help with electric shower, colder weather, cooler tank, lower pressure - ideas?

tedcrilly

Hi

Hoping for some advice, I have an electric shower fed from main tank, which is located only a few feet 2-3 feet above in the attic.

In the summer with generally warmer weather all is okay, but as the nights cool so those the water in the tank in the attic.

Adjusting the shower to get any kind of hot water from the shower in the autumn/winter the pressure coming out of the reduces to very little.

I know this is mainly because the water coming into it is colder so it takes longer to heat it to the required temperature which results in lower pressure.

I need to improve the insulation in the attic and I know can wrap the tank but is there anything else I can do ?

Anybody else have this issue? should I be looking at a better electric shower (currently a redring, that came with the house)

I heard Dimplex advertising some showers that work with low pressure -

open to any ideas.

thanks

TC

davelerave

you can insulate the tank obviously(sides and top) or try a different shower head .A 9.5 or a 10KW Triton or Mira(i'm not sure of the sizes) shower will give better heat but wiring needs to be suitable

Stoner

if you insulate the attic you should leave under the tank free of insualtion.

There are better showers out there, a Mira or Triton for example with decent pumped units nuilt in. 2-3 feet between the tank and the shower is not idea , more would be better if possible.

steifanc

i had the same problem , and wasn't happy about the cost of running the shower in the winter .

a plumber might disagree with what i did for many reasons , I'm not a plumber so i can only tell you of my experience.

i was annoyed with the cost of running the shower in the winter because of the extra power used to heat the colder water in the storage tanks. with it being winter there was plenty of hot water in the house.

so what i done was took a feed from the hot on the cylinder Fed it threw a pressure reducing valve and then into a thermostatic mixing valve with the feed from the header tanks on the other side and then to the shower .

works with no problems , i rarely move the power setting onto the 3rd setting

as of yet , no problems

Joey the lips

This is a common problem with electric showers in winter, The pressure reduction is because of the extra time heating the water. A simple solution is not easy you have to be careful about heating the attic tank up for fear of legonaires. TBH if the pressure reduces that bad then the shower is not working correctly. Have you considered a T80 mains fed shower. These sometimes dont work so well because of poor mains pressure outside dublin so you might need to fit a T450I pump with it.

davelerave

would the mains shower be an improvement in winter?If the flow and KW rating are the same the hottest shower will be the the one with warmest cold feed i think.