@Don Abel What are the real reasons for going "off the grid", anyway? Reduced cost of utilities? Reduced dependence upon foreign energy sources (oil)? Getting back at the "bureaucracy"? Or, is it Self-Sufficiency? Being able to live daily without support or help from the outside, whatever and whomever they might be? But, again, why? If we view our individual "dues" paid to the govt. over all our lives as needed and necessary, then, hadn't THEY ought to have the forthrightness to sustain us in our ageing and frail years? "Off the grid" means to me, just as it did then in 1981, freedom from the compulsion of electric power, supplied water, telephone service, television. Holed up in Northern AZ., my wife and I, thrown into the need for self contrivance by my being laid off from my job, lived day-to-day absorbing the rigors of our existence. Goat, milk for bread and baking. Chickens, plenty of eggs. Rabbits, meat. We still had to fill big containers in town with water, 26 miles away, but got along on a surprisingly small amount of water than most city dwellers used. Now, neither of us had a job, then. Our nice home, in Phoenix, sold to a gentleman and his wife, produced the needed income to pay the lot payment on our 40 acres, and the car payment on our '78 Ford Fiesta. There is most ironic conclusion which I'll withhold until I Find if anyone cares.......... Frank
Hey, I just noticed this is under Home Improvement. A Perfect Man would be a nice home improvement, wouldn't it?
@Shirley Martin "OK but I get dibs on the first perfect man to come by. " I've kept an eye out all my life to see the "perfect woman", but each rather perfect one is followed by another even more perfect! Kept watch, but truthfully never strayed once while married...... Frank
We have the same problem in our apartment which is relatively modern. The problem is 22mm supply pipework takes a ridiculous long unnecessary route. Nothing I can do except moan about the incompetent plumbers.
We have a new combi boiler, sadly it's just the length of 22mm pipe that causes the delay; 6 litres have to drain to get hot water. The pipe runs could have been around a quarter less but in Britain builders are atrocious and when you buy second hand the only remedy is re-run the pipes. We have a ten year guarantee on new builds but that guarantee is like a chocolate fireguard. What's it like in America?
There is a new way of plumbing new houses here, but as far as I know it is only used in new construction, or perhaps in dwellings that have been completely gutted. It consists of a 1" or greater diameter supply PEX pipe run to a manifold whose size depends on the size of the building, and there is a number of these manifolds interconnected. There has to be at least two, one for hot and one for cold, and from the manifolds, supply PEX pipes are run individually to each fixture. In theory, this prevents any pressure drop no mater who is using what and there is no temperature fluctuation with multiple users. In old construction, there are several systems of recirculation that keeps hot water always available. I am not sure what a Combi is that was referred to in the above two posts, but when I lived in Japan, we had on-demand small water heaters in every room that needed hot water, and you truly did get hot water in seconds.