Problems with my shower

[TomLeggate]

Hello

I have been having problems with my shower over the past few weeks. It was producing a burning smell on the high setting and so everyone in the flat has been having cold showers for about a week. Been trying to get an electrician out to see it so I turned the shower unit off at the mains and opened up the unit for a look. Here are the pics of the insides.

http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0049.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0051.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0052.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0053.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0054.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0055.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0056.jpg
http://strokes.no-ip.org/tom/Pics/Shower/HPIM0057.jpg

The neutral wire at the bottom of the unit was hanging off like that when I opened the unit up. The high heat setting that had been causing the problem hasn't been producing any heat at all recently which would be explained by the wire just hanging there. The smoke/burning smell that I detected would have been from the pipe leading out of the pump (guess) which as you can see looks a little burnt and melted. Clearly something happened in the unit which caused a fault at that point at that wire and I don't really think it is a good idea just to connect it back up again myself without knowing the cause of the problem.

 

[Adam_151]

The wire and output sensor switch need to be replaced

What has happened, is there has been a slightly dodgy connection, its got warm which has incresed the resistance a bit, and maybe caused some movemnet which has made the physical connection worse (higher resistance again)

There higher resistance a connection has, the more heat that is generated in it, and its just a vicious circle until the connection goes open circuit

 

[Lectrician]

Agree, with the above.

It's the overheat cutout gone.

Type shower doctor into google for spares.

 

[TomLeggate]

Thanks. I really don't know if there is/was a dodgy connection at all in the recent past and because of this I am unsure as whether just to order new parts or get an electrician to fit a new shower in its place.

I found the spare parts list on http://www.showerdoc.co.uk/spares/triton/ivory.html not exactly sure what I need as it doesn't have a particular code for the piece that melted.

 

[Adam_151]

how old is the shower?, if its over 5 years then you might be best having a new one fitted, they have a limited lifetime, fur will be building up on the heating elements, etc, and ours is about 5 years old and it burnt out a switch connection, I think age takes its toll on connections in them etc, probably built quite cheaply and after 5 years about worn out

 

[TomLeggate]

I have been in the flat 2 years and it has been in there all that time. I think that it had probably been in the flat for a few years before then.

 

[TomLeggate]

Before the burning smell occured, the shower had been alternating between hot and cold and seemed to have problems reaching the stable desired temperature. Would this be a likely symptom of the temperature senor switch playing up before finally destroying itself.

 

[mapj1]

Possibly, or it could have been the lead working itself out from under a terminal, in which case a quick check when it first went funny and a bit of a clean and tighten of all terminals would have been in order, and cheaper, but I guess you know that now, so I won't rub it in.
If you do just replace the defective part, take the time to check all other conections are secure, and are still shiny metal to shiny metal on the contacting surfaces, or another dirty or loose contact could follow the same route soon.
regards M.

 

[WabbitPoo]

In my experience you are lucky to get more than a few years from an electric shower. Most seem to go badly wrong not long after the warranty runs out! Even when you clean the head regularly. Anyone got experience of buying v. expensive electric showers - are they any better?