Shower help needed - any plumbers around

[agnesf]

We have a shower in our bathroom & are just having a new one built in our downstairs extension. We have conventional heating system with cylinder in airing cupboard.

The pressure in the upstairs shower is not great. However I thought that the one downstairs would be better as it is downstairs and I thought that what mattered was the height between the top of your shower and your header tank.

However my plumber has said that the distance to worry about is that between the header tank and the hot water cyclinder - so this means it doesn't matter if the shower is upstairs/ downstairs or anywhere.

Is this right?

If so how can we get a decent shower without fitting a pump. We are on a water meter and have heard that pumped showers use loads of water so am not v keen. Also I don't actually like them much - they are too full on for me.

I'm no expert but that doesn't sound quite right. The water pressure at the tap will be the results of the difference in height between the header tank (highest point in your system I assume) and the tap itself. We have our header in the loft and the hot water cyl 4 floors below, but this does not mean the water pressure on the top floor is good. It's poor because the distance between the tank and the tap is less than 1 floor.

We have a shower pump to make things work well. See if you can combine an eco-friendly shower head with a pump plus a "waterpebble" that glows red when you're in the shower too long.

You can have a pump turned down - on our old one there was a dial on the pump for low pumping and high pumping. I am beginning to snigger a bit now due to one of my friends expressions for breaking wind now colouring everything I am writing. Think I need .

Anyway may be worth still thinking about the automated machine to ensure you get enough water pump

I am grown up really parp

had a shower fan fitted.but the hose in the loft just goes to soffit and sits there no hole or vent....is this right

he is probably wrong. Perhaps he estimates that the frictional losses in the extra length of pipe, and the many elbows, bends and other fittings, may balance out the extra height. I think it unlikely, but if you can find a table to calculate flow losses, you can work it out. Plastic pipe scores here, because you may be able to run a long continuous length with no elbows or joints, so it will flow better (and quieter)

I have been very impressed at the improvement in flow when replacing copper and lead piping with MDPE in continuous lengths (this is for cold only, but there are hot plastic pipes available too)