Tankless Water Heater

[2-yota]

Thanks for the write-up & review. Previous owner of my trailer put in a brand new 6 gal water heater with electric ignition just before I bought it. So I"m good for a few more years. But when it comes time to replacing it, I'd definitely would consider a tankless on-demand system. So far, my 6 gal water heater has worked good for us (family of 4). Maybe because it's a new unit, but the recovery time is fairly quick and each of us has enough hot water right to the end. Either way, tankless is probably the way to go.

[Dscan]

Here are a couple more pics of the water heater. If you are considering installing the Girard in your AR One and have any questions or need help feel free to contact me.

Dscan

[Dscan]

Background

So my 2013 Starcraft AR-One came with an Atwood 6 gal water heater with manual pilot light. Too be quite frank is was a POS from day one. Pain in my rear to get it going and keep going every time we used the trailer. It would often blow out during the night. It was the worse part of the campsite set up by far. So much so we got to the point where we just didnt use it. Majority of the time we would camp at parks that had bathrooms near the site and we would use that for showers instead of our trailer. Let’s face it what kind of showers can you take even with a functioning 6 gallon water heater? Short for sure. As a result the tub/shower was relegated to a storage area most of the time. I often thought of upgrading but cost and installation always held me back.

Point of the post.

About six months ago my wife and I decided we were going to completely remodel both our home bathrooms leaving us without toilets/showers for about 4 weeks. The plan was to use our trailer which is stored on our property. There was no way I was going to put up with the current water heater everyday for 4 weeks let alone risk running out of hot water during our showers before work or have to wait significant recovery time between showers. So I started looking into upgrading the water heater. Of course I could have just got a new 6 gallon replacement with electronic pilot or get a tankless one. While a 6 gallon one might solve the ease of use and reliability issue it wasn’t going to solve running out of hot water or recoup time between showers. So I went with a Girard GSWH-2 Tankless Water Heater. It was pricey to say the least but not as much as moving the trailer to a park near our home with showers or staying in a hotel for a month. I went with the Girard mainly because I knew it would fit in the space the old heater occupied with only minor mods to the trailer. It looked to be a relatively easy install and turned out it was. Best mod I ever made regarding the trailer by far. Works great and we have had no issues since installing it. Our showers while at home are only limited by the 15 gallon grey water tank capacity but still gives us long enough showers so we don’t feel rushed and the recovery time is only due to the emptying of the holding tank. Since our trailer is not near a sewer clean out we have to empty into a portable tote. We have subsequently used it on camping trips. Since we camped at sites with full hookups we have virtually endless hot showers with no recovery time in between. What a pleasant convenience. Here are some after pics. Didn’t think to take pics while installing it.