Hot Water Down in a Fitzroy Terrace
Fitzroy's Victorian-era terraces present a particular challenge for hot water replacement. Space is tight, the homes are narrow, and the original hot water infrastructure — often a small storage system tucked beside the back door — doesn't always have a natural successor location. This Fitzroy job involved a terrace with a failed storage unit and a client who wanted to go continuous flow but was worried about fitting a new unit in a constrained side passage.
The answer, as it often is in inner-Melbourne terrace properties, was a compact Rinnai wall-mounted unit on the exterior red brick wall. The unit takes up minimal wall footprint, the flue runs straight up, and the gas and water connections feed from below — leaving the passage clear and the installation looking intentional rather than improvised.
The Installation
The existing storage unit was drained, disconnected, and removed. We installed the Rinnai on the brick wall using stainless anchor bolts, then connected the cold water supply and hot water outlet with new copper pipework. The gas connection was made from the existing supply line running along the building's base. A condensate drain was run to the nearby garden bed.
- Removed and disposed of failed storage hot water unit
- Installed Rinnai continuous flow unit on exterior brick wall
- New copper connections — cold inlet and hot outlet
- Gas connection from existing supply, pressure tested
- Flue run vertically, terminating above eave line
- Commissioned and checked at all hot water points throughout the terrace
Fitzroy's narrow terraces often have only one suitable wall for a hot water unit. Continuous flow units are significantly smaller than storage tanks — most models are under 500mm wide — making them far more practical for constrained installations in heritage inner-Melbourne properties.
Hot Water in Melbourne's Inner North
We do a lot of hot water work across Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, and Brunswick — inner-north Melbourne's dense terrace and apartment stock has high turnover of hot water systems, and the constraints of these older properties mean the work often requires more thought than a standard suburban installation. If you're in a terrace and your hot water is failing, call us before assuming it'll be complicated — in most cases we've done the same job on the same type of property before and know exactly what the solution is.
Hot Water Replacement in Fitzroy?
Same-day response to Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick and the inner north. Fixed price, all brands.