A standard gas tank is still the most-installed water heater in Pittsburgh, and for good reason. It’s the lowest-upfront-cost way to get hot water back in your house, it’s familiar, it works in a power outage if it has a standing pilot, and a well-installed Rheem tank from a Wahl crew will give you 8 to 12 years of reliable service.

We install gas tanks in three configurations: standard atmospheric (chimney-vented), power vent (electrically vented out a sidewall), and direct vent (sealed combustion). Which one fits your house depends on your chimney, your basement layout, and your venting.

The three gas tank configurations

Standard atmospheric (chimney-vented)

The classic Pittsburgh installation. The tank pulls combustion air from the basement and vents up through a chimney liner. Lowest upfront cost. Works in any home with a functional chimney sized to current code.

Best for: older Pittsburgh homes with a serviceable masonry chimney and an existing properly-sized liner. We replace the chimney liner when the existing one is undersized, missing, or corroded (which is common in Pittsburgh’s older stock).

Power vent

The tank has an electric blower on top that pushes exhaust horizontally out through a PVC pipe to a sidewall. No chimney needed.

Best for: homes where the chimney is undersized, deteriorating, capped, or doesn’t exist (interior basement, no way to get to a chimney). Power vent is also the only gas tank option in a tight mechanical closet that can’t safely pull combustion air from the room.

Trade-off: needs a 120V electrical circuit nearby. Won’t work in a power outage. Slightly more expensive than atmospheric, but solves a lot of venting problems Pittsburgh basements present.

Direct vent (sealed combustion)

The tank pulls combustion air from outside through a dedicated intake pipe, and vents exhaust through a separate pipe (or a concentric pipe-in-pipe). No air is drawn from the room.

Best for: very tight basements, finished basements where the water heater shares space with finished living areas, or homes with combustion air supply issues. Common in newer construction.

What we install

We’re a Rheem Pro Partner, which is the top tier of Rheem’s dealer program. We install the Rheem residential gas tank line as our primary lineup:

Rheem Classic Plus and Performance Plus are the workhorses. 6-year tank warranty, 40 and 50-gallon sizes, atmospheric and power-vent variants. 95% of our gas tank installs are this line.

Rheem Professional Classic offers the same Rheem quality with a slightly different feature set. Available in 40, 50, 65, and 75-gallon sizes.

Rheem High Efficiency condensing gas tanks are ENERGY STAR rated. 90%+ efficient, much longer life, higher upfront cost. We install these where the customer wants the lowest possible gas bill and isn’t ready to go tankless.

If a different brand fits a specific install better, we’ll source it. But Rheem Pro Partner pricing gives us the best value for the customer on standard configurations, and the warranty pass-through is the strongest in the industry.

Sizing: getting it right matters

A standard gas tank delivers about its tank size in continuous-use hot water before recovery time kicks in. Get the size wrong and you’ll either run out of hot water on a Saturday morning, or you’ll spend more than you need on a unit that’s bigger than your fixture count justifies.

Our Pittsburgh sizing guide:

These are starting points. We refine the recommendation during the visit based on your fixtures, your shower count, your dishwasher and clothes washer cycle timing, and how your family uses hot water in the morning.

What’s included in every Wahl gas tank install

• The Rheem tank (40, 50, 65, or 75-gallon, your spec)
• New T&P (temperature and pressure) relief valve and code-compliant discharge piping
• New safety pan (where applicable)
• New gas valve and flex connector
• New cold-water shutoff valve and dielectric unions
• Expansion tank if your home’s pressure system requires it (most do, this is code in Pittsburgh)
• Chimney liner inspection (and replacement quoted separately if needed)
• Combustion air verification
• Pressure test on the gas line
• Pull the city plumbing permit and coordinate the inspection
• One-year maintenance tune-up
• One-year labor warranty
• Photos of the install before we leave

What it costs

We present exact pricing in your home after a free in-home estimate. On our water-heating relative-investment ladder, standard atmospheric gas tanks sit at the entry tier ($), power vent and direct vent step up one tier ($$), and chimney liner replacement is quoted as a separate line when needed.

We come out, measure, look at your venting, check your gas line, and put real numbers on paper before we touch anything. Part of our process is presenting the numbers in person with both standard and Wahl Club member rates shown side by side. If a competing quote looks suspiciously low, ask what’s actually included. The cheap number is almost always missing the venting, the pan, the expansion tank, or the permit.

Add-ons we recommend (and why)

We don’t try to upsell. We do walk you through the add-ons that pay off, and we let you decide.

Expansion tank. Code in most of Allegheny County if you have a pressure-reducing valve or check valve. A failing expansion tank is the most common cause of water heater T&P relief valve drips.

Pressure-reducing valve (PRV). Pittsburgh’s incoming water pressure runs high in many neighborhoods (90 to 110 PSI is common). A PRV holds it at 60 to 75 PSI, which is what your fixtures and water heater are designed for. We check incoming pressure on every visit.

Moen Flowsmart digital shutoff. A WiFi-connected automatic shutoff valve. If a leak or pressure anomaly is detected, it shuts the water off automatically. A premium add-on, hard to beat for flood prevention in a Pittsburgh basement.

Whole-house water filter or softener. Pittsburgh water is moderately hard and is chlorinated (or chloraminated in some areas). Both shorten water heater life. A simple inlet filter or a Nuvo softener pays for itself in extended water heater life and better-tasting tap water.

Surge protector at the panel. Power vent and high-efficiency models have electronics. A whole-house surge protector at the panel is a small add-on that protects every appliance in the house, not just the water heater.