Froze my tankless water heater, looking for options

TomPanning

Advanced Member
RV LIFE Pro
Joined
Sep 2, 2021
Messages
33
We stored our new (to us) Reflection while staying with family for a couple weeks, and I thought I ran antifreeze through the tankless water heater because I didn't do anything specific to bypass it, but I got a waterfall under the water heater when I hooked back up to city water. It turns out that the red handle in the Nautilus panel is a water heater bypass, and if you follow the pictured "winterization" configuration then you will bypass the water heater. I talked with an RV tech where we'll be staying for a few days next week, and he said that Furrion doesn't make replacement parts, so the whole unit has to be replaced.

So now I need to figure out what our next step will be. I tend to do my own work, but I draw the line at messing with propane fittings. Having the RV tech replace the water heater with a new one of the same model is probably the most straightforward, but I expect it will be somewhat expensive.

I have heard that many people have had trouble with winterizing the Furrion tankless water heater, even when they have the proper configuration to run antifreeze through it. Our previous trailer had a Girard tankless water heater that winterized very easily by running the antifreeze through it. I'm not sure how much more it would cost to replace the Furrion with a Girard, or whether it would be worth the expense.

I also saw that someone in a similar situation had their "mixing bowl" silver soldered for much less than the cost of a new water heater, so that's an option.

I know there are some people who really don't like tankless water heaters in general and would take this as an opportunity to switch to a normal water heater, but we're fine with staying with a tankless water heater.

Are there any other options that I'm not thinking of? Does anyone have experience swapping out the Furrion tankless water heater for something else, or has anyone else had any luck repairing the mixing bowl?
 
​Those tankless heaters are not winter friendly are they. You have nothing to loose at this point to give a shot at the solder fix. Good luck with whichever way you decide to go.
 
Sorry to hear about your experience, it seems like the winterization directions for the TWH should be clearer. I always look for a bit of pink coming out of the heater.
 
I have seen other posts that state that the winterization instructions in the GD manual are wrong and that the Furrion manual should be used for that water heater. Sorry for your troubles! Unfortunately, I'm one of those "haters" when it comes to on-demand/tankless water heaters in RVs and would use this opportunity to install the largest tank style HWH I cold fit in the space... but that's just me.

Rob
 
Hopefully my new/never used trailer was winterized correctly. I may need to take it out of storage earlier to dewinterize before my first trip in April. Prior to picking it up in November the temperature got down to 22 which is why it was winterized already.
 
Well, good news and bad news. The good news is that if your only problem is the mixing bowl, you can replace it with a simple pipe elbow. The "mixing bowl" serves as a temperature buffer if other fixtures turn on or off. So if you replace it with a simple pipe, expect sudden temperature variations if other fixtures get turned on or off. But, it's a lot better than having no water heater, and can be done easily and cheaply.

I replaced the mixing bowl with a piece of ½" PEX with an elbow and two ½" MNPT male connectors. That worked fine and didn't leak. Unfortunately, because our water heater hadn't been winterized at all, there were several more leaks deeper in our water heater. So we'll be getting a replacement. But hopefully this info will be helpful to people whose only problem is the mixing bowl.
 
For anyone who stumbles upon this in the future, we replaced the Furrion with a Girard tankless water heater. The connections (electric, propane, water) from the Furrion were straightforward to use for the Girard. The wires from the water heater to the control panel could be reused as well; just disconnect them from the Furrion stuff at each end and connect the Girard stuff.
 
So what’s the bottom line on winterizing the Furrion tankless? I’m reading you can’t blow it out or something may get damaged. Then, I’m reading the antifreeze won’t get to it with nautilus valves in the winterize config. Is there a trick with the nautilus valves to make it still suck antifreeze yet, still run it to the Furrion?
 
Yes, the Nautilus panels I’ve seen seem to have a handle (colored red in the cases I’ve seen) that controls the water heater bypass. I’ve attached an instruction manual that says that it’s the red handle (see page 5).

You should be able to verify this yourself: with the Nautilus panel configured for regular water usage (city connection or from your fresh tank), when you turn on the hot water at a faucet the Furrion control panel will show that hot water is flowing. If you change just the Nautilus red handle, and then you turn on hot water, the Furrion control panel will not show hot water flowing (because it’s been bypassed).

So when winterizing an RV with a tankless water heater, you can follow the Nautilus diagram for all the other handles, but NOT the red handle. Leave the red handle in the “normal” position (the direction that it points for regular water usage).

And you are correct: blowing air through the lines will leave a substantial amount of water in the Furrion’s “mixing bowl”.
 

Attachments

  • Nautilus-P1-User-Instructions.pdf
    1.2 MB · Views: 45
Thanks. Sounds like I can blow out the system in the city water position with the WH heater bypassed and then winterize with fluid without it being bypassed. Fortunately I’ve got a couple months so I’ll experiment at some point with water.
 
Thanks. Sounds like I can blow out the system in the city water position with the WH heater bypassed and then winterize with fluid without it being bypassed. Fortunately I’ve got a couple months so I’ll experiment at some point with water.
I blow out the whole system with the red handle in the normal position. Then I pump in the pink stuff. This has worked well for me.
 
Last edited:

New posts

Try RV LIFE Pro Free for 7 Days

  • New Ad-Free experience on this RV LIFE Community.
  • Plan the best RV Safe travel with RV LIFE Trip Wizard.
  • Navigate with our RV Safe GPS mobile app.
  • and much more...
Try RV LIFE Pro Today
Back
Top Bottom