Water Heater Vent Clearance & Liner

[nowitsmyproblem]

Our company had a project in a home built in the early 1900's. The GC was dividing this house into a 2 family residence. He's been working on it for a few years now and prior to our work at the job 2 water heaters were installed by his plumber. These vented directly into the chimney with no liner. This was roughly 2019 at some point. When we began on the project whatever heating may or may not have been there when we started the work was gone, the entire structure was down to the studs. We put a furnace in the attic for the second floor apartment and vented through the roof, and installed a 90+ condensing gas furnace venting though side of house. Now inspector has failed our work due to no liner and also vents from the water heaters being too close to combustibles. The problem is that this basement is maybe 6' tall, and they installed tall water heaters. Does anyone have any solutions to fixing this issue with the current water heaters? The issues I see other the failure of the inspection is that even if you got a liner in there you'd still be close to combustibles to keep the proper fall back the water heater. The other problem with the liner is this chimney is over 100 years old and the opening is 8' off the roof and is not flat. Short water heaters could work, but all I can see is to tell him he should have went with electric water heater. I have uploaded the pictures to my profile of the situation.

[pecmsg]

How does a inspector fail the heater install for existing water heaters?
What’s stated on the permit?

[nowitsmyproblem]

Disapproved RCO 2019 2427.5.4- chimney liner(masonry 7x’s smallest connector). Need calculations or chimney liner installation. RCO 2019 1801.1- cap unused chimney openings. Hot water tanks. RCO 2109 2427.10.5- clearance to combustible single wall vent pipe. Hot water tank vent piping. RCO 2019 2426.5- vent per manufacture. Hot water tanks seal around vent pipes

The water heaters were approved in 2019 for install so my guess is that before we got involved with the project a furnace or boiler was vented into the chimney as well?

[heatingman]

Have the plumbers Install a liner of appropriate size (or provide the calcs proving its right), and use b-vent to reduce clearance requirements. Or an approved clearance reduction insulation for the flue.

Or - replace water heaters with side wall venters.

Or - do nothing. Get paid and let the GC sort it out.

Nothing on there about HVAC. Id submit for payment as is.

I


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[heatsolutions]

Tjerlund makes a sidewall power vent system for standard water heaters, gpak is the model I think, downside if I remember is they used to interlock with the thermocouple so when there is a power outage a manual reset needs to be pushed at the draft hood and the pilot relit.

[hearthman]

All these are valid points. When you demo'd the house and rebuilt it more than a certain %, the entire house loses any grandfathering and must meet the current code.

You bring the liner into the room as high as you can while meeting clearance to the ceiling and framing. Use B-vent connector but you have to observe IRC Ch. 24 on max. vent connector runs and sizing. You can manifold two WHs if done properly. If still insufficient vent rise, replace the Wh's with shorty 40's, go TTW1, tankless, or electric.

Contact a chimney professional.

No pics in your profile.

[pecmsg]

Your jobs done. It’s now on the GC too get the water heaters up to date.

[nowitsmyproblem]

Typically I'm pretty good with computers but I can't figure out how to get pics of this anywhere on this site. All very valid points the space to work with is the biggest issue. You put a 3" 90 on top of one of these water heaters and it's less than 3" from the floor joists (one of them is 2" taller than the other one). In order to keep good rise / fall you'd need to bring the liner out butt up against the floor joists and the outer perimeter of the structure has other wood combustibles right there also. All in all the inspector could look at different reasons to fail again even once we have a liner installed and b vent. The space just isn't there to work with. I truly appreciate all of your advice and opinions on this. Totally agree this is his problem but it's screwing up my permit. He reused these water heaters and was trying to cut costs and had them as extras he rehabs many properties and we do quite a bit of work for him, but either power vent or electric would be the best option. Short natural draft could work also, but eliminating the chimney as an exhaust chase all together would be best.

[theoldscroll]

Typically I'm pretty good with computers but I can't figure out how to get pics of this anywhere on this site. All very valid points the space to work with is the biggest issue. You put a 3" 90 on top of one of these water heaters and it's less than 3" from the floor joists (one of them is 2" taller than the other one). In order to keep good rise / fall you'd need to bring the liner out butt up against the floor joists and the outer perimeter of the structure has other wood combustibles right there also. All in all the inspector could look at different reasons to fail again even once we have a liner installed and b vent. The space just isn't there to work with. I truly appreciate all of your advice and opinions on this. Totally agree this is his problem but it's screwing up my permit. He reused these water heaters and was trying to cut costs and had them as extras he rehabs many properties and we do quite a bit of work for him, but either power vent or electric would be the best option. Short natural draft could work also, but eliminating the chimney as an exhaust chase all together would be best.

i BET THE PLUMBER DIDN'T PULL A PERMIT. This is the inspector's attempt to bust his ass. The plumber knew better than to single wall vent it, or the owner did it himself.