When Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans on August 29, 2005, it flooded an estimated 80 percent of the Crescent City. Local businessman Tommy Cvitanovich was among the tens of thousands of residents whose homes gave way to the storm. "After Hurricane Katrina I lost the roof, and our house was totally broken down to two-by-fours and brick walls," he explains.

But like many on the Gulf Coast, the hurricane couldn't drive him away. A "Big Easy" restaurateur with a long family connection to New Orleans, Cvitanovich held his ground and rebuilt his home. And when he did, he opted for a different type of water-heating solution for his young and growing family, choosing to go tankless with Rheem.

The Cvitanovich children at home in the master bathroom tub: It was Tommy Cvitanovich's tankless installation at home that led him to replace the tank-type water heater in the restaurant..

"I love it," he says. "I've got a wife and four children. With the previous tank-type unit, when people started bathing around our house, it wasn't uncommon to run out of hot water. That's why we went to tankless."

To handle the installation, Cvitanovich called in Bienvenu Brothers Plumbing, Heating and Cooling of nearby Metairie, La. The company replaced two tank-type water heaters with four gas-fired 5.4 gpm tankless water heaters in the expansive house.

Dedicated tankless units supply the home's cabana and master bath, which contains a luxury shower. The remaining two units supply the rest of the five-bathroom, 6,250 sq. ft. house.

Drago's Restaurant: Although Hurricane Katrina took a personal toll on Cvitanovich, his family restaurant fared much better. Drago's, http://www.dragosrestaurant.com/ established by Tommy's father in 1969, survived the storm with very little damage. The grateful family opened its heart and its doors to the community after the storm. "We served almost 80,000 meals free of charge," Tommy Cvitanovich says.

Tommy Cvitanovich, owner of Drago's Restaurant in Metairie, La. "Our restaurant is so big, our peak demand can be all day, every day."

Located in Metairie, Drago's Restaurant is arguably the most popular seafood spot among locals. Serving 1,000 customers each day, the 40-year-old, 10,000 square-foot landmark also attracts the tourists, making it one of the top five gross-sales restaurants in New Orleans.

Influenced by Tommy's successful home tankless installation and fed up with an outdated, 150-gallon-tank water heater's inability to keep up with demand, Drago's management switched to Rheem tankless technology to power the massive hot water needs of the busy restaurant.

"Our restaurant is so big, our peak demand can be all day, every day," explains Cvitanovich.

"We've got kettles that are going all day long," he adds. "It's very important for me to fill them and get them boiling ASAP, so it's much better to start at 160°F than at the faucet temperature. I have one pot that is probably 80 gallons — just filling it would deplete a tank heater. But I also have a 60-gallon kettle and two 40-gallon kettles.

"When we had a tank, we had to have boiler inspections once a year, and we were constantly running out of hot water. We would run out especially at night, when we were cleaning."

Temperature regulation was also a critical factor. Cvitanovich explains that he needs to reach two specific hot water temperatures around the clock: 140?F for regular cleaning and 180?F for rinsing dishes. "Sometimes if we were cleaning and the tank ran out, we had to wait for hot water," he says, referring to the previous tank-type unit.

After consulting with Rheem's local sales agent, Barbot, Woolf, Canale of Harahan, La., Drago's called in Bienvenu for the job.

Once proper sizing was determined, the company installed three Rheem GT-199XN-1 heavy-duty tankless water heaters, with an Energy Factor of .82, and a maximum flow rate of 7.4 gpm (gallons per minute). Two of the units were manifolded (or connected) together to handle the restaurant's overall water needs from kitchen to cleaning to restrooms. One additional 7.4 gpm tankless unit was installed to heat water exclusively for the massive kettles in the kitchen.

"All three tankless water heaters were installed outdoors, up on the roof, to save space in the building," explains Bienvenu. "Installing outside eliminated the need for venting, which saves installation time and cost for the customer."

Space-Savings, Energy Efficiency and Reliability: While space-savings and energy efficiency are important to Cvitanovich for both his home and Drago's, maintaining temperature and reliability were the driving factors for the restaurant's tankless installation.

"We go through a lot of hot water here and we've never run out since we got tankless. They told us that if the units are hooked up together (manifolded) and one goes out, you still have hot water from the other two," he says. "That was part of the reason we went with tankless. But that situation hasn't happened yet."

Tankless handles the complex and challenging commercial water heating needs of Cvitanovich's large and bustling restaurant as readily as it serves his busy family at home. "I'm very satisfied with tankless," he says. "That's why I recommended it to some friends who also had to rebuild after the storm."

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