Last Sunday I had to replace a 40-gal electric water heater in a crawl space and was surprised to find the old heater had side connections for hot & cold water and electric. Neither Lowes nor Home Depot had a matching water heater (and it was Sunday) so I bought one with top connections, and got advice from the sales person to use pex (flexible plastic pipe) and compression fittings to get the water to and from the existing copper pipes to the top of the new heater. (I don't like to use a torch - especially in a crawl space.) It seems to be working, but my concern is that the fittings seem pretty flimsy and the water pressure is VERY high in this area. Does anybody have any bad/good experience with this combination?

[This message has been edited by rpxlpx (edited March 15, 2001).]