Shower install, old fuse box

[Aragorn84]

Right.

I can see then that replacing the CU is likely to be something i'd not be prepared to pay for, especially as its not my property.

Would adding an additional fuseway to the existing Fusebox and running the shower from that create as many problems?

Assuming i can get a large enough Fuse for the board, how likely is it that its going to be able to handle the current?

I wouldnt mind using a lesser rated shower, say a 7 or 8kw unit if that meant i could achieve my goal.

End of the day, not having a shower is a serious pain in the arse. Having baths wastes so much time (not to mention the cost of the water), so i'm prepared to spend a bit of cash to install a shower as it will benefit me. I'm not prepared to spend many hundereds of pounds upgrading the entire wiring system for the whole property though. Swapping out the CU to allow the installation of the shower would have been fine, but paying an electrician for many hours of work at their ripoff rates is simply outwith my means.

Any ideas or suggestions on how i should proceed?

 

[slup]

Do you definitely need an electric shower?

What kind of hot water system do you have? You may be able to just fit a shower pump and mixer shower. This will give better results than an electric shower anyway.

Steve

 

[Aragorn84]

the existing setup has a combi fed hot water system and tank fed cold water

The bath tap has a mixer on it already with a shower attachment, however it seems to act very strange with the cold water.

Once the hot tap is turned more than about one turn on, the cold tap does nothing. You then adjust the hot tap back down and theres about 0.5degrees of motion which makes it go from roasting to freezing. Trying to adjust the tap in 0.01degree increments to get the water at the right temperature is simply rubbish, and when you get there the flow rate is junk.

I suspect the problem is that the cold pressure is low due to it being gravity fed, and the hot water being fed from a combi means its basically at mains pressure. The restriction caused by the shower head means that the cold water simply cant flow, and the hot water may even be finding its way back up the cold pipe into the tank?

Perhaps i should place a post in the plumbing section to see if this is curable without resorting to an electric shower?

 

[electronicsuk]

I suspect the problem is that the cold pressure is low due to it being gravity fed, and the hot water being fed from a combi means its basically at mains pressure. The restriction caused by the shower head means that the cold water simply cant flow, and the hot water may even be finding its way back up the cold pipe into the tank?

Perhaps i should place a post in the plumbing section to see if this is curable without resorting to an electric shower?

Yes, I think posting this in the plumbing forum would be a good idea, as I'd be quite suprised if you're supposed/allowed to feed both gravity and mains water into a mixer tap without some form of non-return double check valve.

In any case, a proper mixer shower with direct hot and cold mains feeds should perform far better, as the controls are thermostatic and will adjust to keep the set temperature, unlike a bath mixer tap.

 

[Aragorn84]

Yer thinking about it this might just be the way to go. I'd planned to pull a mains cold feed from the feed to the tank in the attic for the electric shower anyway, so if i do this, and take a T off the hot feed at the bath i think we're onto a winner!

Looking at the install the combi boiler has been botched in to replace what looks like an old immersion/backboiler setup, so i presume when the bath was originally plumbed in both feeds would have been gravity fed, so i doubt theres any form of check valve in the system.

Thanks for the help... off to the Plumbing forum i go!