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.

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.

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 if you be smarter than me and buy a unit that has a built in heater to prevent unit from freezing and definitely don't buy this one.

Great little water heater. Electric pilot and powered ventilation reassure me that this unit is safe. More efficient than the ancient on-demand gas only unit I replaced. Display is nice and everything works as intended. The unit does put out hot exhaust, thus the stainless vent requirements. But, you aren’t paying the price for an ultra high efficiency product. A bit frustrated on the install, a few little things designed better and install would be a breeze. On install of direct vent through wall: 1) The wall flange needs installed first because it overlaps the mounting holes. 2) The wall mounts actually need set off from the wall about 1.5-2” to get the elbow to enter the wall correctly. 3) The elbow is slightly obtuse, so the unit needs mounted higher than it appears in relation to the wall flange to force the elbow into an acute angle. Needed so the exterior vent has enough down slope.

Pleased with performance so far. Very easy to set or change water temperature. After having used one with knobs to control gas flow and water temperature this one is AMAZING. My residence is small, older home; this works well even with two appliances using hot water. Easy to install. Just keep in mind, it has 1/2 inch water supply connections.

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.

Can a propane heater be sexy? This one is!! Extremely beautiful and functional and water pressure is great!!! Would soooo recommend!!

Received item on time. I have installed it but it still needs to be connected to propane , then I will test and I 'll report later.

I used to use a 20 Gallon electric water heater (run off a generator for an hour first) then I took a chance and bought one of these. It has been one Summer so far and I am super impressed. A 20lbs propane tank lasts about 35-40 showers and it comes on right away. It has totally changed how we shower at our off grid/solar cabin. I wish I had figured this out 10 years ago...seriously.