Power shower question

jrar

Looking for some advice ...........

Have a Triton T90 power shower installed in the main bedroom en-suite since the house was built (1998) and am now looking to "convert" the wall-mounted shower in the main bathroom to another pumped/power shower.

I've heard conflicting reports about the number of such showers that a domestic electricity supply can safely support etc. Plan would be that they would never be running simultaneously, but it means others in the house wouldn't need to access the en-suite to have access to a decent shower.

Is this possible in practical and regulatory terms ?

Hoagy

The standard house supply is 12KW, most electric showers are 9.5 KW, so you can only have one running at a time.
You can fit a priority unit at the consumer board which will interlock two showers to prevent them both running at once. It's about €230 plus VAT, though.
An alternative if you're converting from an existing mixer shower would be to fit a pump unit to the existing hot and cold water supplies. You can get a unit similar to the Triton which just has a pump in it so the electrical requirement is small.

bertie1

I assume the shower in the bathroom that you want to convert is to another electric shower , you will need to put in a priorty unit or non priority unit on the wiring. Both showers run at 40 A and your main fuse is only 63 A.

This unit will ensure they both cannot run at the same time

311

Hoagy wrote: »

You can fit a priority unit at the consumer board which will interlock two showers to prevent them both running at once. It's about €230 plus VAT, though.

I've seen these in action ,how do they actually work ?

bertie1

311 wrote: »

I've seen these in action ,how do they actually work ?

One of them has a current sesing coil & you decide which one you want to mak the priority shower, that one gets power no matter what & the second one only gets it if the first isn't drawing current.

The other type just uses the current sensing coil to lock off the second shower so the first one can finish

davelerave

they're 'non-priority boards ' you need if u have 2 electric showers the priority thing is a cheap version

MickLimk

I've seen a 2-pole changeover contactor used for this purpose.

The supply comes in and the NC terminals run to one shower via a normal 40A isolating switch. The NO terminals run directly to the second shower. The isolating switch for this shower is the one that controls the state of the contactor.

Both showers are still isolated under the control of their own 2 pole switch with the only difference being one is isolated by a switch, the other by the contactor with both having the minimum required gap. It works out cheaper as the 2-pole changeover contactor is cheaper than the priority unit and you only need 1x40A switch as you can use a much lower rated one for the one controlling the contactor. On the downside (depending on who you're sharing a house with!), the second shower can turn off the first even when it's running.

Anyone got an opinion on whether this still meets regs?

Stoner

I assume that the shower that is isolated by a contactor still has its own 40-45Amp isolator close to it? that will kill the power regardless of what the contactor does? it would need that and there should be no reason as to why it would not be installed.

After that it sounds fine as long as both showers cant run at the same time, and both have RCBO protection.

RoundyMooney

That's correct. You still have to have a means of isolation at the shower unit.