Watts Hot Water Recirculation System with Programmable Timer for Tank Water Heaters, Instant Hot Water, 120V Pump, 10 ft Cord, 2 Adapters, Sensor Valve, Mounting Screws, 2 Supply Lines (0955800)

I wanted to wait a while before reviewing this device to gauge it effectiveness. It's been installed about a month now. I have a 2000 square foot home sitting on a slab, so my water lines (Pex) are in the attic. Although it does not get terribly cold in Southern California during the Winter, it used to take upwards of 30 seconds before the water would get warm. That was a lot of perfectly good water going down the drain. After installing this device, it now takes only 5-7 seconds before the water starts to warm up. Interestingly, the closer the faucet you are opening is to the valve, the sooner your water will become warm/hot, so I find that the sink next to the one with the valve (in our master bathroom) gets the water warm-to-hot within just a few seconds. It's important to tell you that the water will not be piping hot and waiting for you right when you turn on the faucet, but the amount of time, money & water you will save is still worth it. The pump attaches to the top of your water heater and is VERY quiet. After installation, I had to touch it to make sure it was running. Although I have mine set to "On" 24 hours a day, I appreciate the timed feature that allows you to turn it on and off at certain times of the day. It runs on 110 volts, so you may need to buy an extension cord to plug it into an outlet in your home or garage if it's not close to an outlet. As mentioned elsewhere, check the WATTS website before buying as apparently this device will not work with all water heaters. I failed to do this, but I was lucky. Also, it will not work with a tankless heater so do not try it! As far as installation goes, I'm fairly handy around the house, but plumbing is not my strong suit and I scoffed at the notion that I could install this in one hour. However, it took just a little over one hour (as advertised) to install with the only hiccup being a crowded space under the sink where the valve was installed, causing me to get creative with the hose routing and placement. Don't feel like you have to mount the valve to the wall. Mine is working just fine without mounting. I didn't even need to bring out my plumber's tape/pipe dope because everything sealed up great the first time. As an aside, while you have your water heater dismantled, go ahead and drain it. It's probably been a while. My wife was thrilled when I (finally) installed this device after maybe 3 years of her asking. She heartily recommends it and so do I.

After years of waiting for water to reach the far areas of my house, I had finally had enough. This pump exceeded my expectations and works flawlessly. It sat on my counter for a few weeks until I finally decided to install it. Installation time was less than 30 min. It took me longer to get the junk out from beneath the far sink than it did to install. The instructions are straight forward and easy to understand. I did the under the sink valve first. They supply you with all the right hoses and connections. I did have to get long hoses, but that is not the fault of the mfg. My supply pipes are further apart. I bought longer hoses and everything was golden. Installing the pump was beyond easy. Yes I did have to buy the correct CPVC fittings with 3/4" threads to connect to the pump. Less than a dollar at the local hardware. Off the discharge pump I went with a flexible hose that connected to my system. You will have to buy a few extra pvc fittings if you need to make it work with your water heater system. It took less than 30 min to install in total and I plugged it in. I could tell it was working, but the pump is extremely quiet. We set the mode to timer, because we want it on from early morning to around 11 pm at night then the timer shuts off the pump. You will still have hot water, but just not as fast as when the pump is working. Even if you let it run all the time, it would cost around $20 a year, tops, but the timer is a nice feature. So far I am extremely happy with the product and it has hot water at our furthest sink within 5 seconds. Don't hesitate to buy this product.

I can honestly say this is probably the most cost effective way of getting hot water to far places in a home, Our home 12 years old is roughly 3000 sq ft 2 story with 4 full baths with the master being at the most furthest point of the home upstairs roughly 100+ feet away from the hot water tank in the garage between the master bath sinks, jetted tub and shower I would have to wait almost 4 minutes of water running before it got warm then cold. The water lines used throughout the home are PEX non metallic plumbing. The pump and sensor unit are very easy to install on your own with a bit of common sense and took me about 40 minutes to install. I let the pump do it's thing for about 30 minutes went up to the 2nd sink in the master bath, which is the last and furthest in the home only 3 feet further than the 2nd sink, within approx 3 secs the water was warm to the touch followed by hotter water very shortly thereafter. I had my wife verify this later that evening, we would usually waste a bunch of water filling up the jetted tub or turning on the shower waiting on hot water, again within seconds the water was warm then hot! I was very amazed as I was getting prepared to drop a few thousand $$$ to have a Tankless installed just for the upstairs master bath I am very pleased with this system. Now I have seen where some people are concerned about cost to run this etc. first it waste no water so right there whatever the cost should be outweighed in water savings. Second I have seen people mock those about putting this on a smart timer since it already comes with a built in timer, what those doing the mocking are not realizing is that if the power goes out then the built in timer does not keep its correct time once power is restored, Yes I'm sure for many this is probably a very rare thing, but I can tell u you here in Northern CA the power especially in the summer is 50/50 at best! So yes I would highly suggest the use of a smart plug for one of these, I already have dozens of smart plugs/lights & switches in use at my home so I did not need to purchase one but they can be purchased for less than $25 I recommend Tp-link by Kasa! The other nice thing about the smart plug especially if it has the energy monitoring option (Not all do get one with the monitoring) is that you can get a real time look at what the power consumption is daily, weekly and yearly to kind of give you a idea of the Electric use which is not bad. The pump averages right around 22 watts +/- while running the company states is should be less than a nickle a day or so to run 24 hours. I may set up a schedule or Alexa routine but currently I have not having 48 345 watt solar panels and Battery I am not to concerned about 22 watts running. On to the gas usage, given we have a large home along with large heated pool/Jacuzzi and outdoor gas fireplace etc. we have a very large diameter gas line with a smart meter. I can always here the meter gurgling so to speak when any of the large items are being uses including the hot water tank, to date after checking numerous times I have yet to hear the gas meter or the actual hot water tank firing constantly, not saying it does not fire up once enough coldwater gets pushed back into it I am just not hearing it like a normal tank being heated up! So again I do not believe that the complaint of this using mass amount of utility to use 24/7 again as compared to dupping 100s of gallons a day down the drain I fully believe at best it is a gain in savings at worse it is a break even! I did have to purchase a second sensor kit to place in the kitchen downstairs as our home has a branched Hot water line since doing so even our kitchen sink water is now warm to hot within seconds. I have yet to experience the so called major bleedback into the cold water line that some have stated happens that when they turn on the cold water it is warm to hot for a brief moment, either way even if I did it is still worth every penny for this setup!

Pump is great at circulating the water during the hours you set it to. It's nice to wake up to having instant hot water, especially in the winter when it would take literally minutes to get hot water to the master bath, which is at the opposite side of the house that the hot water heater resides. However, there are some quirks that people should know about. Pros: Small unit, affordable, does the job as described. Timer is nice, it's analog with pull out tabs/switches, but easy enough to setup. Cons: 1. Most people won't be able to install this themselves. This should go on the hot water heater, and if you have copper pipes that you'll need to cut, and sweat new pipes onto, most people will need a pro. I used shark fittings, but still had to cut, measure, cut to get it right. If you have flexible hoses on top of your hot water heater, then it would be an easy install for you. Under sink install is very straightforward. 2. If you have sensitive hearing, you may hear humming in your walls/pipes as this is running during the set times. I can hear it when I walk by walls that have pipes in them, and it irritates me. So, I don't run it all night. 3. When it runs, some pipes in walls get a "drip" sound. No idea what is causing it, I'm still chasing it down. 4. This is a very minute con: Since it recirculates the water into the cold water pipes, when you initially open your cold spout you might get luke warm water for a few second. Not really a big deal. Overall happy with it as it functions well.

Our kitchen sink is a ways away from our water heater in the attic. Typical time to wait for hot water was 85 seconds. Installed this puppy and now have hot water in 4-5 seconds! It is remarkable. Two notes on my install. First, I'm pretty handy and could easily have done this myself but for one thing. I don't sweat copper pipes, and the hot water line out of my water heater was soldered copper all the way. So rather than mess this up, I called a plumber to install. He said he'd put in a lot of these units and customers rave about them. Second, I have an electrical outlet in the attic maybe 6 feet from the water heater, so we just plugged the pump in and it worked. Super quiet by the way. The unit basically sits right above our bed and can't be heard at all. The pump has a built-in timer, but if the power goes out, I didn't want to have to go up and reset it, so I bought a Kasa wifi controlled outlet ($13 for 2 on Amazon). I left switches on the pump "on" 24/7 but have the wifi outlet scheduled for 6 am to 9 am and 5 pm to 10 pm so it doesn't run while we are away or asleep. I can always turn it on or off from my phone or through Alexa. The plumber hadn't seen that setup and will likely be suggesting it to his customers going forward. Overall, very happy with the ease of installation and operation of the pump. I'll likely pay for it on saved water bills.

It's been almost three years since I installed this product. I left it running it on constantly and it is still running great! Hot water after about five seconds to my farthest faucet and shower.

This 5 star rating maybe temporary. The system installed extremely easy. The hardest part was removing all the junk from under the sink to reach the connections for the valve. Everything went smoothly. Actual install was less than 45 minutes and I am only a little bit handy. However, after the initial excitement of seeing that the system was working and hot water was at all the sinks in under a few seconds I took a shower to reward myself for a job well done--or so I thought. After years of using the same shower I know exactly where the handle goes to reach my comfortable water temperature. This time I kept turning the handle to allow more cold water....and turning.....and turning until there was no more turn left. The system was full of hot water throughout. The water in the cold line was so hot I could barely put my face under it. And there seemed to be no end to the hot water. I think I might have been sending hot water back up the city lines. I went through the OEM's diagnostic test for this situation and at first it appeared the sensor valve was not closing. However, I had turned the pump off about 30 minutes earlier and realized I had compromised the test in doing so. I turn the system back on and gave it 10 minutes to fill the lines with hot water. I ran the cold lines again for a couple of minutes and the water was still hot in them the entire time. But I ran the diagnostic test again and the valve was closed. Huh? After scratching my head for a few minutes I wondered if my water wasn't hot enough to close the valve as quickly as I expected it to close. I ran the hot water for a few moments and then filled a cup. I then measured the water temperature. It was only a little over 106 F. I read somewhere that the valve closes when the water flowing through it is 106F. It seems that a lot of hot water was flowing into the cold water lines until the hottest water from my water heater finally reached the sensor valve. I turned up the temperature on the water heater and will retest. Based on the valve test passing I think this will solve, or at least improve, the situation with too much hot(ish) water going into the cold lines.

Wow! I wish I had done this sooner. It used to take nearly 2 minutes for hot water to reach my shower, wasting energy, water, and time. It now takes less than 20 seconds! First the build quality is excellent. The body of the pump is cast iron. One connection is 3/4 in. male thread and the other is a 3/4 in. female coupling. An extra long 10 ft cord makes wiring as easy as plugging in a lamp. The under-sink bypass unit is a thick plastic/nylon. The included connecting hoses are stainless steel braided hoses. Now for installation. The under-sink bypass installs easily with just an adjustable wrench. Installing the pump could range from easy DIY to moderately difficult depending on how your water heater was installed. If you have braided stainless steel wrapped hoses or flexible copper connecting the water heater to your house plumbing, it will be as simple as using an adjustable wrench to remove the connection to the WH and installing the pump with the same wrench. (Don't forget to turn off the water, the water heater, and drain a little off the top of the WH tank) If your WH was installed like mine, you will need some plumbing skills which may include cutting and soldering pipe and measuring and installing fittings . If you don't feel comfortable with these skills, a plumber could easily do this part for you. It took me about 10 min to install the under-sink unit (including cleaning out under the sink so I could reach the connections) and 3 hours to install the pump (including 3 trips to the hardware store). All in all, well worth the time, money, and effort. I expect this unit to pay for itself in a few years based on energy and water savings.

We have been in this house for 6 years and have been frustrated with how long it takes to get the hot water from the tank to the bathroom. We were always washing hands and brushing teeth with very cold water, and running the tub for a long time before any hot water got there. Finally I found out about this product. I wasn’t too enthusiastic about using the cold line as a return. I thought that would result in warm water when we wanted cold. Also I replaced my tank a couple of years ago and the new tank has a heat trap so I read that it would be a problem with the proper operation of this unit. But my research found that worst case was that I could remove the heat trap on the hot side and replace it with a plain nipple so I decided to purchase the unit and try it out. Installation was fairly straight forward although I had to remove a section of copper pipe and solder it back together, but that was a minor task for me. The hardest part of the installation was tightening the fitting onto the outlet side. There is nothing on the pump housing designed to put a wrench on to stop the pump from turning. I had to put a crescent wrench on the housing where it bolts together which had me a bit concerned about cracking the housing. It did turn out ok though. I got it all installed and fired it up. It is quiet, slight hum, but it is located in an unfinished b a segment (cellar really) so unless I go down there I can’t hear it. The great part is that the heat trap has not interfered with the operation at all. I get hot water at the bathroom sink and tub almost immediately. This makes me very happy every time I turn on the tap. I don’t use the timer at all. I installed a smart outlet linked to a phone app so I can shut off the pump whenever I need to (like if we are going away) but so far the pump runs 24/7 since we are home most of the time, and we want hot water at the bathroom even in the middle of the night. One bonus is that I also get hot water sooner at the kitchen which is on a different branch but it tees off about 10 feet after the tank, so its already about ⅓ of the way there. I may upgrade with an additional valve under the kitchen sink but I am thinking that I will be ok with it the way it is for now. It has been about 2 weeks since install and I am very happy with this pump system.

The pump and temperature bypass valve have been installed for approximately 1 week and so far so good. I had a concern that the cold water line would be too warm with the hot water bypassing into it to maintain hot water lime temp but not too bad. The cold water from the faucet at the bypass valve sink is at about room temperature. It is a trade off to have room temp cold water instead of icy cold-cold water at the tap since I didn't have to plumb in a return line. I did install a downstream ball valve so the HWH & pump can be isolated if anything requires service in the future The pump has been running 24/7 as I have yet to program the timer so not sure how that is going to work.

The pump works great and gets the hot water to your fixtures quickly. For those of us that have overly long water line runs, this is the answer. If you are not sure of your ability to sweat in copper pipes, hire a plumber. The plumbers that I hired, installed the pump in 40 minutes and did a wonderful job (well worth the money and no headaches). The only thing that I can suggest to the designers of this pump is to have more than one setting for the timer. Myself, I don't use the timer but rather go to the basement and turn on the pump with the manual override. Another good thing about this pump is that it seems to hold the hot water at the fixtures, even though the pump is not running. I wonder if it has an internal clapper valve?

Just moved and our ensuite is the furthest away possible from hot water tank. This product solved our issue. Depending on how your sink tap is fitted you might need some extra pieces. Our house didn't have the shutoff valves under the sink so I need some extra pieces to make it work but simple enough to figure out if you have done some simple plumbing before.

I purchased this product to eliminate the long wait for hot water to reach my upstairs bathroom. It works perfectly and it will save many gallons of wasted water. Great product and reasonably priced.