Having 2 electric showers in a house...

Ronan H

Can anyone tell me the truth about this phenomenon, if there is a definitive answer about it. For months various people have been telling me that you can not have 2 electric showers in one house, but nobody seems to be able to definitively tell me why. They usually say its "something to do with the pressure" or "something to do with the electrics"... Hardly enlightening answers...

So can anyone shed some proper light on this please...

Power Shower Head

secman

Seem to remember when I was applying to ESB Networks for a connection, they specifically asked in questionaiire as to how many electric showers would be anticipated in house. Yhis would suggest that its not only to do with water pressure but the draw on the electrical circuit ? To heat water in an instant I imagine it uses a lot of electricity . Someone more knowledgable might confirm this.

Avns1s

Course you can have 2 electric showers in the house. You can have any number you want BUT you can only have one in use at any given instant.

This is because of the large power requirement of the shower and that using two will likely blow the main ESB fuse into your house.

There is a unit which your electrician will install in your consumer box which will only allow one shower to be in use at a time.

Moanin

The answer to your question uis that yes you can have two electric showers but you have to get some kind of a circuit breaker box thing installed.I got a second elec shower installed recenty and the sparky had to install this box.It costs €100 but it's regulation.Its something to do with power surge.You can't use the two electric showers at once

Corkey123

Head

as Avns!s explain you can as many showers as you like, but only one can be activet any given time. The showers use approx. 42 amp while the main fuse in the house is approx 62amp. (Please forgive the generisation of this as it is to explain the issue). Therefore naturally two electric showers on at the same time will blow the main fuse.

Your options are
1. To get the ESB to upgarde the main fuse, how much this will cost you will need to contact the ESB. However the last time I heard it was approx. €400

2. Is to get a priority board. This is a small ECB baord for the showers and will only allow one shower to be activated at the same time. Approx €150 last time I check. Any decent sparks will install it in an hour.

It has nothing to do with the pressure of water etc. Although it is recommended you have a separate storage tank for the two/three/four showers

kc66

A house I lived in had two showers which could be used at the same time, but one was run from the hot water tank.

Kashkai

Its all been said above but just to clarify, my brother in law works for the ESB and he says its a bad idea to put two electric showers into a house as they will be popping the circuit breakers if they are in simultaneous use.

We are extending our place at the moment and are putting in one electric shower and one pumped shower. The pumped shower requires you to have a source of hot water already but it will give a shower of up to 15 times the pressure of any electric shower. This is because the water going through the electric shower must be a slower feed in order for the element in the shower to have enough time to heat the water. That why in the summer you will have a higher pressure off electric showers because the incoming water is already luke warm whereas in winter because the incoming water is cold, you have to turn down the pressure in the electric shower in order to give it time to heat up.

noby

kc66 wrote:

A house I lived in had two showers which could be used at the same time, but one was run from the hot water tank.

That's just a pumped shower. Doesn't use nearly as much current.

Ronan H

Great stuff, great stuff indeed everyone...

Heres another shower question... Our house is a 3 bed semi, run of the mill i would think. We are thinking of getting a pumped hower in wgich would run off the tank in the attic, someone told me (probably the same killjoy that said you cant have 2 electric showers in a house ) that you would need to get a bigger water tank because the shower is so powerful that it will empty the tank in no time... Whats peoples view on this? I had never thought of it until it was mentioned so i just thought i would check and see what the game was...


Circuit Breaker Head

secman

we got a power shower in what you would call a run of the mill 3 bed semi and my 2 brothers who are plumbers insisted that I put in a larger cylinder in the hot press, am I glad I listened, as I,ve on 2 occasions run out of hot water with the larger one, unusual circumstances, loads of showers in quick succession and with visitors on a special occasion. A great job, the power shower, muco better than the electric one, from a feel good factor in the shower. But having said that , in our new house we will have both ,as they each have their merits.

samo

Very stupid question but am always a little mystified between the whole pumped shower and electric, what would be the ballpark price for a pumped shower and I'm assuming its something a plumer would be needing to fit??

Endymion

Head wrote:

Great stuff, great stuff indeed everyone...

Heres another shower question... Our house is a 3 bed semi, run of the mill i would think. We are thinking of getting a pumped hower in wgich would run off the tank in the attic, someone told me (probably the same killjoy that said you cant have 2 electric showers in a house ) that you would need to get a bigger water tank because the shower is so powerful that it will empty the tank in no time... Whats peoples view on this? I had never thought of it until it was mentioned so i just thought i would check and see what the game was...


Circuit Breaker Head

Yes, They do anything from about 14 litres a minute to 16-18 litres a minute. That will empty a tank pretty fast.

btw, everything said above about two electric showers is bang on.

samo, depends on what you go for. An actual pump added to your cylinder to give high pressure will set you back maybe in the region of 400-500 euros. Where as a power shower unit, maybe 200 euro. As for needing a plumber. Yea that would be a good idea.

Smiley101

Someone once told me that when using two electric showers you need to use an interlock. This will only allow one shower to be powered at a time

Endymion

Smiley101 wrote:

Someone once told me that when using two electric showers you need to use an interlock. This will only allow one shower to be powered at a time

Someone, or two or three, also posted that in this thread. Conincidence, I think not!.

paul666

for a pump shower u need a 220volt supply so u will need both an electrician and a plumber. pump showers only draw about 5 or 6 amps though. electric showers can draw up to 38amps.

vallo

My 2 cents worth having recently posted here for advice on this topic:
I had planned to go for an electric shower so that I could have a shower any hour of the day or night without having to crank up the gas boiler or emersion.
My searches meandered around various different options, but eventually settled on fixing the hot water storage problem by using a more efficient cylinder and installing a second (we already had one) pumped power shower off the same pump in the new bathroom.
I went for the coppercraft phoenix (without the pressurised house stuff) and it is incredible. If the boiler is run for 1 hour, the water in the cylinder is still hot enough for a shower 24 hours later. With my old conventional foam insulated cylinder it would be too cool for a nice shower within 4 or 5 hours!
The pumped power shower is the business and while it does guzzle water (so you may indeed need to look into getting a bigger tank, or a second linked tank) your shower time is much quicker and if you want to be eco-friendly you can always switch off the water while shampooing or between soapings.
The Mira and triton electric showers, while decent enough in their own right are just piffling compared to a proper shower!

hargo

Vallo found your 2 cents interesting. Why are the coppercraft cylinders more efficient at holding the heat. Can you replace your standard cylinder with one of these. I have old cylinder with lagging jacket not very efficient.

vallo

Hi Hargo - I don't know why exactly they are so much more efficient but I neglected to mention that they are much more expensive too.
They come in at around 1100 as opposed to about 300. Our old cylinder was from coppercraft too, but it was the conventional type. This one is from the phoenix range but we just got the cylinder - not the whole pressurised unvented system.
It is the only variable that has changed - same heating, same boiler, same shower etc .. but water that stays piping hot for ages.
Would deffo recommend it.

Access

We have an electric shower upstairs in our bedroom and across in the guest room. Normal electric showers draw savage power from the fuse board, therefore our house has a switcher unit which will only allow one shower to operate at a time.

Its just a safety measure.

Also why would you need a bigger water tank if you are installing 2 electric showers? no need what so ever!

Endymion

Access wrote:

Also why would you need a bigger water tank if you are installing 2 electric showers? no need what so ever!

Power shower is different to an electric shower genius.

Corkey123

We have an electric shower upstairs in our bedroom and across in the guest room. Normal electric showers draw savage power from the fuse board, therefore our house has a switcher unit which will only allow one shower to operate at a time.

Access - I think you'll see earlier in the thread that this was already mentioned.

The reason it is recommended to have a separate storage tank not "a bigger" storage tank is that pending on your needs you may leave the tank dry while an electric shower is turned on. A small tank with a couple of toilets, etc. may drain the tank at prescisely the wrong time and burn out the element in the shower. Hence the RECOMMENDATION.

Endymion

MartinCorcoran wrote:

The reason it is recommended to have a separate storage tank not "a bigger" storage tank is that pending on your needs you may leave the tank dry while an electric shower is turned on. A small tank with a couple of toilets, etc. may drain the tank at prescisely the wrong time and burn out the element in the shower. Hence the RECOMMENDATION.

He's mixing up power with electric shower. You can run electric showers either off the mains or off a tank (of course depending on the shower type) a power shower would need a much larger supply of water then an electric one, as the flow rate tends to be much higher.

kikel

I've got 2 electric showers in the gaff. Didn't install a splitter as the recommendation was. Do make sure everything worked okay i turned on every electric appliance i got and nothing tripped.

Auslander

Here's an interesting link for anyone considering up-grading there hot water tanks,

http://www.lycrisbyrne.com/index.html

it is an alternative to the coppercraft tanks but considerably cheaper, the company is based in Bray. I have no vested interest in the company. Do check out the Dual tanks which can be used in conjunction with evacuated solar collectors. They present the way forward as far as heating houses in the future is concerned. A collegue in work recently dispenced with the conventional boiler and installed a 1000L glass lined water tank with several indirect internal coils, which is heated by an air to water heat-pump & evacuated solar collecters which work in tandem.
During days of reasonable sunshine the collectors alone will sustain the 1000L tank at a temperature of 60 - 65 degrees. the only energy input into the system is a small circulation pump which draws about 40Watts in normal service. The air to water Heat Pump will only operate when there are prolonged periods of bad weather, or at times of heavy energy demand. i.e. Winter months when the building envelope will sustain high rates of Fabric losses.
The off-shoot of this techno babble I'm going on about in Laymans' terms is as follows;

since last May when the system was installed, in a House that is well over 300metres sq, The Heat pump has not yet been required to operate, i.e. the solar collectors have supplied all the buildings' heating energy requirements, and the only financial running cost has been the circulation pump.

A seperate electrical meter was fitted to the new system to monitor the Power consumption, and so-far has recorded 21euros worth of kWh.
I think its a pretty slick system myself & definitely the way forward.
There's my tupence worth.