Timer for shower

Random

We've got a switch in the hotpress to turn on / off the water. It's a bloody pain in the mornings when it's not hot or whatever and it's useless unless you get out of bed 2 hours in advance to turn it on.

Is it possible to fit some sort of timer to this switch so we can program it to come on at whatever time we want?

Any ideas on what's involved in this task? How much it might cost?

Thanks

Carlow52

Random wrote: »

We've got a switch in the hotpress to turn on / off the water. It's a bloody pain in the mornings when it's not hot or whatever and it's useless unless you get out of bed 2 hours in advance to turn it on.

Is it possible to fit some sort of timer to this switch so we can program it to come on at whatever time we want?

Any ideas on what's involved in this task? How much it might cost?

Thanks

Not much involved, I would think 100 euro for supply and fit, assuming easy access to existing switch in HP.

In passing if u have gas, heating the water with it is currently cheaper than elec

davelerave

an economy 7 type timer might suit.consider nightsaver if you have electric water heating only.

Random

We have oil for our central heating.
We have an electric shower but that's just for the water pressure and doesn't heat the water.

Not sure what "economy 7 type timer" is but I'll have a Google.

As for easy access in the HP - what exactly is easy access? How much space does it need?

Random

This is what the inside of the HP looks like. The top switch is for the power for the shower.
The red box is the switches for the water. We used to have a bath so the one on the right isn't used and it switches between shower / bath (I think). The switch on the left in the red box turns the water on off.

This is there the timer would be installed I guess. Is there enough space?

Davy

Random wrote: »

We have oil for our central heating.
We have an electric shower but that's just for the water pressure and doesn't heat the water.

The switch on the top is for a pump for the shower?

Random wrote: »

As for easy access in the HP - what exactly is easy access? How much space does it need?

Their would be enough room there, its a similar size of the switch so it would fit.

What Carlow52 mentioned already, its cheaper to heat the water using the heating system. You may have a timer on the heating system already that you could program to come on half hour before you get up. It can zoned just to heat the water and not the house. Probably more costly but depends what you already have installed. The quicker/cheaper fix is installing the immersion timer.

Random

We use the immersion at the moment for heating the water for the shower .. if the heats on then that's a bonus but I find the water still has to be on anyway - it certainly heats up quicker when the heating is on though.

I'm not really sure what this whole zoned stuff is about ... how the hell do I know if my heating does that?

lintdrummer

First things first: I'm no electrician! But this would definitely be a very easy job. You would essentially be installing an analogue timer, same ones they used to have for central heating before the digital ones came in.

It would replace that red box and would have a switch with 3 positions: Constant on, constant off and timed on. There's a wheel on it with the 24hours marked. You set it to the right time and then pull out a little pin for every 15mins you want the emersion to come on.

Eg. If you wanted your water hot every morning at 8, you would pull out all the little pins on the dial between the 6 and 8 hour marks and hey presto!



Thats the kind of thing. Clock and switch. Simple. It'd be about twice the width of the existing red box.

eoghan.geraghty

There are ones rated for the 3kw load in an Immersion element, no point in trying one designed for switching central heating.
Apt and Immermat are 2 models.
100 euro for supply and fit would be very cheap, 150 inc vat more realistic.

davelerave

as already said if you can zone the dhw separately it would be preferable to electric water heating.you could still fit a immersion timer anyhow.get a plumber to take a look at heating to see if it can be zoned easily