage of water as one runs off the cold water in the pipes to get to the hot...

There are 17 other taps on the market which allude to the fact that their taps deliver boiling water but, in fact, they do not. They can't because Quooker have a patent on the technology required to make it happen.

ALL non-Quooker taps fall short of 100C, boiling.

Quooker achieve 100C from the first drop. This is how that happens:

The Quooker tank is fitted beneath the sink. It is "Vacuum Insulated" which gives it very low loss of energy and helps maintain the internal water temperature without having to constantly use electricity.

Because the water is stored under vacuum, the water can be heated beyond boiling. In fact, all Quooker tanks store water at 110C!

Why?

Well, when the user activates the tap, the water must travel from the tank to the tap and there is a loss of a few degrees as this happens. The above-boiling temperature at which Quooker stores water allows this loss to happen but the water at the spout to still be 100C.

So, a full 10 degrees celsius are lost between the tank and the tap?

No. As soon as the water reaches the spout it contacts regular atmospheric pressure where it reverts instantly to 100C.

Why are Quookers more expensive than other taps?

They are quality, European made systems with nearly 35 years of development gone into them. They are a relatively small company and only supply the European market -you cannot get Quooker in the U.S, currently.

You need excellent quality parts, build and insulation to ensure a system handling water at 110C lasts. Quookers last...

Will Quooker save me money?

That really depends on how often you boil your kettle and how much of the water you boil you actually use?

With Quooker, you only draw what you need, then shut off the tap, just as you would cold water for drinking.

If, like most people, you boil your kettle several times a day, Quooker will be more efficient.

However, you have to buy the Quooker day one, and they are far more expensive than kettles, so, as a purely money-saving exercise, you'll have to wait quite a few years to get your money back via ESB savings.

That said, Quooker is far more than efficiency:

Quooker is super convenient: Boiling water at the twist of a tap, instantly.

For cooking, instant water for boiling spuds, preparing pasta etc...

Like coffee? If you make proper coffee using an Espresso machine but like a 'long' coffee or Americano... you'll probably be topping up your espresso shot with boiling water from your kettle! This is time consuming and inefficient as kettles require a minimum amount of water to safely operate and this is more than you'll need for your Americano.

Quooker is safer, especially for kids:

Kettles cause injury every day. Kettles fall off counters and can shower the area in boiling water when this happens.

You cannot knock a Quooker tap over!

If you require more info, to see, use or buy a Quooker please contact us: quookers.ie

Getting the kids to make you a cup of tea is just child labour.

Ah seriously are you sure your not mixing kettles up with kettle bells in regards injuries?
Not dissing the Kooker product which I think is superb if you can afford one and will make use out of it but I don't think I would want one in a house which has kids climbing all over the place.
Curious kid puts hand under boiling tap is far more likely than a kettle falling from a counter in my opinion.

cgriffin · 29-08-2014 2:39am

greasepalm wrote: »

funny the instant hot water tap was based on the need to save water i thought with this new water charge and maybe not even got a look in if water charges were not there.i was lucky to have solar panel water heating for that area.
bookmarked that guide for future use cheers.

To be fair in a busy household of 5 or 6 people I think there is a good chance that the tap could pay for itself on water saving alone within 12 to 15 months.
You also got to allow for the fact that it can simply just be a more practical solution for many people as well.

Victor · 29-08-2014 2:43am

For a domestic kitchen, just use the kettle.

For large installations, use flow & return pipes.

touchdown77 · 29-08-2014 12:11pm

halosecurity.ie wrote: »

Instant Boiling & Instant Hot water Taps...

The Quooker tank is fitted beneath the sink. It is "Vacuum Insulated" which gives it very low loss of energy and helps maintain the internal water temperature without having to constantly use electricity.

Because the water is stored under vacuum, the water can be heated beyond boiling. In fact, all Quooker tanks store water at 110C!

How can you store water at 110c ??

Water changes from a liquid to a gas (i.e. steam) at 100c.

So are you storing steam or water ?

Wearb · 29-08-2014 12:47pm

touchdown77 wrote: »

How can you store water at 110c ??

Water changes from a liquid to a gas (i.e. steam) at 100c.

So are you storing steam or water ?

Pressurised water can be stored above 100C if under required pressure (not vacuum which has opposite effect). Needs safeguards when under pressure because of instant boiling and expansion if pressure is suddenly released.

Dardania · 30-06-2015 8:07pm

Just to give a brief review - I purchased the kitchen version of the tap, and the bathroom version of the tap, and used them in my home for the past few months.

Reason for buying them was the hot water cylinder took up quite a bit of space in the house that would be better used with a wardrobe. The shower is electrically heated already, so it was no harm to get rid of the cylinder. I had considered a combi boiler, but the expense of replacing a 8 year old system boiler + tearing apart a kitchen was hard to justify with these electric taps available on the market. I reckoned the combi boiler cost would have been in region of €3,500 by the time I'd replaced the boiler, and put a 22mm DHW pipe in to enable me get rid of the electric shower, to make it worth while.

Additionally I was getting my electrical consumer unit replaced at the same time as it was in poor state, so was able to get a dedidicated RCBO circuit installed for the bathroom tap, and got a fused spur linked into an existing, rebalanced kitchen RCbO'd circuit - so the electrical works were convenient at the time. I reckon for the dedicated bathroom circuit (incl. some wall chasing outside the bathroom for FSO) and the kitchen FSO came to about €200.
I kept a a close eye on circuit loading screen versus incoming breaker for the elec supply, and so far with the tap and the 8kW electrical shower plus normal parasitic loads around the house, all has been fine e.g. no trips. I would be curious what would happen if I tried another tap, plus a booster pump, on a conventional domestic 12kVA / 63A supply.

Ordering process and delivery process was very smooth from purchase.ie including a phonecall to discuss the tech requirements.

The taps are quite fine - certainly not as premium feeling as a traditional metal tap, but for plastic taps, quite well built.

Using the valve is a bit of a change from normal - closer to the centre is reduced flow, and further from the centre is increased flow. It's a bit disingenuous that you get hottest closest to the centre, moving to less hot further out. Additionally a single digit number of times, we've inadvertently left the tap dribbling, by not getting correctly back to the centre position - a click indent would be advisable for future development to ease this issue.

Temperature versus flow is fine - you certainly get hot water at low flow, and lukewarm at higher flows. Mrs. Dardania is very happy to have warm water for teeth brushing etc. It will be interesting to see what the temp is like in winter, when the incoming mains is colder.

I was surprised at the length of time it took to heat up - typically about 8-10 seconds, and you have to have it on low flow to get proper heat (as the 3kW element is full on/full off). But fine thereafter - you can modulate the flow to control the temp,to personal preference. And definitely faster than anything even a combi boiler would do.

Pressure wise, it's all down to your supply. Presently I have them both connected to the incoming mains - which is fine for the kitchen tap, but not ideal for the bathroom tap. I have it on the old "DHW" pipe work, so I can put a booster pump on that in future quite easily with some changes in the attic (funded possibly upon receipt of the HRI tax credit) - for now irish water can pressurise it. And if I do put a pump on that old DHW pipework, I could also pressurise the shower, but leave the WC on tank head, in case of power cuts (and of course the bath tap is also on tank head for hand washing).

During installation, the plumber wrongly connected the bathroom tap to tank head, so had only 2.5m of head pressure (so approx. 0.25 bar - less than the min stated on the tech specs for the tap) - the tap worked, but wouldn't be considered safe - the water, even when turned to max flow which in theory is most lukewarm, came out quite hot, to the point of scald (a problem in itself) but more concerning is if you turn the tap off, walk away, and someone else uses it, the water remaining in the tap will have boiled to steam, and could be hazardous. Plumber had to fix that pronto. But all good now when the water supply is per the tech spec.

One quirk with the kitchen tap is that it's water discharge nozzle is quite a dispersed spray, whereas I am more accustomed to a continuous flow. I think the nozzle supplied sprays in order to create some back pressure to fill the heating element chamber (which is fine) but in cold water mode, it has a tendency to splash around the sink...not the end of the world, but we have noticed it.

Running costs I haven't gotten a handle on yet - hard to isolate, but should be clearer in the coming months. I doubt the saving of heating a water tank will be matched by the expense of these taps, but use is minimal, so I am not expecting a shock.

Overall I'm happy with the purchase, would recommend it to anyone, as long as they're aware of limitations, and have a good water supply and electrical system.

instant hot water taps - any use?

Comments