Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

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Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

October 31, 2011, 01:03:39 pm

Aqua hot is new to us. My wife loves long hot showers, but she runs out of hot water. The AH switch is ON, the elect. switch is OFF. Everything else is working great

Any ideas of why we're running out of hot water? Cheers.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #1 – October 31, 2011, 01:06:32 pm

You might revisit the idea of expecting "long hot showers" ;o)

best, paul

Quote

Aqua hot is new to us. My wife loves long hot showers, but she runs out of hot water. The AH switch is ON, the elect. switch is OFF. Everything else is working great Any ideas of why we're running out of hot water? Cheers.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #2 – October 31, 2011, 01:08:45 pm

Hmmm, never been a problem in our unit, DW has taken 30 min hot showers. Member Roger Berke moderates an rv hydronic heat board on yahoo, best to take question there

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #3 – October 31, 2011, 01:14:16 pm

Is it firing on diesel?

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #4 – October 31, 2011, 01:50:27 pm

Hi Steve,

Roger Berke is "The Man" when it comes to Aqua Hot Repair. He has moved his forum from Yahoo to here Forums

Your Aqua Hot is rated to provide 1.5 gallons of hot water per minute with a 55 degree F rise in temperature. One fella recently contacted Roger from Canada regarding no hot water. His hose was suppling about 35 degree water and with a 55 degree rise, he was only getting 90 degree water at the shower.

Another posibility is the mixing or tempering valve. You can open the case of the Aqua Hot and turn the knob all the way one way, then all the way the other way and finally back to where you started to get is operating properly most of the time.

The knob may be stuck requiring one to get pliers and rock the knob back and forth, adding more torque till the knob breaks free and is easy to turn.

You can check the valve by placing you hand on the out put line from the tank to the valve, the other hand on the red pex taking hot water to the coach and asking for the hot water faucet to be turned on inside. The hand on the hot water coming from the tank should get real hot, perhaps 150 degrees + while the hand on the red pex should be very warm to the touch if not indeed hot. This should be sustained for as long as you wish to check.

If the red line gets cool while the line from the tank stays hot, bad valve. If the line from the tank cools off, could be the stir pump is not being started or the diesel burner is not picking up the need for more hot water quick enough (control thermostat).

Check it out and let us know.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #5 – October 31, 2011, 03:48:28 pm

Sounds to me like you are the 'other man'...
You should make a deal with your fav local campground. Discount camping for hydronic repair by Rudy... Its a win-win!!!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #6 – October 31, 2011, 03:51:00 pm

Quote from: flite2010 – October 31, 2011, 01:14:16 pm

Is it firing on diesel?

Yep!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #7 – October 31, 2011, 05:20:07 pm

The 1.5gpm spec is critical. You have to search for a shower head with that spec. The best we've found is Oxygenics at CW. Its full flow spec is 1.75gpm, but it includes a twist valve to reduce flow a little further. Measure the actual flow with a bucket. Remember that flow can change with water pressure.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #8 – October 31, 2011, 08:39:25 pm

Quote from: amos.harrison – October 31, 2011, 05:20:07 pm

The 1.5gpm spec is critical. You have to search for a shower head with that spec. The best we've found is Oxygenics at CW. Its full flow spec is 1.75gpm, but it includes a twist valve to reduce flow a little further. Measure the actual flow with a bucket. Remember that flow can change with water pressure.

Ahhh! That makes sense. We had that shower head in our SOB with a 10 gallon water heater and although we couldn't take LONG showers back-to-back we made it work. I guess my DW thought "never runs out of hot water" meant exactly that, but I had reservations about it myself. Everything else on the AH is running fine. Thanks!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #9 – October 31, 2011, 09:26:05 pm

Steve,

Good to hear the unit is working.

I sent you an e-mail via the forum. Did you get it?

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #10 – November 01, 2011, 07:40:14 am

Quote from: Rudy – October 31, 2011, 09:26:05 pm

Steve, I sent you an e-mail via the forum. Did you get it?

I did Rudy... thanks! Before I call in any help, I'm going to try a water flow restrictor in my existing shower head. Another thing is that the water coming in is pretty cold. It's about 35-40F in the am where I am now and I read that the water temp has something to do with the ability of the AH to heat water as well. This is a learning curve for me ... heck, I just found out WHERE my AH was yesterday! Had to remove a piece of basement wall to see it.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #11 – November 02, 2011, 03:07:15 pm

Steve,

An easy solution when the city water is very cold is to use the water pump off the fresh water tank and just replenish every couple days after shower time.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #12 – November 02, 2011, 04:00:37 pm

Now I really wish I had thought of that while I was standing in the shower with "pee warm" water hitting me! I will try that the next time. Makes perfect sense!

Thanks!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #13 – November 02, 2011, 04:26:10 pm

OK... I learned a lesson with the Aqua Hot. My DW takes showers hot enough to boil an egg with. I avoid the water at all costs.

She ( and I kinda did too) thought that AHot would supply an unlimited amount of hot water at full blast. Just like a home water heater... it doesn't because it can't.
I simply throttled down the amount of water coming through the shower head by adjusting the uh, oh, uh... the ON/OFF handle and we now get plenty of "hot enough" water for us to take back-to-back showers if need be. We were just using water too fast that was too cold for the AH to keep up with. Sigh. It wasn't the Aqua Hot - it was me. I mean it was my wife. OK, OK... it was us.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #14 – November 02, 2011, 06:21:17 pm

Steve, that might be but I have to say, that we'ved owned our coach for 8 years and just this past fall is the first time we experienced the "lack of hot water". I take a long, hot shower and have never run out of hot water until this fall. I think our issue is the mixer valve and either Rudy or FOT will be looking at this.

Tom

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #15 – November 02, 2011, 07:54:14 pm

Quote from: txforetravel – November 02, 2011, 06:21:17 pm

Steve, that might be but I have to say, that we'ved owned our coach for 8 years and just this past fall is the first time we experienced the "lack of hot water". I take a long, hot shower and have never run out of hot water until this fall. I think our issue is the mixer valve and either Rudy or FOT will be looking at this.

Tom

I know mine needs servicing. It's on the schedule.

Another Aqua Hot Question

Reply #16 – December 16, 2011, 01:33:21 pm

OK, I just had the fuel pump replaced on my Aqua Hot and the annual service done, .i.e new nozzle, clean chamber, etc.

We took the coach to a park so we could turn everything on and to test the AH to see if we had "unlimited" hot water. We ran out of hot water very quickly before the repair.

Our shower has the original shower head ( I'm pretty sure it is anyway) on it and with the wife taking her hot shower, we ran out of hot water in about 3-4 minutes with the water on full blast with the elect. heater on as well as the Aqua Hot.

This morning I removed the original shower head and replaced it with a low flow head from Oxygenics ( bought at Camping World). I asked the wife to take her hot shower using the new shower nozzle and to also throttle down on the water a little while she was soaping down to reduce the flow rate. She did not run out of hot water.

I climbed in 15 minutes later, did the same thing and managed to finish my shower without running out of hot water.

Now I wanted to see how long of a shower we could take before we ran out of hot water running it wide open. I waited another 30 minutes, turned on the shower so it was almost all hot water and let it run at full blast. After 7 minutes of running, the water started to get cold so I turned the shower off.

While we ARE getting more hot water then before the repair, I guess expected more than I got so my LAST question is this:

I'm thinking that I was expecting more out of the Aqua Hot than it could provide. There really is no such thing as an "unlimited" supply of hot water is there? With the unit freshly serviced and a low flow shower head we can get a good 6 minute shower at full blast before we start to run out of water. Oh yeah - outside temp. is 75F. If I take a Navy shower and reduce the flow of water while I'm shaving or soaping down, then everything is fine.

So... is everything fine or IS there really unlimited hot water when using the Aqua Hot?

Do I still have a problem with the AH? Sigh.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #17 – December 16, 2011, 01:52:40 pm

Steve, I would have to wonder how you made out in your SOB assuming it had the 6 gal LP water heater ?
Seems I recall you had another RV prior to the Moose, so am wondering what it had for water heater ? as I assume it did fine on hot water.
I am sure any heater can be run out of hot water, as for the RV world, I don't think I ever heard of anyone running a unlimited amount of hot water nor just cold water as most have limited supply source.
Just fascinating subject
Thanks

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #18 – December 16, 2011, 02:47:44 pm

Quote from: Dave M – December 16, 2011, 01:52:40 pm

Steve, I would have to wonder how you made out in your SOB assuming it had the 6 gal LP water heater ?
I am sure any heater can be run out of hot water, as for the RV world, I don't think I ever heard of anyone running a unlimited amount of hot water nor just cold water as most have limited supply source. Just fascinating subject Thanks

HA! That's what I am thinking as well. I had a standard 6 gallon LP water heater in my SOB and ran out of hot water (well, my wife did anyway) all the time

. This is our 1st Aqua Hot and we just didn't know what to expect. As far as I'm concerned it's working fine. I just need to explain to my DW that she needed to be a little more, uh... conservative.

loooong showers need to be taken at the camp showers! Cheers!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #19 – December 16, 2011, 03:17:47 pm

I think it is the city water being colder that is causing you to run out. If you had water that was in the tank you could take 100 gallon showers and never run out of hot water. I would say mix the two. Use the tank to supplement the city water and you might increase the incoming temp enough to allow the aquahot to keep up. I know I was out in Iowa and it was 7 degrees and we had the heat on and could run the shower and shower with no issues but they were not the forever kind of shower as there was no dump close by. I drove over to the interstate and dumped on the way home. Still, the aquahot kept up with the demand for heat and the demand for hot water very well.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #20 – December 17, 2011, 02:55:26 am

Steve & Kathy B,

It seems to me that you sure have been put thru the wringer with this problem. What really surprised me is that until John S' answer no one even alluded to one of the first questions I would have had, had I been keeping up with reading all the messages posted here. My question would have been--where are you currently located? I mean if you are north of the sunbelt states right now, does your incoming water come in the form of FROZEN ICE? The last couple years--here in Washington State, we've had some of the coldest cold on record. While nothing can compare with Michigan or Minnesota, many times people would forget to let their water lines "drip" during the night only to find things didn't work like they used to...including Aqua Hot's. And you NEVER EVER want to let an AH freeze. That stunt will cost you some very serious money and any "warranty company" will show you what they mean by "owner's negligence" when you think they should cover the cost of fixing it.

Good luck,
John Christman

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #21 – December 17, 2011, 06:04:27 am

John, if the aquahot is on then it should not ever freeze. IT is way too hot to freeze in the bay that way even if you have a thru hole cut. Now if you leave it off and it gets cold you can freeze it and you are right it is a 9K repair. I did not freeze mine but had to replace one on my last coach.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #22 – December 17, 2011, 07:39:20 am

I am in Jacksonville, FL and it's 74F degrees this week.

The water temp is normal cold water, not 35F or anything like that. The water in my fresh water tank was normal cold water for this area at this time of year because I had just rinsed it out at the park I was staying at that night.

After some more research I read that my unit is rated to provide 1.5 gallons of hot water with the water temp at 55F. Since the Oxygenics shower head is rated at 1.75 gallons per minute and the water temp being around that 55F mark, it makes sense that I would run out of hot water if the showers on full blast. It may also be a mixing valve problem and I'll look into that later.

Different experiences from every one it seems. Thanks for the advice my friends!

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #23 – December 17, 2011, 08:54:04 am

The mixing valve is used to prevent scalding. Without it you could receive 180-190 degree water at full hot. I seems to me that your system is operating properly. Remember the flow valve on the Oxygenics system. You don't HAVE to tell your DW that you reduced flow a little.

Re: Running out of hot water with Aqua Hot...

Reply #24 – December 17, 2011, 03:08:00 pm

Quote from: amos.harrison – December 17, 2011, 08:54:04 am

The mixing valve is used to prevent scalding. Without it you could receive 180-190 degree water at full hot. I seems to me that your system is operating properly. Remember the flow valve on the Oxygenics system. You don't HAVE to tell your DW that you reduced flow a little.

HA! That's right! I'll sneak in and tweak that when she's not looking.

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