What Temperature Is Your Tap Hot Water?

[launderess]

It's heating season here (though you wouldn't know it by outdoor temps in 50's and low 60's for past few weeks), so boilers are set to "winter" to provide steam for heating well as hot water.

Noticed about a week ago tap hot water is *HOT*. I mean far to hot to bear for an instant. While this does make for lovely steamy hot showers, and great if one is on a sanitizing jig with buckets of hot water and disinfectant it cannot be generally safe.

Got a thermometer out yesterday and tap water hits 179.8 degrees Fahrenheit!

Thought take advantage of this near boiling water out of tap to run a "maintenance" wash in some of the washing machines. First up was the Miele and it was *NOT* happy with incoming water that hot.

Machine filled alright but first tumble of drum sent scalding hot water shooting up out of detergent drawer. While mopping up that mess noticed water hose was far to soft with connections rather warm. Let machine finish first cycle, drained and short spin, scrub rest! Didn't wish to harm something! Opened the door and huge wafts of steam came bellowing out. Hahahaha!

Won't be doing that again, but to take advantage of this new found bounty of uber hot water will haul out the Maytag wringer and some of those packets of vintage Persil 59 detergent and soap powder. They were made for really hot washes (and a few subsequent rinses as well), so that's me sorted.

 

[rp2813]

I have my tankless heater set to 135. 

 

Pausing here to let the gasping wind down . . .

 

I've thought about bumping it up to an extravagant 140, but with Dave in assisted living now, the days of really funky wash loads requiring extensive stain treatments are over in this household, and 135 seems to get the job done on whites with boosters added.

 

My FWB lives in a 4-plex and his hot water is absolutely scalding.  That seems like overkill to me, but since there's just one set of machines in the communal laundry room, if I lived there and had to share them with others, I'd be taking advantage of the super hot washes for sure (assuming the commercial coin-op Whirlpool doesn't dumb down the temperature), just in case the other tenants preferred only warm and/or (yikes) cold.

 

I can't imagine tap water hot enough to brew tea is good for hoses, fittings and valve components on clothes washers, dishwashers, or even faucets for that matter.

 

[askolover]

My gas tank water heater is set around 150

 

[polkanut]

Ours is set at 130º.

 

[luxflairguy]

my tank is set at 130.

 

[chachp]

Ours is set to a little higher than Medium

 

<span style="font-family: helvetica;">We don't have numbers on ours.  The water comes out of the tap at about 135.</span>

 

[arbilab]

2 central tanks for 60-unit apartment.  Averages 115F.  Paltry, but free (included in rent).

 

Cold is 80F in summer and passing through lower 60s now.

 

[foraloysius]

My hot water is set to 60 degrees Celcius so 140 Fahrenheit. Washer and dishwasher only connected to cold water.

 

[yogitunes]

mine has always been set at 160....

were not full set into the Winter season yet, but I can tell when the outside temp has dropped as I have to adjust the tub knob more to the left past the center sweet spot....

if I was the only person living alone, and had only one machine, I could consider dropping it down some....but there are times of running machines and two showers at the same time with no loss of pressure/temps.....I envy some homes of having two tanks!

 

[DADoES]

 
104°F is normal (or 103°F or 102°F)

Sometimes 97°F for a cooler shower after yard work.

112°F for a whirlpool-tub soak.

122°F to 125°F for handwashing the non-stick skillet or other items.

115°F to 122°F for warm laundry.

133°F to 140°F (can't go higher) for hot laundry.

 

[Marky_Mark]

I'm surprised that your hot water is that hot, Launderess.  Is it the same for other/all apartments in your building?  I would have thought that the building's management would have taken steps to reduce that temperature due to concerns over liability / duty-of-care issues if someone were to get injured.  Even if the system cannot reasonably provide cooler hot water at this time of year, I'm surprised they haven't installed tempering valves (for example) to reduce the temperature of the hot water entering the apartments.  I wonder if this is supposed to be the case, but your apartment may be receiving abnormally hot water due to a fault/oversight.  

 

[petek]

I have ours set at 120. When I run the washer or dishwasher I let the water run in the sinks until it reaches that temp, not that I check it too often, but it takes a good minute at full blast. Our laundry is never really dirty, mucky, whatever. If there is a stain on a shirt for example, I'll just spray some Resolve on it, wait the requisite minutes et voila. I guess I'm of the camp where today's top rated laundry detergents can handle the worst and don't require extra hot water.

 

[appnut]

Checked hot water coming out of the tap, 121.5 F.

 

[ea56]

I agree with both Petek and Marky Mark.

Especially about hot water coming out of the tap at 179F, thats just too damn hot and dangerous! I’m surprised that first of all a landlord would spend the extra dollars maintaining the hot water at this temp and secondly that they would put themselves in such a potentially libelous situation. Someone gets a severe burn and they're gonna call Chetem and Wynn and win big.

And I agree that most modern detergents can remove dirt, grim and germs from laundry with hot water between 120-130F.

When we had our current water heater installed 10 years ago it came with the thermostat set at 120F by law. I requested that the plumber raise the temp to 130F, we met at the middle on 125F and thats been perfectly adequate for our needs.

And 125F must be sufficient to kill everyday household germs because neither of us is ever sick, knock on wood! We keep our home spotlessly clean, use good detergents, disinfectants and other cleaning products and wash the laundry weekly, change the bed weekly, change the kitchen towels and dish clothes daily. The floors and bathrooms are cleaned by hand weekly, no dirty toilet brushes or filthy mops. And the laundry always comes out clean, fresh smelling, stain and lint free by washing everything in 125F hot water.

Eddie

 

[qsd-dan]

162F

 

[kenwashesmonday]

145F at the kitchen faucet. 

 

This works out well since I always run the Maytag Jetclean portable dishwasher on 'light wash' without using the 'accu temp' or 'heated dry' options.  Having the machine parked in front of the sink for 53 minutes is long enough.

 

[petek]

Excerpted from a leading consumer reporting magazine

As far as I'm concerned I'll live by they're reporting. Unless someone else can show me any other testing organizations methods and results which are also repeatable.

We tested over 50 detergents, liquids and pods, some of which are claimed to be gentle on sensitive skin or friendly to the environment, as you’ll see in our laundry detergent ratings.

First, we launder fabric swatches that are saturated with blood, body oil, chocolate, coffee, dirt, grass, and salad dressing. We use stains that are exceedingly hard to remove so that we can detect real differences among detergents. Even the best detergents can’t remove every stain completely.

Today's water and energy efficient washers are designed to operate using cooler water than traditional top-loaders from the 1990s. As wash cycles got cooler, the chemistry of detergents had to change in order for them to clean effectively. That's why we test using cool water. We wash swatches in two identical washers with each detergent, then allow the swatches to air-dry. (A dryer is out of the question because the heat can alter the stains.)

Testers use a colorimeter, a device that measures color intensity, to see how much of the stain remains on each dry swatch, compared with stained swatches that have been laundered using only water.

The best detergents we’ve tested earn an Excellent rating in removing body oil and dirt—common stains—but they can also tackle tougher ones, such as grass and blood. Hard water, which has a high mineral content, can reduce the effectiveness of some detergents. We test for that, too, as you'll see in our ratings.

The worst detergents? They're barely better than water when it comes to removing most stains.

 

[joeekaitis]

 

120°F setting on the water heater.  Always use the High Temp and Heat Dry options on the dishwasher (boosts to 135°F).

 

[whirlykenmore78]

Water Temp:

Our 50 Gallon Gas WH is set to 140.

Launderess: Dear Lady 180f/82C is WAY too hot for tap water. You could run a commercial dish machine in that building WITHOUT a booster heater and it would keep temp. That has to be some kind of code violation for a residential building. Agreed though that the MT would be in it's element with this water temp. Could do several loads before the water cooled off.
WK78