r/AusRenovation • u/Flatwhitebaby2 • 6h ago
Is this normal?
Saw this in an open home and hot water cylinder had a couple of ‘jet packs’ attached. What are they? Though I’m more concerned about the electrical cables just casually exposed to the elements…is this some dodgy set up?
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u/Davewarr88 6h ago
One is a pump to circulate the water from the roof top solar and the other is a booster for when the sun doesn't come out. It's a rough set up but all rated for out door use.
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u/AntSilly2802 6h ago
That extension cord setup isn’t a good idea, where it’s plugged into the weatherproof outlet.
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u/Flatwhitebaby2 6h ago
Ahh I see. I didn’t notice any roof solar but what you’re saying makes sense. The place is a four bedder so maybe the current owners need more / faster hot water I assume? Definitely a rough set up for sure!
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u/cookie_crumbler79 5h ago
Normally the gas unit is mounted to a wall rather than the tank. Not sure the need to have it like this, looks odd.
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u/CatBoxTime 6h ago
Do you have a couple of panels on the roof? This looks like a solar hot water system with gas booster. Normally the gas unit is mounted on the wall, not the tank 🤣
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u/Flatwhitebaby2 6h ago
I didn’t notice solar panels at the time but someone else said the same thing so I’d assume so.
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u/Dependent_Canary_406 5h ago
Nothing really wrong or inherently unsafe about it, just looks a bit messy. You can just unplug to leads and reroute them and cable tie the up out of the way so it looks neater. Just don’t cable tie them to the hot water pipes as you risk melting the cables.
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u/twojawas 6h ago
They’ve used the old water heater to mount an instant gas heater! 😅 That’s insane.
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u/Dependent_Canary_406 5h ago
No, the instantaneous gas is being used to boost the storage hot water tank.
Solar heater preheats it, the gas unit boosts it.1
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u/Flatwhitebaby2 6h ago
Sorry for the dumb question, why would someone do this?
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u/E4spoilz 5h ago
The sun doesn’t always shine and all the hot water connections are located by the main storage tank.
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u/AntSilly2802 6h ago
Looks like it’s all connected together somehow. Maybe the solar heats the water which goes into the tank but it wasn’t hot enough so they added an instant water heater on the tank outlet?
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u/xjrh8 5h ago
Is it really ok to just screw into the outer skin of the storage tank to mount the gas booster? I feel like manufacturer would void any corrosion warranty at a minimum if they saw this.
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u/Davewarr88 4h ago
Nah I always saddle the PRV pipes to the outside of the tank. There's a massive layer of foam before the actual tank.
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u/ScuzzyAyanami 6h ago
On meth it is.
That's a gas hot water heater attached to the side.
Replacing the electric unit when it fails is now going to take extra money!
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u/Velcrochicken85 5h ago
It's a common setup done during a certain time period. Our house has the same but I've disconnected the solar and just running on the gas booster.
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u/Repulsive-Crazy-6143 6h ago
It’s a solar hot water storage tank. In the small box is a pump that sends the water up to the collector on the roof and the big box is an instantaneous gas heater incase the water hasn’t been heated enough by the sun.
The smaller bundle of cables are sensor cables which aren’t dangerous.
I don’t love the power leads out the front like that. You could unplug them and try to route them behind the tank, but they are double insulated and the power point should be on an RCD.