I've installed a Bristan Artisan surface mounted dual control shower in
my bathroom, and the flow is rather pathetic. The water supply is
mains pressure, and it looks as if it's the shower control itself which
is restricting the flow since the hand held spray on the bath mixer tap
(also Bristan, but from their Quadrant range) in the same room gushes
out most satisfactorily. I know some shower mixers come with removable
restrictors and I did check for these before installation, but didn't
find any. Bristan say that the shower is suitable for both gravity and
mains systems, from 0.1 to 5 bar, so I would have thought there would
be some sort of widget somewhere, but where? The irritating person on
Bristan's helpline refused to give me any information unless I told her
the water pressure, but as my all purpose girls' handy manometer
isn't...err...to hand, it seems I am stuck. Does anyone have any
knowledge of what Bristan might have concealed in this device?

Thanks.

Pen

pen wrote:

I've installed a Bristan Artisan surface mounted dual control shower in
my bathroom, and the flow is rather pathetic. The water supply is
mains pressure, and it looks as if it's the shower control itself which
is restricting the flow since the hand held spray on the bath mixer tap
(also Bristan, but from their Quadrant range) in the same room gushes
out most satisfactorily. I know some shower mixers come with removable
restrictors and I did check for these before installation, but didn't
find any. Bristan say that the shower is suitable for both gravity and
mains systems, from 0.1 to 5 bar, so I would have thought there would
be some sort of widget somewhere, but where? The irritating person on
Bristan's helpline refused to give me any information unless I told her
the water pressure, but as my all purpose girls' handy manometer
isn't...err...to hand, it seems I am stuck. Does anyone have any
knowledge of what Bristan might have concealed in this device?

IIRC, when I installed a Bristan shower (might have been the Artisan -
bar type flow control on the left end, temp on the right), there were no
adjustments required for mains pressure. Even if you were your would
expect tham to add restrictions for a mains pressure system not remove them.

(Not a paricularly good shot of the mixer, but:
http://www.internode.co.uk/loft/imag...erfinished.jpg)

I take it both your hot and cold feeds to the shower are mains pressure?
(i.e. combi boiler or pressurised storage system etc).

What happens if you remove the shower head - how fast does the water
come out of the pipe on its own?

Is is a multi mode head? If so have you tried rotating the control ring
on the shower head?

If you are sure you have both mains hot and cold, and want to talk to
the help line again, why not just say 3 - 4 bar and see what they tell you.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On 4 Mar 2006 08:18:02 -0800, "pen" wrote:

I've installed a Bristan Artisan surface mounted dual control shower in
my bathroom, and the flow is rather pathetic. The water supply is
mains pressure, and it looks as if it's the shower control itself which
is restricting the flow since the hand held spray on the bath mixer tap
(also Bristan, but from their Quadrant range) in the same room gushes
out most satisfactorily. I know some shower mixers come with removable
restrictors and I did check for these before installation, but didn't
find any. Bristan say that the shower is suitable for both gravity and
mains systems, from 0.1 to 5 bar, so I would have thought there would
be some sort of widget somewhere, but where? The irritating person on
Bristan's helpline refused to give me any information unless I told her
the water pressure, but as my all purpose girls' handy manometer
isn't...err...to hand, it seems I am stuck. Does anyone have any
knowledge of what Bristan might have concealed in this device?

Thanks.

Pen

As per suggestion made in an earlier thread, I went to Halfords today
and bought a traditional tyre gauge. Using a polythene tube, some
masking tape and a couple of jubilee clips I connected it to my bath's
cold tap and found that the cold water pressure is 2.5 bar.
--
Regards,
Mike Halmarack

Drop the EGG to email me.

IIRC, when I installed a Bristan shower (might have been the Artisan -
bar type flow control on the left end, temp on the right), there were no
adjustments required for mains pressure. Even if you were your would
expect tham to add restrictions for a mains pressure system not remove them.

(Not a paricularly good shot of the mixer, but:
http://www.internode.co.uk/loft/imag...erfinished.jpg)


Yes, yours is very similar - except that I replaced the rather flimsy
handset and riser rail set with one from Grohe. I'm quite sure that I
have mains pressure hot (Megaflo) and cold, and I've tried taking the
hose and handset off completely to see what came out - which was, not
as much as I'd like!

If you are sure you have both mains hot and cold, and want to talk to
the help line again, why not just say 3 - 4 bar and see what they tell you.

Good idea, I might try that tomorrow.

Pen

As per suggestion made in an earlier thread, I went to Halfords today
and bought a traditional tyre gauge. Using a polythene tube, some
masking tape and a couple of jubilee clips I connected it to my bath's
cold tap and found that the cold water pressure is 2.5 bar.

Ooohh, I missed that one. I might even have an old tyre inflation foot
pump in the attic somewhere that I could use......

Thanks, Pen

pen wrote:

have mains pressure hot (Megaflo) and cold, and I've tried taking the
hose and handset off completely to see what came out - which was, not
as much as I'd like!

In which case it sounds like one of two things: either there is
something wrong with the mixer (or its installation), or, your
expectations of flow rate are a tad high!

It might be worth actually getting some figures for the flow rate. Could
you time how long it takes to fill a bucket of known size? That should
let you work out how many litres per min it delivers. Once you know that
it is much easier to see what is happening.

If you are sure you have both mains hot and cold, and want to talk to
the help line again, why not just say 3 - 4 bar and see what they tell you.


Good idea, I might try that tomorrow.

If you can also say to them "I have measured it and I am only getting 3
lpm from it" then it is far more obvious there is a problem.

(if however you are getting 10+ lpm then it might be an expectation
problem - many shower mixers that are designed to run from mains
pressure hot water will be designed to limit the flow to what can be
reasonbly expected from a small combi boiler)

Another thought: did you fit isolator valves in the shower pipework? If
so have you checked they are fully open? Also did you use "full bore"
valves rather than the normal smaller bore service valves? If not, and
flow is marginal, changing the valves may help.

--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/