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Low water pressure from new shower

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  • 08-05-2012 6:47pm
    #1
    sweeeet_thang
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4 ✭


    I recently had my bathroom renovated. I had the old bath shower mixer taps removed, and separate taps for the bath and shower installed. Now I have very low pressure in the shower, where before it was good. The company that did the renovation tell me this is because the shower used to feed from the bath tap, but now has it's own pipe higher up. Is that a good reason? What should I do?
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    #2
    JohnnieK
    Registered Users Posts: 2,526 ✭✭✭JohnnieK


    What type of shower is it?


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    #3
    sweeeet_thang
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4 ✭sweeeet_thang


    I'm not sure. I really don't know much about this stuff. It's not an electric shower, i.e. the hot water comes from an immersion, and there's no pump as the guy turned on the old shower and determined that the water pressure was sufficient that a pump wasn't needed. The new one has two taps - one to turn the water on, or on higher, or off, etc. and one to adjust the temperature. Does that answer the question? Thanks for your help.


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    #4
    JohnnieK
    Registered Users Posts: 2,526 ✭✭✭JohnnieK


    It's a gravity fed shower and without a pump it's not going to get any better. You would be better standing under a bucket with a hole in it.


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    #5
    youtheman
    Registered Users Posts: 1,274 ✭✭✭youtheman


    sweeeet_thang wrote: »
    The company that did the renovation tell me this is because the shower used to feed from the bath tap, but now has it's own pipe higher up. Is that a good reason?

    Short answer : No (if fact this is a bullsh*t answer and I would be very pi55sed off in anyone tried to fob me off like so). Assuming your shower head hasn't changed in height, there should be no chnge in the pressure.

    I'd be looking at the new shower mixer, maybe it is supposed to be used with a pump. Or possible a pressure loss due to too many elbows in the pipe run. Get the data sheet for the shower mixer and see what inlet pressure is specified.


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    #6
    JohnnieK
    Registered Users Posts: 2,526 ✭✭✭JohnnieK


    youtheman wrote: »
    Short answer : No (if fact this is a bullsh*t answer and I would be very pi55sed off in anyone tried to fob me off like so). Assuming your shower head hasn't changed in height, there should be no chnge in the pressure.

    I'd be looking at the new shower mixer, maybe it is supposed to be used with a pump. Or possible a pressure loss due to too many elbows in the pipe run. Get the data sheet for the shower mixer and see what inlet pressure is specified.

    Spot on.

    If it was a bathroom company they might have got a deal on the shower valve so this was the reason it was put in.
    If OP has any documentation from the shower it will state what type of system it is suitable for.

    My suspicion is that it's just a gravity shower fed by 1/2" pipes along the attic. If this is the case it should have been explained to the OP


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    #7
    sweeeet_thang
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4 ✭sweeeet_thang


    Thanks a million for your help, guys. It is just gravity, but I don't think that should be a problem as it's an apartment and I have 3 levels above me. I don't have the data sheet for the shower bar valve, but I googled it. It says it requires a minimum of 0.5 bar pressure. Is that a lot? I don't know what I had before.

    Also, I noticed when I googled it that in the pictures, it sits flush against the tiles, but in mine there is about a centimetre of bolt visible between the nut and another metal bit that's next to the tiles (I hope I'm explaining that right). Could it be that he simply didn't cut the pipes short enough, and would that cause low pressure?


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    #8
    Joey the lips
    Registered Users Posts: 10,262 ✭✭✭✭Joey the lips


    sweeeet_thang wrote: »
    Thanks a million for your help, guys. It is just gravity, but I don't think that should be a problem as it's an apartment and I have 3 levels above me. I don't have the data sheet for the shower bar valve, but I googled it. It says it requires a minimum of 0.5 bar pressure. Is that a lot? I don't know what I had before.

    Also, I noticed when I googled it that in the pictures, it sits flush against the tiles, but in mine there is about a centimetre of bolt visible between the nut and another metal bit that's next to the tiles (I hope I'm explaining that right). Could it be that he simply didn't cut the pipes short enough, and would that cause low pressure?

    Thats a high pressure shower. If you live in an apartment you must have a pump in your hotpress. If not the shower is incorrect.


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