Electric Showers
 

Looking for a bit of advice please.

My mum has an electric shower (Mira Supreme, which according to the web is
either an 8 or 9 Kw, I have yet to go and look at it) that has been in the
house since new build in 1994. She is telling me the 'pressure' has
decreased over the last few months, it still works OK to have a shower but
"not as powerful as it was", She has removed and cleaned the shower head
which makes no difference. Is it likely to be furred up and if so is there
a cure, apart from replacement. If she goes down the replacement path can
you get 'powerful electric showers or are the dependant on your incoming
water pressure? I presume you cannot put a pump in the circuit because of
pumping mains water. Assuming the cable is the correct rating is it worth
putting a higher Kw rated shower in it's place, and will this create the
feeling of more pressure? I hope that makes sense to everybody, it does to
me but I know what I am trying to say!

Cheers

John

On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 12:25:08 +0000 (UTC), "John"
wrote:

Looking for a bit of advice please.

My mum has an electric shower (Mira Supreme, which according to the web is
either an 8 or 9 Kw, I have yet to go and look at it) that has been in the
house since new build in 1994. She is telling me the 'pressure' has
decreased over the last few months, it still works OK to have a shower but
"not as powerful as it was", She has removed and cleaned the shower head
which makes no difference. Is it likely to be furred up and if so is there
a cure, apart from replacement.

Could be. You can get them descaled or do it yourself with a
descaling acid - e.g. one intended for HW systems

If she goes down the replacement path can
you get 'powerful electric showers or are the dependant on your incoming
water pressure? I presume you cannot put a pump in the circuit because of
pumping mains water. Assuming the cable is the correct rating is it worth
putting a higher Kw rated shower in it's place, and will this create the
feeling of more pressure? I hope that makes sense to everybody, it does to
me but I know what I am trying to say!

You can get electric showers up to about 10.5kW for normal domestic
use. This will give proportionately more flow, but no electric
shower can be described as "powerful"

You can't put a pump on a mains supply, but really it wouldn't achieve
anything because the flow is designed to be lower than the supply
would give to allow sufficient heating to take place.




Cheers

John


..andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

If she goes down the replacement path can you get 'powerful electric
showers
or are the dependant on your incoming water pressure?

The flow is usually determined by the amount of water that can be heated,
not by how much water can get through the thing. Unfortunately, at under
10kW, you aren't going to heat much water and an electric shower is not
going to be good. The limit is around 4 litres per minute, which is less
than half the paltry amount the water supplier to require to provide and
about a tenth of what they typically provide.

The best fix is to throw it away and connect to your house's hot water
supply, which can usually supply far more hot water, although if the thing
has furred up, replacement with a similar device (or descaling the old one)
will restore the previous performance.

Christian.

"John" wrote
| My mum has an electric shower (Mira Supreme, which according to the
| web is either an 8 or 9 Kw, I have yet to go and look at it) that
| has been in the house since new build in 1994. She is telling
| me the 'pressure' has decreased over the last few months, it
| still works OK to have a shower but "not as powerful as it was",

Is it possible that your mother is noticing the flow is decreasing because
it (both the weather generally, and the incoming water temperature) is
getting colder as we approach winter? If she's turning the temperature up to
get a hotter shower (or trying to keep the same output temp with colder
incoming water) then the flow will decrease.

If you turn the temp down then the flow should increase. If the flow is low
even at low temps, then suspect physical impediment to water flow.

Owain

She could get a power shower, although I suspect Owain is right, I have a
direct water heater and find I have to turn up the heat in winter to
compensate for colder water being fed to the house, which causes a drop in
pressure. I don't recommend connecting to the hot water supply as if you are
fed by a hot water tank, you rely on gravity feed which gives very little
pressure. If you have a diirect water heater or combi boiler you will have
the same problem in winter as you have with the electric shower.