When tiling the floor in 300mm tiles and the walls in 150mm tiles, would
you try to align the wall and floor grout lines, it looks smart that way
in SketchUp, but given the non-square nature of most corners, is that
asking for trouble in reality? Would you do the opposite and have the
floor tile grout lines centred on the wall tiles, so if it "walks" a
little as you go round the room it's not so noticeable?

I seem to remember Andrew Gabriel mentioning "poor man's" UFH, the floor
area excluding the bath is only 6'x4'. Looking for enough to take the
chill off the tiles, rather go for the cat on a hot tin roof effect or
expect too much actual heating of the room. I could easily run a couple
of zig-zags of 15mm pipe in-series with the bathroom radiator, or if
microbore would be good enough it would probably less hassle to thread
that in ... thoughts?

Any recommendations for humidistat fans (wall or ceiling mount equally
possible) quiet is good, particularly so the shutters don't click and
clack in the wind all night long.

I think the current Mira Excel mixer shower is old enough that it
doesn't owe me anything, so probably best to replace rather than dig it
out of the wall and re-fit. Are their BIV ones still the same sort of
quality as ~20 years ago? All their shower handsets seem to be chrome
plated plastic now, which looks tackier than plain white to me, who else
to look at?

In article ,
Andy Burns writes:
I seem to remember Andrew Gabriel mentioning "poor man's" UFH, the floor
area excluding the bath is only 6'x4'. Looking for enough to take the
chill off the tiles, rather go for the cat on a hot tin roof effect or
expect too much actual heating of the room. I could easily run a couple
of zig-zags of 15mm pipe in-series with the bathroom radiator, or if
microbore would be good enough it would probably less hassle to thread
that in ... thoughts?

I've done another one since then - two parallel runs of 10mm microbore,
coming together and feeding into the towel rail with a TRV. The parallel
microbore runs are on the flow side, and the towel rail on the return
side.

It hasn't been tried yet though - waiting for a new boiler to be installed.

Any recommendations for humidistat fans (wall or ceiling mount equally
possible) quiet is good, particularly so the shutters don't click and
clack in the wind all night long.

I've just done one which uses a pipestat on the hot pipe feed
to the shower (and bath, only there isn't one in this case).
Run-on is length of time pipe takes to cool after use.
It's also driven by the light and run-on timer.
Again, room isn't finished, so it's not yet tried yet for real.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On 03/05/15 19:01, Andy Burns wrote:
When tiling the floor in 300mm tiles and the walls in 150mm tiles, would
you try to align the wall and floor grout lines, it looks smart that way
in SketchUp, but given the non-square nature of most corners, is that
asking for trouble in reality? Would you do the opposite and have the
floor tile grout lines centred on the wall tiles, so if it "walks" a
little as you go round the room it's not so noticeable?

I seem to remember Andrew Gabriel mentioning "poor man's" UFH, the floor
area excluding the bath is only 6'x4'. Looking for enough to take the
chill off the tiles, rather go for the cat on a hot tin roof effect or
expect too much actual heating of the room. I could easily run a couple
of zig-zags of 15mm pipe in-series with the bathroom radiator, or if
microbore would be good enough it would probably less hassle to thread
that in ... thoughts?

Any recommendations for humidistat fans (wall or ceiling mount equally
possible) quiet is good, particularly so the shutters don't click and
clack in the wind all night long.

I think the current Mira Excel mixer shower is old enough that it
doesn't owe me anything, so probably best to replace rather than dig it
out of the wall and re-fit. Are their BIV ones still the same sort of
quality as ~20 years ago? All their shower handsets seem to be chrome
plated plastic now, which looks tackier than plain white to me, who else
to look at?


Goes and checks

I have 100mm wall tiles and 300mm floor tiles. One wall line up, the
other does not. Neither looks any more right or wrong than the other.

I have never paid attention until you asked (and I laid the tiles
myself). In fact, remebering back, I set the wall tiles to give me the
best cuts on each end and be buggered with the floor to wall alignment.

Andrew Gabriel wrote:
two parallel runs of 10mm microbore, coming together and feeding into
the towel rail with a TRV. The parallel microbore runs are on the
flow side, and the towel rail on the return side.

Yes, mine would be to a towel rad, I think I'll give it a try.

uses a pipestat on the hot pipe feed to the shower (and bath, only
there isn't one in this case). Run-on is length of time pipe takes to
cool after use.

Worth a thought, thanks.

It's also driven by the light and run-on timer.

Speaking of lights, the diyfaq wiki says IPx6 for lights above zone1,
yet IPx6 downlights are like hens' teeth and just about every bathroom
lighting shop sells MR16 IP56 as suitable for zone1, is the wiki
gold-plating the actual IP requirement?

On Sunday, 3 May 2015 21:11:04 UTC+1, Andy Burns wrote:
Speaking of lights, the diyfaq wiki says IPx6 for lights above zone1,
yet IPx6 downlights are like hens' teeth and just about every bathroom
lighting shop sells MR16 IP56 as suitable for zone1, is the wiki
gold-plating the actual IP requirement?

No. The x is a wildcard. IPx6 means you can use IP16 if you want to.
Owain

wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

the diyfaq wiki says IPx6 for lights above zone1, yet IPx6
downlights are like hens' teeth and just about every bathroom
lighting shop sells MR16 IP56 as suitable for zone1, is the wiki
gold-plating the actual IP requirement?

No. The x is a wildcard. IPx6 means you can use IP16 if you want to.

I know what the X means; it's the large variety of IPX5 "zone1" lights
and dearth of IPX6 lights that I'm on about.

Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

the diyfaq wiki says IPx6 for lights above zone1, yet IPx6
downlights are like hens' teeth and just about every bathroom
lighting shop sells MR16 IP56 as suitable for zone1, is the wiki
^^^^
gold-plating the actual IP requirement?

No. The x is a wildcard. IPx6 means you can use IP16 if you want to.

I know what the X means; it's the large variety of IPX5 "zone1" lights
and dearth of IPX6 lights that I'm on about.

OK, I see the confusion in my original post, I meant there a lots of
IP65 available, rather than IP56 ...

Andy Burns wrote:
When tiling the floor in 300mm tiles and the walls in 150mm tiles, would
you try to align the wall and floor grout lines, it looks smart that way
in SketchUp, but given the non-square nature of most corners, is that
asking for trouble in reality? Would you do the opposite and have the
floor tile grout lines centred on the wall tiles, so if it "walks" a
little as you go round the room it's not so noticeable?

I seem to remember Andrew Gabriel mentioning "poor man's" UFH, the floor
area excluding the bath is only 6'x4'. Looking for enough to take the
chill off the tiles, rather go for the cat on a hot tin roof effect or
expect too much actual heating of the room. I could easily run a couple
of zig-zags of 15mm pipe in-series with the bathroom radiator, or if
microbore would be good enough it would probably less hassle to thread
that in ... thoughts?

Any recommendations for humidistat fans (wall or ceiling mount equally
possible) quiet is good, particularly so the shutters don't click and
clack in the wind all night long.

I think the current Mira Excel mixer shower is old enough that it
doesn't owe me anything, so probably best to replace rather than dig it
out of the wall and re-fit. Are their BIV ones still the same sort of
quality as ~20 years ago? All their shower handsets seem to be chrome
plated plastic now, which looks tackier than plain white to me, who else
to look at?


Well, I installed a ceiling 1.5Kw heater fan. I can say from
experience, it is awful. I'd never do it again!

"Andy Burns" wrote in message
...
Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

the diyfaq wiki says IPx6 for lights above zone1, yet IPx6
downlights are like hens' teeth and just about every bathroom
lighting shop sells MR16 IP56 as suitable for zone1, is the wiki
^^^^
gold-plating the actual IP requirement?


The area above zone 1 is outside the zones and therefore no specific IP
ratings apply.

--
Adam

ARW wrote:

The area above zone 1 is outside the zones and therefore no specific IP
ratings apply.

Thanks.

Actually my 7'6" ceiling is under the 2.25m limit, and height will be
reduced a little more by tiling floor and cladding ceiling. so the
lights will be in zone 1, I'm not going to get hung-up on
technicalities, but I'll go with IP rated lights anyway.

If, as the wiki says,

"Lights placed in shower enclosures and directly over
baths in rooms with low ceilings will need to be SELV
and IPX6 or better."

then I'd expect such lights to be available, however I find that IP44,
IP64 and IP65 are what everyone sells, the latter is likely what I will
go with, but is the wiki actually right by claiming IPX6 is required?

"Andy Burns" wrote in message
o.uk...
ARW wrote:

The area above zone 1 is outside the zones and therefore no specific IP
ratings apply.

Thanks.

Actually my 7'6" ceiling is under the 2.25m limit, and height will be
reduced a little more by tiling floor and cladding ceiling. so the lights
will be in zone 1, I'm not going to get hung-up on technicalities, but
I'll go with IP rated lights anyway.

If, as the wiki says,


Do not always belive the wiki.

IPX4 if fine.

--
Adam

In message , Andy
Burns writes
ARW wrote:

The area above zone 1 is outside the zones and therefore no specific IP
ratings apply.

Thanks.

Actually my 7'6" ceiling is under the 2.25m limit, and height will be
reduced a little more by tiling floor and cladding ceiling. so the
lights will be in zone 1, I'm not going to get hung-up on
technicalities, but I'll go with IP rated lights anyway.

If, as the wiki says,

"Lights placed in shower enclosures and directly over
baths in rooms with low ceilings will need to be SELV
and IPX6 or better."

then I'd expect such lights to be available, however I find that IP44,
IP64 and IP65 are what everyone sells, the latter is likely what I will
go with, but is the wiki actually right by claiming IPX6 is required?


No,

The regs only require IPX4 (or IPX5 if water jets will spray against
them)

See:

https://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Technical/DataSheets/Firstlight/Zones.pdf

--
Chris French

Coming back to the tiles you will have difficulty keeping the grout lines aligned because of the extra grout line between the 150mm tiles. We tried it with some 150mm tiles and a band of 75mm tiles between them, after just a couple of tiles the grout lines were hopelessly out of alignment.

Richard

"Andy Burns" wrote in message
o.uk...
When tiling the floor in 300mm tiles and the walls in 150mm tiles, would
you try to align the wall and floor grout lines, it looks smart that way
in SketchUp, but given the non-square nature of most corners, is that
asking for trouble in reality? Would you do the opposite and have the
floor tile grout lines centred on the wall tiles, so if it "walks" a
little as you go round the room it's not so noticeable?

I seem to remember Andrew Gabriel mentioning "poor man's" UFH, the floor
area excluding the bath is only 6'x4'. Looking for enough to take the
chill off the tiles, rather go for the cat on a hot tin roof effect or
expect too much actual heating of the room. I could easily run a couple
of zig-zags of 15mm pipe in-series with the bathroom radiator, or if
microbore would be good enough it would probably less hassle to thread
that in ... thoughts?

Any recommendations for humidistat fans (wall or ceiling mount equally
possible) quiet is good, particularly so the shutters don't click and
clack in the wind all night long.


Do you really need a humidistat fan?

--
Adam

ARW wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

Any recommendations for humidistat fans

Do you really need a humidistat fan?

Dunno, thought they were preferable to a run-on timer from the lights?
Ventilation at the moment consists of opening the window, then trying
remember to shut it before I go to work.

Tricky Dicky wrote:

Coming back to the tiles you will have difficulty keeping the grout
lines aligned because of the extra grout line between the 150mm
tiles. We tried it with some 150mm tiles and a band of 75mm tiles
between them, after just a couple of tiles the grout lines were
hopelessly out of alignment.

I was going to use 6mm spacers for the floor and 3mm for the wall, but
following Tim's comment that he hadn't noticed, and your confirmation
that it'll easily slip out of alignment, I'll try not to be too bothered
about it ...

On Mon, 04 May 2015 17:08:18 +0100, Andy Burns wrote:

ARW wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

Any recommendations for humidistat fans

Do you really need a humidistat fan?

Dunno, thought they were preferable to a run-on timer from the lights?
Ventilation at the moment consists of opening the window, then trying
remember to shut it before I go to work.

The humidistat fan that I fitted last Autumn works OK but is dependent on
the weather. In warm, humid weather I had to turn up the setting to stop it
coming on spuriously; in the same conditions now, just having a **** will do
it!
Mine had an optional timer, so I wired that to a pull-switch and, by trial
and error, set the time to ~25 min. Now. I let the humidistat operate when I
have a shower then, just before leaving the room, pull the switch for a few
seconds (the timer needs that) then pull again.
I put some closeable vents in the door, modified for a bit more open area.
When having a crap I just turn it on.
--
Peter.
The gods will stay away
whilst religions hold sway

/Do not always belive the wiki. /q

Gasp...

Jim K

"Andy Burns" wrote in message
o.uk...
ARW wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

Any recommendations for humidistat fans

Do you really need a humidistat fan?

Dunno, thought they were preferable to a run-on timer from the lights?
Ventilation at the moment consists of opening the window, then trying
remember to shut it before I go to work.



They can be a bit temperamental (as PeterC says)

It's horses for courses and you should fit whatever you believe will work
the best in your situation. There is no right or wrong.

I am quite happy to use two switches, one for the lights and one for the
timer fan.

If I thoght that the fan was going to be left on all day then I would fit a
momentary action switch so that it just did the timer and then switched off,
but if I thought that the fan would never by the user I would fit a
humidustat fan.

Cheers

--
Adam