Electrics Shower - HELP!!!

[Berties-girl]

Ok here goes, i am moving to new place at the end of May and i had someone come and look at the electric shower there as it doesnt work with out scolding you , heres what he said i needed,


Hot & Cold supply mixer shower.

The shower that is there is a white box on the wall look standard to a normal electric shower and a pull cord to turn it on, my OH said it is a power shower due to low pressure in the area, its also in a mobile home so i would have thought it about 7.5.

Im confused because i have got to work and wont see the shower again til the weekend and i am confused as to which shower i need? and can you get standard 7.5 electric shower with hot and cold inlets?


MOD

moved as not strictly an electrical problem

 

[bushynut]

you mean a 7.5kw shower?

 

[Berties-girl]

Yeap thats what i mean, sorry having a blonde day

 

[Steve]

You need a shower that takes hot water from the boiler and cold water from the mains, and mixes it and pumps it to the shower head, a power mixer shower really. These aren't very popular, but consume much less electricity.

However, what you can do is use a shower pumping unit (outside the bathroom somewhere) and a standard thermostatic shower/mixer tap in the shower. A plumber should be able to advise.

 

[kevplumb]

mixer shower

 

[AdamW]

You need a shower that takes hot water from the boiler and cold water from the mains, and mixes it and pumps it to the shower head, a power mixer shower really. These aren't very popular, but consume much less electricity.

However, what you can do is use a shower pumping unit (outside the bathroom somewhere) and a standard thermostatic shower/mixer tap in the shower. A plumber should be able to advise.

A mobile home (I believe "park home" is the current estate agent term BG )is unlikely to have water storage tanks of any type, so I am thinking that the boiler would be a combi. As we all know you aren't allowed to pump mains water (it upsets the pumping stations).

So, a power shower is unlikely to be suitable.

Berties-girl, what heats the water for your kitchen sink, and what type of room-heating do you have? I am asking because if it is a combi boiler then as Kev says, a mixer shower would be suitable. This would rely on mains pressure cold water and mains pressure hot water (coming from the combi boiler).

If you do not have a combi boiler (if this is the case your heating will most likely be electric panels or gas warm-air blowers) then an electric shower might be your only realistic option.

 

[Berties-girl]

Thanks for all your help,i think the guy who looked at the shower has confused me even more, but here are some more details,

We have a water tank and standard boiler, the heating is radiators from the boiler, we also have an immersion tank.

The shower that is already in is not a mixer shower from the boiler, it heats its own water as it goes, which is why i cant understand why the plumber said there was a cold and hot inflow.

Its these hot and cold inlets that are confusing me.

Any ideas now?

 

[Bahco]

Not sure what you want but a suggestion..........

Have an electrician change the supply cable for a 10 mm one and fit a new 10.5 Kw shower.
This should give you more flow if you have low pressure.
Make sure you test your flow first for adequate pressure.

 

[HDRW]

Not sure what you want but a suggestion..........

Have an electrician change the supply cable for a 10 mm one and fit a new 10.5 Kw shower.
This should give you more flow if you have low pressure.
Make sure you test your flow first for adequate pressure.

That is quite the worst advice I've seen in these forums! If the basic problem is low water pressure, how on Earth is fitting a bigger cable going to improve it?

B-G, since you have a tank of hot water already, the advice to get a shower with hot and cold feed sounds good to me - electric showers are hugely expensive to run (like running three or more electric kettles at once) and I can't understand why they seem to be so popular, especially in situations like yours where you've already got a cheaper way to heat the water (the boiler).

Showers that take hot and cold feed are either just thermostatic taps, using whatever water flow you have and mixing the hot and cold to give the temperature you've asked for, or "Power Showers" where there is an electric pump to boost the water pressure. The latter usually have a thermostat as well, so don't get confused! Don't buy a power shower that has manual temperature control - it's false economy and will annoy you in use

So what you have is an "electric shower" and what you want is a "thermostatic power shower".

Have a look at the range of thermostatic power showers available - the electrical load will be a few hundred watts at most, rather than the 10.5kW (10,500W) that was suggested - any shower with a rating in kW is going to be an electric shower and isn't what you want (you've already got one and it's not working in your situation).

You can get seperate pumps which would feed into a thermostatic unit, but finding space for one may be tricky, so the all-in-one units are worth looking at, such as this: http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp;jsessionid=5SASMGSIPTPLLCJO2C3CJ0Q?id=21906&ts=05714

There are a number of them available, and while you may not always get what you pay for, you don't get anything for nothing so it's worth looking carefully and not just buying the cheapest!

On top of buying and installing the unit, you'll need the plumber to run a feed from the hot tank (or a convenient hot pipe nearby) and someone Part P qualified to fit a Fused Switched Unit (FSU) like this: http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp?id=79130&ts=06335 outside the bathroom for the electrics - no reason why this couldn't be fed from the existing electric shower cable, but it must be outside the bathroom.

Best of luck!

Howard

 

[Berties-girl]

Thank you so much Howard, that made total sense, at least i now know what i am looking for now.

Thanks again

 

[Berties-girl]

Howard do you think this sort of shower will be okay.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=32875&item=4376753020&rd=1

 

[HDRW]

Howard do you think this sort of shower will be okay.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=32875&item=4376753020&rd=1

Well the price certainly looks good, but it's not thermostatic, which means you'll have to adjust it to take account of the temperature of the hot water coming into it (which may vary over the time you're under the shower - depends how well mixed the temperature is in your hot tank).

I think you should get a quote for the work to be done first - if the trademen are going to charge £hundreds then it doesn't make sense to save a few quid in getting inferior equipment - in my opinion!

Cheers,

Howard

 

[Bahco]

.
Make sure you test your flow first for adequate pressure.

HDRW

Read ALL the advice next time before jumping in

It was not implied that a larger cable would increase the pressure. Not in my post anyway

A 10.5 Kw will give more flow than a 7.5Kw, hence my suggestion.