I'm looking to replace my water heater. It's a short 38 gallon in the corner of our laundry room. The lines coming out of the wall are 2"-3" above it, extend a little bit over it, and have a short length of flexible copper pipe soldered to them and going into the water heater.

I want a 50 gallon medium sized water heater that be taller and thinner. The issue is that I'll need to cut the flex pipe off and extend the copper pipe up about 18" to reach the connections and fit the new water heater in the space. Do I need to do this in the wall? Can I do it against furring strips on the wall? Can i just run the pipe up a few inches away from the wall?

No, sure but no need, sure.

So there's no need to secure it anywhere or protect it?

ABATTBQ11 said:

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I'm looking to replace my water heater. It's a short 38 gallon in the corner of our laundry room. The lines coming out of the wall are 2"-3" above it, extend a little bit over it, and have a short length of flexible copper pipe soldered to them and going into the water heater.

I want a 50 gallon medium sized water heater that be taller and thinner. The issue is that I'll need to cut the flex pipe off and extend the copper pipe up about 18" to reach the connections and fit the new water heater in the space. Do I need to do this in the wall? Can I do it against furring strips on the wall? Can i just run the pipe up a few inches away from the wall?

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No reason I can think of that you can't put the extension outside the wall. Soldered joints would be best so leave plenty of pipe sticking out of the wall to safely solder. You can use shark bite fittings instead but I don't trust them on copper personally and they are expensive . At least you can see them and know if they start leaking so it's a good option if you don't want to solder. You may want to attach some plywood or something at the top and secure the top ends of the pipe with a one or two hole strap.

The flex is soldered to the pipes? I've never seen that. That's unfortunate.

I'd cut those off like you said and put an elbow on it and then go up as far as needed and elbow back to the water heater a tad. Then I'd fit a nipple to that so I could replace my flex as needed. Flex comes it some wild lengths. I like stainless flex myself but this should be a pretty easy fix. If you are only going up the wall a few inches, even 12" or more, you won't need to support the pipe. It's not being wiggled and it should be protected by the water heater from being bumped or jostled. Just give it a wiggle and judge for yourself.

When I use flex they have washers and I just thread them on by hand and tighten 1/4 then. If it seeps, I give it another 1/4 turn and keep doing that until it stops. It doesn't take much so the copper pipes should be fine.

Thanks! I'm more concerned with there being any kind of code issue. I'll probably leave 2"-3" out of the wall, solder on an elbow and extension, and attach the extension to a furring strip at the top regardless. The last thing I want is something falling and hitting an unsupported line and causing a leak.

Yeah it's a corrugated copper pipe that is made to be soldered on to the line. Like this:



Everything you said is pretty much the plan.

ABATTBQ11 said:

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Thanks! I'm more concerned with there being any kind of code issue. I'll probably leave 2"-3" out of the wall, solder on an elbow and extension, and attach the extension to a furring strip at the top regardless. The last thing I want is something falling and hitting an unsupported line and causing a leak.

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shark bites are supposedly code compliant but it's probably worth asking a local plumber about local codes if you want to be sure.

Copper in the wall now ?

I have done this before with 90's and extensions but both times it was galvanized so I did not have to do any cutting and sweating

Post a pic

They also make a 30 inch stainless flex that may allow you to keep the rough in where it already is

You can probably rent the tool that does the propress copper press crimp fittings if you dont want to deal with soldering. Super easy to work with.

That's the current setup. The current water heater is 32" tall. The one I want is 48". Thinking about it I could probably just solder an elbow and nipple with an 18"or 24" flex and be fine.

Is it kosher to connect the shut off valve directly on the water heater? I figure that'll be easier to get to when the lines end up being the water heater

Master Plumber Nov 2022 = identical to yours me thinks
during new/replacement WH also got rid of trashy/leaky Gate valve corroding 1980 with Ball valve - nice

I get it - saves one step today to attach valve directly to WH but guess valve might go to dumpster with WH in 10-15 years ... the only drawback. A plumber might poo-poo the protocol & give IRC insight, then during house resale Realtor's inspector might not care. I say why not? We see elect.panels in closets b/c Grandfathered in ...

I should not need one. We're on an open loop system.