As most of you know we had a house fire recently which destroyed the bathroom. We are staying in the house while it's rebuilt, so the insurance have supplied a portable shower unit; one of those "tardis" type things.
The shower requires a 16A feed, the shower unit itself is apparently 8kw; it is apparently possible to run them from a 13A socket and a converter lead (with built-in RCD) has been supplied for this purpose. However (and they did warn me about this) it blows the fuse after a couple of minutes; not ideal when you're wet and outdoors on a cold night!
I am told that a cooker feed would work. However, being on gas I don't have one.
Does anyone have a solution i.e. replacing/upgrading any necessary fuses or circuit breakers in the consumer unit? Or am I best to send it back as not fit for purpose; after all the last thing I want is another fire! ;-)
Last edited by: VxFan on Sat 20 Oct 12 at 23:59
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Prior to my daughter buying her flat an electric shower had been installed.
Alongside the consumer unit is a RCD etc and cabling run to the 9KW shower.
The RCD is not connected to the consumer unit but to the mains supply.
I assume this is the simplest way to sort out your requirement.
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I had to upgrade the RCDs in the Quickline consumer units when re-placements shower units were put in in the old place.
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8kW is more like 35 amps - no wonder it blows the fuse! A 13A socket can only support 3kW - not sure what planet the insurance co is on... I wold get them back pronto to run out a proper supply from the consumer unit in the right size cable before you have another fire!
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>> 8kW is more like 35 amps - no wonder it blows the fuse! A 13A
>> socket can only support 3kW - ............
If the socket was in a 30 amp ring main then I personally would risk plugging in an 8 kW shower. The shower will have a thermostat to control the water output temperature, so the current will rise and fall and will only reach 35 amps on occasions and even then only for relatively short periods of time.
The feed to an electric cooker is similarly under-specified. It works on the assumption that even if all parts of the cooker were switched on it would be unlikely that they were all cunsuming their full current simultaneously.
I'm not a qualified electrician. I'm merely saying that I would risk plugging an 8kW shower into a 13 amp socket provided that it was in a 30 amp ring main. In a ring main the current is split, and each part of the current goes round the ring through different sections of wire.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Sat 20 Oct 12 at 16:10
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>> The shower will have a thermostat to control the
>> water output temperature, so the current will rise and fall and will only reach 35
>> amps on occasions and even then only for relatively short periods of time.
With most (AFAIK) modern electric showers the current only has two or 3 settings depending on whether you set it to 'eco' (reduced power) or normal (full power) mode. Otherwise it's the rate of water flow which determines the temperature.
EDIT: and 8kw isn't that much - if it has an eco mode I suspect you would only be able to use it in summer when the water is a bit warmer.
Last edited by: Focus on Sat 20 Oct 12 at 16:16
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Last edited by: Zero on Sat 20 Oct 12 at 16:26
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It is indeed on a ring main L'Es; it's also protected by its own circuit breakers in addition to the main board in my house.
To be fair to the insurance company it is not of their doing, I asked them if I could get this in and they agreed, they've had no input into the spec.
I shall have a word with a local sparky on Monday I think. it was a bit of an offchance that one of the regulars on here would be so qualified.
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You are correct L'Es - the ring is rated at least 32A (probably nearer 40A as that is the down rating for 2.5mm2 cable under insulation AFAIK). However, a double socket is only rated for 20A and a single plug is only rated for 13A, so the plug at least would overheat. You could split the cable and put 2 plugs on it which would split the load across 2 sockets, but the current may not split equally between the sockets, and if one came unplugged it would be live, so a bit of a risk...
Better all round that the thing is wired properly, then there is no issue - in this case it needn't be a permanent affair, just a cable running out of the consumer unit from an appropriately fused circuit.
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This thread relates to a house fire and the shower unit was provided via insurance so they can get by when the house is fixed..... I would think sorting the power supply to the shower via an approved supply makes sense. I'd not want another insurance claim!
Last edited by: rtj70 on Sat 20 Oct 12 at 22:36
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Thank you Richard. I'd had that option suggested to me by an acquaintance, but as he's not an electrician himself I was reluctant to try it; I'm rather wary of mains electrickery at the best of times and beyond the basics of changing plugs and fuses tend to keep well clear of it.
The consumer unit's in a bit of an awkward spot but I daresay with a spot of lateral thinking something can be worked out.
Thanks to all.
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>>I'd had that option suggested to me by an acquaintance, but as he's not an electrician himself I was reluctant to try it;
>>
The thought of it makes me shudder.
I have seen a similar lash up before.
A next door neighbour who was the biggest DIY disaster had a cable out of his fuse box to a PLUG, This supplied power to a socket whos cable passed along the back of the kitchen sink , though the wall, then under the paving stones to a jerry build shed/garage.
Is your consumer unit a modern one? Does it have a RCD instead of a main switch? Does it have a spare slot for the shower circuit ?
If no RCD then see my earlier response.
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>>
>> Is your consumer unit a modern one? Does it have a RCD instead of a
>> main switch? Does it have a spare slot for the shower circuit ?
>> If no RCD then see my earlier response.
>>
Yes Henry, installed in late 2005. Not sure what you mean by a "spare" slot; will try and find me camera and post a pic of the unit later.
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>>
Yes Henry, installed in late 2005. Not sure what you mean by a "spare" slot;
>>
Sometimes not all of the spaces for the Minature Circuit Breakers are used.
Maybe there a blank plastic plate instead of a MCB, in which case a suitable MCB can be put in that space and cabled to your shower.
www.selectsos.com/consumer.html
A larger consumer unit with six blanks on the left
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>> Sometimes not all of the spaces for the Minature Circuit Breakers are used.
>> Maybe there a blank plastic plate instead of a MCB, in which case a suitable
>> MCB can be put in that space and cabled to your shower.
>>
Gotcha, thanks.
In which case yes there are three spare slots.
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>>
>> >> Sometimes not all of the spaces for the Minature Circuit Breakers are used.
>> >> Maybe there a blank plastic plate instead of a MCB, in which case a
>> suitable
>> >> MCB can be put in that space and cabled to your shower.
Might be slightly more complex. IIRC the MCB in the CU should run sequentially from high current circuits to low.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Sun 21 Oct 12 at 20:05
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>>
>> Might be slightly more complex. IIRC the MCB in the CU should run sequentially from
>> high current circuits to low.
>>
Cant find me camera so basically left to right it's;
Main Switch (big)
Smoke Alarm
Upstairs Lights
Downstairs lights
Central Heating
Outbuilding (has its own seperate consumer unit)
RCD (big)
First floor Ring
Ground Floor Ring
Kitchen Ring
Then the three blanks.
Hope this helps.
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>> RCD (big)
>> First floor Ring
>> Ground Floor Ring
>> Kitchen Ring
>>
>> Then the three blanks.
>>
>> Hope this helps.
>>
To me it looks like above circuits are guarded by the RCD so swopping a blank for a MCB would be simple to do amd give the shower the mandatory protection of a RCD.
So IMO a very simple task to do the safe thing.
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>So IMO a very simple task to do the safe thing.
The blank spaces may not have a feed to them.
From his description I'm guessing Harley's CU has two circuits.
From the incoming bus-bar at the top of the CU he'll have one connection to his 'Main Switch' which then feeds the lights, smoke alarm and RCD via a secondary bus-bar. The RCD output will be another bus-bar which feeds the MCBs to the ring mains. The secondaries look like a toothed copper strip.
Does that make sense?
In the worst case he'll need an additional RCD, 32A MCB and cabling to the shower.
If it was me I'd get the insurance company to appoint one of their approved contractors to wire it up.
Personal hygiene might be a problem though. I've been waiting since the beginning of May for my insurer to fix damage caused by a water leak while we were on holiday.
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>> A next door neighbour who was the biggest DIY disaster had a cable out of
>> his fuse box to a PLUG,
>>
I am awed.
There was I thinking that what came with my house was a tad on the silly side, but at least that runs to a socket in the garage, with the garden supply terminated in a plug[1].
All professionally installed, I wouldn't have done that, which makes me wonder what the EU are smoking with their insistance on "professional" oversight.
Now sporting an RCD socket and one of those radio controlled plugin switches so I can turn on the garden systems without having to run downstairs[2] and rummage around in the garage. Still not a silk purse, but less of a sow's ear than it was.
[1] And that's all the outdoor lighting and the shed sockets fed from the one. You can guess what happened next.
[2] There's a one floor difference between ground level front and back.
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NICEIC regulations regarding electrical work ....... www.niceic.com/Uploads/File1247.pdf
Last edited by: L'escargot on Mon 22 Oct 12 at 07:31
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Update; problem solved. I phoned the electrician who's doing the house repairs and he will be putting the correct socket in place either Friday or early next week.
Many thanks for your help and advice.
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>>he will be putting the correct socket in place either Friday or early next week.
>>
With the change of temerature due at the end of the week you will need the hot shower working ALL the time
Good result.
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>> Update; problem solved. I phoned the electrician who's doing the house repairs and he will
>> be putting the correct socket in place either Friday or early next week.
I'd be interested in details of the socket, plug, and the wiring when it's been done.
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We've got something like that at work for occasional operation of a powerful woodchip blower.
It's a chunkier socket which takes one of those round blue plugs with 3 large round pins inside. The cable is much thicker than any ordinary domestic appliance lead.
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Electrician advice needed plaese - henry k
