Hot water in a hotel?

[Alpo]

How do they do it? Smallish heater in every room? Largish heater on every floor? Giant boiler in the basement?

 

Leave us say I own a motel with fifteen, maybe twenty rooms. I can, maybe, get by with a four or five hundred gallon water heater.

 

But someplace like the MGM Grand? How do they make sure there is enough hot water for hundreds of rooms?

 

Book I'm reading, the couple is living in an RV with a ten-gallon heater. Occasionally they will go spend a weekend in a hotel with "a shower big enough for two, and unlimited hot water".

 

After the third or fourth mention of "unlimited hot water", it got me wondering.

[Cusz M. Dutch SASS Life 55326]

The hot water has a return loop to the boiler always a moving.

[Alpo]

You're saying (I think) that the water in the boiler in the basement is always pumping through the pipes, which is why when you turn on the faucet on the 80th floor it don't take ten minutes for the water to get hot?

 

But still, how big a heating system they need to service a largish (hundred rooms or more) hotel?

[Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438]

Zoned system, multiple boilers.

 

LL

[Badger Mountain Charlie SASS #43172]

HOT WATER is for sissys.

[Pat Riot]

Alpo,

They have a recirc system with a boiler. Depending on the size of the facility they may have multiple boilers / systems. Some older motels still have individual heaters.

[Pat Riot]

HOT WATER is for sissys.

Uh...Yeah, okay BCM

 

How long does one have to wait before making posts here...Sheesh...It's like I am waiting for hot water or something....hehehe

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

two minutes

[Forty Rod SASS 3935]

HOT WATER is for sissys.

Well then, I'm a sissy.

 

Wanna make something of it? Well, do ya?

 

Is your answer is YES then show up any time and bring your own burying box.

 

If your answer is NO then show up any time and I'll take you someplace really nice where you can buy me dinner.

[Alpo]

If someone had paid attention in English class, he'd know that to pluralize "sissy", you drop the Y and add IES - sissies.

[Texas Lizard]

You're saying (I think) that the water in the boiler in the basement is always pumping through the pipes, which is why when you turn on the faucet on the 80th floor it don't take ten minutes for the water to get hot?

 

But still, how big a heating system they need to service a largish (hundred rooms or more) hotel?

I guess you need to know....The shower at the top floor drains into the shower below....The hot water just flows down hill threw each room and shower....They never need to warm it up....Saves on gas to warm it up...

 

TL

[Tyrel Cody]

http://www.sciencechannel.com/tv-shows/how-do-they-do-it/videos/how-do-they-do-it-how-do-hotels-always-have-hot-water/

[Utah Bob #35998]

Dependsc on the hotel. Older ones are a problem. I've been in some where you better shower before 7am if you want hot water.

[Tom Bullweed]

Up to about 20 years ago, cycling water and a main boiler was common.

Newer hotels have smaller heaters, sometimes for each floor. They can close an entire floor from hot water, heat, lights, etc, during no peak periods.

Either water system is efficient. Heating warm water requires little energy.

[Alpo]

I guess you need to know....The shower at the top floor drains into the shower below....The hot water just flows down hill threw each room and shower....They never need to warm it up....Saves on gas to warm it up...

 

TL

Thay DOES soind like Texas. But how about the CIVILIZED world?

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

Thay DOES soind like Texas. But how about the CIVILIZED world?

In the CIVILIZED world there is a filter and a heater between floors to make sure your water is warm and at least looks clean. but it still comes from a shower on the floor above you.

[Alpo]

Seriously? Soap scum and the guy washes his butt crack, then urinates in the shower, and that all goes down the drain and then out of the shower head on the floor below?

 

To quote Valley Girls, "Groody to the max".

 

Now I kinda wish I hadn't asked this question.

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

I think there's only one "o" in grody.

[Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438]

I guess you need to know....The shower at the top floor drains into the shower below....The hot water just flows down hill threw each room and shower....They never need to warm it up....Saves on gas to warm it up...

 

TL

 

Aw, come on!

 

You cannot allow water that flows into the drain to re-enter the supply; that's unsanitary and violates every plumbing code that I'm aware of.

 

And the cost of treating that water to make it potable again would usually exceed the cost of simply heating and pumping more water from a fresh water supply.

 

Somebody is telling Tall Tales!

 

LL

 

ps: Some very sophisticated buildings have self-contained wastewater treatment systems, capable of treating gray water and bringing it back to potable standards; but those systems do NOT simply allow waste water to "drain down" into the supply system below. Drain water is piped to the treatment system, filtered, chemically treated, and after meeting certain purity requirements, reused. I'd be surprised to see this in your local Holiday Inn.

Edited December 13, 2016 by Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438

[Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438]

Too much hot water in a shower can be worse than not enough.

 

I have a client that manufacturers shower valves. They were sued a couple of years ago when a hotel guest was scalded to death in their shower. This was odd, as the valve was equipped with a mechanical "stop" to prevent such occurrences. By law, the plumbing inspector was obligated to check the tub outlet in each bathroom with a thermometer, making sure that the "stop" prevented the discharge of water in excess of 120 degrees F. If this is done, the faucet cannot be turned further, and 120 deg. is the max that can be produced at the spout. However, this hotel was built on a thin budget, and to save money, the owner deleted one of the boiler systems called for in the plans. This over-worked the remaining boilers, leading to guest complaints of insufficient hot water in the rooms. To counter the complaints, the owner sent his handyman around to each room, with instructions to fully open all of the "stops". (You should have seen the looks on the hotel's lawyers' faces when that admission came out at deposition!) With the limits removed, the tubs discharged water as high as 190-200 degrees F. The victim, an elderly woman, was unable to get out of the stream of scalding water, and basically cooked in the tub.

 

LL

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

Leg pulling?? Ya think??

 

Some countries don't have the same standards as the US. I'm sure I've seen water in the neighborhood of 160F in apartments. Hot on the left is inconsistent, even in the same room.

 

I remember a house in Quebec, The faucet on the right was C for Cold, the one on the left was C for Chaud.

[Alpo]

Saw that in Puerto Rico.

 

Cold and Caliente.

 

 

I remember a motel I stayed at once. Had the left faucet wide open for about ten minutes, waiting for hot water so I could shower. Never got hot. They had them hooked up backwards.

 

I believe it was in Indiana.

Edited December 13, 2016 by Alpo

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

I've taken more than one cold shower because I could not get hot water.

 

I almost always rent apartments instead of getting a hotel room. The hot water is often a problem.