Shower Options?

[DRZ]

We are looking to renovate one of our bathrooms and I'm not quite sure what shower options are available to us given the current setup...

We have a gas system boiler in the loft with what is (I think) called a Priority Domestic Hot Water system. The boiler heats a vented tank which is gravity fed from a cold water tank in the loft. The main bathroom has a shower fed from a hefty pump in the loft (that makes a right racket and I need to find ways of quietening it down, but that's another issue entirely)

The bathroom we are looking to replace has an awful 1980s-style beige plastic electric shower. Presumably this is fed only from the cold water feed and was done this way so that if someone used all the hot water it was still possible to get a hot shower. It sucks as a shower though, there's flow but we both really love a powerful shower and this isn't it.

So, all-knowing denizens, what are my options? We definitely do not want another ugly electric shower box on the wall in the new bathroom, so that's out. I've looked at the Triton ENVi system but I am slightly unsure if it'll flow enough. I could take another feed from the cylinder and install another pump and make the new shower a power shower as well but gut feel says this is a bad idea and we'll frequently be out of hot water when we need it.

 

[Orifice]

What size is the tank? If you want to kill two birds with one stone then something like the Mira Platinum would work, they do pumped options so could replace the noisy pump, and do away with anything bar the wireless controller on the shower wall. Unless the water tank is tiny then a normal 3 - 4 minute shower uses about 35 - 40 litres in total, depending on the hot water input temperature only half of that would be from the tank.

https://www.mirashowers.co.uk/platinum

 

[sparton_SPA]

What size is the tank? If you want to kill two birds with one stone then something like the Mira Platinum would work, they do pumped options so could replace the noisy pump, and do away with anything bar the wireless controller on the shower wall. Unless the water tank is tiny then a normal 3 - 4 minute shower uses about 35 - 40 litres in total, depending on the hot water input temperature only half of that would be from the tank.

https://www.mirashowers.co.uk/platinum

Is a normal shower classed as 3-4 minutes?
Honestly, never thought about it - but didn't realise that a shower uses 10L/mins judging off the numbers you have quoted.

 

[sparton_SPA]

Following on from that, we have a 300L water tank. So 30mins of cumulative shower time will empty the hot water.

 

[Haze]

Combi boiler ftw

 

[dlockers]

Combi boiler ftw

Wrong
-

What size is the tank? If you want to kill two birds with one stone then something like the Mira Platinum would work, they do pumped options so could replace the noisy pump, and do away with anything bar the wireless controller on the shower wall. Unless the water tank is tiny then a normal 3 - 4 minute shower uses about 35 - 40 litres in total, depending on the hot water input temperature only half of that would be from the tank.

https://www.mirashowers.co.uk/platinum

I was looking at these but there were horror stories of them failing due to the conditions in the attic (frost etc).

---

What age is your heating system? Is it due? An unvented tank is how we get mains pressure hot water; the shower is amazing. I just went for a basic Aqualisa unit.

 

[DRZ]

Wrong
-

I was looking at these but there were horror stories of them failing due to the conditions in the attic (frost etc).

---

What age is your heating system? Is it due? An unvented tank is how we get mains pressure hot water; the shower is amazing. I just went for a basic Aqualisa unit.

Yeah, agreed, combi boilers absolutely suck and I wouldn't ever want to go back to one.


Age of the system... We're not entirely sure. We think it is approx 15 years old. We have a family friend who was very senior on the engineering side of our boiler manufacturer and he came and had a look at it and said it was in tip top shape and has many years of life left in it.

I'm not really sure I want to go down the route of replacing the boiler, tanks etc etc on top of doing the bathroom. Our plan is to wait for 3-5 years (or the end of the service life of the boiler) and move to an air source heat pump or similar, assuming the technology has advanced somewhat vs the systems of today. It seems stupid to put a gas system in now and also I think the move to ASHP etc would be premature for us today. Looking at the tank we have I would guess it is somewhere around 100L based on the dimensions. Fine for a couple of quick showers but we have had it where we've run out of hot water (especially when we have guests) so that's why we're considering the full range of options.