"DA" wrote in message
...
Hello everyone,

Winter is just around the corner, and I'm trying to find a way to make my
water heater perform better than it did last year.

First off, it seems a bit too small for my family (50 gallon for 4
people). However, in addition to that I have hot water pipes coming out of
the heater to the bathroom and the kitchen, and I'd say there is at least
6-7 feet of bare copper pipes (before they enter the walls) in this first
floor closet. The closet gets cold in winter. Not too much, but I think
60F degrees is probably what it stays at for couple of months. I wonder if
it adds to our poor heater performance? Do you think water can loose much
temperature going through 6-7 feet of copper pipes? What materials one
uses to insulate the pipes? And, lastly, should the heater itself be
wrapped into some sort of a thermal insulation blanket to improve its
performance?

Thanks for all your feedback and ideas!

Cheers!
D.

Have you cleaned the tank? I flush mine every 6 months. Water here is
hideous.
Once you think the tank is flushed, then drain the tank and then remove the
drain valve. It just screws out. Screw in a piece of 1/2 inch pipe with a
5/8 hose attached. Refill and check the hose end. I usually get some bigger
chunk out this way. You will see what I mean when you pull the installed
valve out.

Insulating the pipes is easy and pretty cheap. Benefit is ??? for 6-7 feet.
Insulating the water heater might be a waste of time depending on the
ambient temp of its location. If the heater is subject to outside temps then
yes. It would help some. The top and upper 1/2 of the tank is all that is
needed to be insulated. Careful if you have an gas heater.

You might consider raising the thermostats up 10-15 degrees. Them bumps on
the outside of the tank are where they are located. Careful there is 240v
inside there. I set my electric heaters, top element 5 degrees less than
the bottom one.

Water heater work on temp rise. So the colder the incoming water the longer
it takes to raise the water temp. Winter the ground is colder so the water
takes longer to heat.

A long time ago I had a house with 5 people, and a 30 gallon water heater,
gas. I limited the kids to 10 minutes and staggered them over a couple of
hours. The youngest liked baths so he got 15 minutes. Actually he used less
hot water than his siblings. I had the water heater set on max from the
second day we lived in the place. I also installed a low flow shower head
for the children. We always had to wait for the dinner dishes to run when
wifey went to bed. I showered before bed and the wife was a morning person.
It worked, and yes there were times when we just had to wait a few minutes.