WAGS means Water And Gas Safety

WAGS stands for Water And Gas Safety Valve and it means Protection For You.

Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve

The Taco WAGS is essential Protection Against Water Heater Leaks. The Taco WAGS valve is designed to shut off the water supply (plus the gas supply for gas-fired heaters) in the event of a water leak from a hot water heater, thus minimizing water damage and possible gas leakage. The valve can be installed on all styles of water heaters. WAGS (Water and Gas Safety Valve) is designed to catch water heater leaks before they become floods and shut off both water and gas feeds before disaster can strike.

The WAGS Valve is the only product of its kind that shuts off both gas and water feeds in the event of a water leak.WAGS can also be installed on any non-gas hot water heater and requires no electrical connections making it extremely reliable and economical. The valve can also be used with oil fired water heaters as well as electric water heaters to shut off the water. The Taco WAGS Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve is fully mechanical and requires no external power supply. WAGS will shut off water to other tanks, fixtures and appliances too, such as boilers, pumps and well tanks.

Taco WAGS provides essential protection against water heater leaks.
Your water heater will eventually fail and leak - fact of life! Most water heaters fail within 7-10 years. That's about 5 million tank failures EVERY year. Without a WAGS valve, a leaking tank keeps refilling - and leaking. The Taco WAGS Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve prevents disastrous floods and untold damage to your property.

The Taco WAGS sits in a drip pan under the water heater and is activated when leaking water accumulates to a level of ¾" in the pan. Once activated, the WAGS valve shuts off the water and gas supply, indicated by a red pop-up tab.

When a water heater tank fails, the Taco WAGS Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve

• Shuts off the water supply
• Shuts off gas on gas-fired heaters
• WAGS will shut the water feed off on electric and oil fired heaters too.
• Round-the-clock peace of mind!
• Prevents costly water damage of a flood from a leaking water heater
• Alleviates related gas safety concerns
• Minimizes inconvenience

We Guarantee It!
Since 1920, Taco, Inc. has earned the trust of HVAC and plumbing professionals around the world with high quality, innovative equipment known for performance and durability.

An undetected leak spells disaster.
When a water heater leak goes unnoticed, the tank keeps refilling -- and leaking. Soon, water pressure turns a small crack into a gash, releasing hundreds, even thousands, of gallons of water into the dwelling. Imagine the damage to your floors and possessions! What's more, a gas-fired water heater poses an additional risk, since water can snuff out the pilot light, allowing gas to escape.

$1,000 Lifetime Protection Policy
Taco will reimburse the owner of a Taco WAGS valve their insurance deductible, up to $1,000, if a properly installed WAGS valve fails to detect a water heater leak and subsequently shut off the water feed, resulting in excessive water damage.

Additional Information:

General Information about The TACO WAGS Valve
Instruction Sheet on The TACO WAGS Valve

 Water Sensing Alarms

Now you can use the advanced technology of Water Sensing Alarms to save your home from thousands of dollars in water damage repairs. We carry a full line of flood prevention products. Detect water leaks caused by a failed appliance or plumbing fixture, a burst pipe or burst supply lines that connect Toilets, Sinks, Dishwashers, Water Heaters and Clothes Washers, then automatically shut off the water supply to the problem.  We have Whole-House Water Shut-offs too, so if you are leaving your house you can turn off your water with a switch! Use one of our many Leak and Flood, Water Alarms Today. Stop a deluge by cutting off water at its source!

Click Here to - Have a look through our wide selection of Water Sensing Alarms.

How the Taco WAGS Valve Works

How the Taco WAGS Works
A drip pan is installed under your water heater. The Taco WAGS Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve is attached between the water source and the water heater. When leaking water fills the pan to a depth of 3/4", a water-soluble fiber element in the WAGS dissolves, releasing a powerful spring-loaded piston that closes the flow of water to the tank. In gas-fired water heaters, this action also breaks a fuse that shuts off the gas supply to the heater. This fiber-element technology was first used by the British Royal Air Force to inflate life jackets automatically. WAGS Valves are highly reliable, totally mechanical, and requires no additional power source.



The Taco WAGS Water and Gas Safety Shut-off Valve is manufactured by TACO-hvac, a leader in hydronic-based components for use in heating and cooling applications across the building spectrum.Taco-hvac products have long been recognized for their outstanding quality, field reliability and durability, and ease of installation and maintenance. Over the decades, the Taco name has been, and continues to be, associated with perpetual innovation and important new hvac (heating ventalation and air conditioning) product developments.

The Taco WAGS Story

The Taco WAGS Story
The idea for the WAGS valve was born out of experiencing the pain and frustration of not be able to offer a solution to a customer's problem.

Back in 1986, while working for a plumber and replacing approximately four water heaters daily, Paul Almberg saw the devastation to people's property that a leaking water heater causes. The homeowners were usually angry and disgusted that there wasn't a product to prevent their tank from ruining everything. This was understandable, especially when you were in the process of replacing the failed water heater with a new tank, that you knew was going to fail again in the same fashion in just a few short years.

Move forward to 1992, Paul Almberg was now doing gas appliance service work for the local gas company when he recognized another problem. When the water heater tank ruptured it sometimes extinguished the pilot. The main burner tries to fire because of the flow of water and there is nothing to shut off the unburned gas until the main valve safety drops out. Now when a gas-fired water heater fails you have a potential gas safety concern plus the damage and inconvenience from a flood.

The frustration of not being able to help his customers prevent flooding caused by a leaking water heater and the identification of the gas safety concern nagged at Paul. He had to do something. He started working on a device to solve the problem. One day while talking to a co-worker, Clyde Baragwanath, Paul told him about his concept. Clyde immediately understood the need and thought that the concept Paul had been playing around with could actually work. Both were working nights for the gas company, so they pooled their knowledge from years in the field together with their desire to solve the problem and started working in their basements during the day.

After spending countless hours in their basements, thousands of dollars on lawyers and patent searches, being strung along by false "we can make you rich" infomercial style marketing companies Paul and Clyde were exhausted and really not much further ahead of where Paul was in 1986. They came to the realization that they needed help if they were to make the concept a reality.

It was now 1996 and Paul and Clyde decided that to be taken seriously they needed to have a working product, not just a bunch of concept drawings. It was time to "just do it", to eliminate any doubt that the concept wouldn't work. Their desire to get an actual part made lead them through contacts that family and friend's had to the door of Fielding Manufacturing and Steve Fielding. Fielding Manufacturing specializes in zinc die casting and injection molding, but for Paul and Clyde they had the engineering expertise and tooling capability to actual make a prototype of their concept. They also had a financial supporter in Steve Fielding who had the contacts, enthusiasm and business know-how that would be vital to their success. Together the three of them founded Aquagard, LLC.

Things were starting to happen at a faster pace. An engineer named Mark Miller joined Aquagard and brought his design and patent experience with him. He helped redesign the valve with fewer parts for ease of manufacturing. At about the same time, they received a grant from the State of Rhode Island supported Slater Fund. Things were starting to come together. With the grant money, Mark's engineering changes, and the rapid prototyping capability at Fielding Manufacturing, all the hard work was starting to pay off. In July of 1998 the first prototypes were completed and successfully tested.

By late 1998 the Aquagard team first met with Taco. It was evident from the very beginning that Taco, a leading manufacturer of HVAC equipment, possessed the resources, internal talent, and distribution network to make the WAGS valve a huge success. Not long after the first meeting Taco purchased the rights to manufacture and market the valve. A select multidisciplinary team of Taco employees then started the process of taking Aquagard's prototype and tuning it into a manufacturable, reliable product that could be sold through its distribution network. It turned out be a task full of challenges, but none to great not to overcome.

Taco has invested millions in the development, life testing, manufacturing, marketing, and distribution of the product. We proudly embraced the mission of bringing Paul's concept to completion. The long product development journey of the WAGS valve has never looked so bright as it does today. After all these years, the Taco WAGS development team on behalf of all the employees of Taco and the four Aquagard principles are pleased to finally offer a solution to the disastrous flooding and gas safety concerns caused by leaking water heaters. The WAGS valve has arrived!

TACO WAGS Valve Information

One more homeowner who won't be without a WAGS!

"What a nightmare," says Jeff Southworth when he talks about what could have happened to his basement family room if WAGS had not been on the job.

Shortly after Southworth, his wife and three children returned to their ranch-style house in Pawtucket, RI, on the Saturday before Mother's Day, his wife discovered water on the floor of the laundry room that adjoins the family room.

"Earlier in the week, the pressure relief valve on my water heater had blown off some water and was trickling. I know that every once in a while one of those valves will pop and get stuck so that it can't reset," he says. Southworth "fixed" the problem by giving the valve "a light tap with a hammer," as a friend advised, he explains. But that Saturday, the pressure relief valve failed again and began dumping water through the overflow pipe.

The water first ran into a bucket that, Southworth says, "I have always kept there, for whatever reason, just in case the pressure relief valve blew off water, it wouldn't go on the floor."

The bucket was wedged into a tight space and didn't sit level. The water soon filled the bucket, which fortunately was tilted toward the drip pan under the heater. "It could just as easily have been tilted away," Southworth says. As water collected in the pan, WAGS did what it was designed to do - shut off the water and gas supply and stop the leak.

"I lucked out," he says. In a big way, as it turns out.

Only months before, Southworth had finished the family room with plaster walls and new carpeting. It was filled with new furniture, electronics, computers. "We live down there," he adds. "Three-quarters of my basement is finished. In the rest are the washer and dryer, the hot water heater, an extra freezer, my boiler and some extra storage," he explains. Add it all together and water damage could easily have run into tens of thousands of dollars.

Also, just months previously Southworth had a new 50 gallon gas-fired water heater installed to increase his home's hot water capacity. A friend told him how frequently water heaters fail and about the flooding and damage they can cause, then gave him a WAGS valve for the new heater.

Southworth had a pro install the valve for him The plumber wasn't familiar with WAGS, Southworth recalls, and wasn't convinced of its value. He objected to the fact that WAGS can't be reset and must be replaced after it's been triggered.

"In hindsight, I probably thought a little bit that way, too," Southworth says. "Looking back on it and having had the problem, I think for the peace of mind I have now it is well worth the money."

His experience convinced Southworth of what we've said all along. Considering the financial and emotional disaster a flooded basement can be, every water heater you install should have a WAGS valve.

"I'm going out and buy my Dad a WAGS because he has a finished basement, too," Southworth says. "And I've taken a bunch of pamphlets to work and have been passing them out like crazy, telling people they are nuts not to have one of these."

He adds, "I will absolutely have a WAGS valve on all my water heaters."

WAGS Valves Approved

WAGS Valve Approved by NSF and Massachusetts Board of State Examiners of Plumbers and gas fitters.
TACO WAGS Valve was approved by NSF and Mass. Board At the April 3 meeting of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Board of State Examiners of Plumbers and Gasfitters (Mass. Board) the WAGS valve gained approval under the Massachusetts Plumbing Code (CMR248 2.00). On February 21, 2002 NSF International certified that the WAGS valve conformed to the requirements of ANSI / NSF Standard 61 - Drinking Water System Components - Health Effects. NSF 61 covers devices (used to measure or control flow installed on a service line or building distribution system downstream of the water main and before endpoint devices), components, and materials used therein which are used in treatment / transmission / distribution systems, and are in contact with drinking water intended for human ingestion, drinking water treatment chemicals, or both.

Florida condo owners approve WAGS for protection
After one too many water heater failures caused property damage for condo owners and their neighbors alike, the board of the Sun n' Surf Condo Complex in Palm Beach, Florida, voted to retrofit some 240 units with the WAGS valve and make WAGS mandatory on all new installations. 

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