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thermostatic shower advice please - Mira or not?

chartz said:
The shower systems. The pumps. The Mira thingy. It serves no purpose I can understand in my own context.
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Get you now!

Ours is to boost the pressure and give a constant temperature so you don't get burnt or frozen when someone turns the kitchen tap on full.

We run a low system pressure, esp upstairs, as the open tank is in the roof about 2 meters above the shower.

We're about 4 miles from the waterworks and a similar altitude so would never be able to run a shower off mains pressure.
 
mil46 said:
You must have a Mira thingy (as you call it) otherwise how do you control the flow and/or temperature when you have a shower? In its simplest form it’s a valve to control those two elements… you must need them in France?
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No we don’t. The tap itself does it all!
I guess the supply is completely different here then. No pressure problems at all.
I’ve never seen such a system anywhere.
 
chartz said:
No we don’t. The tap itself does it all!
I guess the supply is completely different here then. No pressure problems at all.
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You must have some sort of control valve. Forget pressure. How do you adjust or even turn on the shower… there must be a valve of some sort (Mira thingy)
 
Presumably two taps, infinitely better than some of the daft things you see in hotels which take 10 minutes to understand.

Maintenance might be a pair of new washers every 20 years. I'd go for that.
 
mil46 said:
You must have some sort of control valve. Forget pressure. How do you adjust or even turn on the shower… there must be a valve of some sort (Mira thingy)
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Apologies just rereading your last post about your tap doing it all. Well that is the Mira thingy then . That’s all a Mira thingy is, it’s a glorified tap that helps adjust the temperature also…
 
mil46 said:
Apologies just rereading your last post about your tap doing it all. Well that is the Mira thingy then . That’s all a Mira thingy is, it’s a glorified tap that helps adjust the temperature also…
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But costs a lot more than a tap
 
Something like that, knowing I’m a great admirer of the British culture myself. An idiosyncrasy of your housing!

mil46 said:
You must have some sort of control valve. Forget pressure. How do you adjust or even turn on the shower… there must be a valve of some sort (Mira thingy)
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No, nothing of the sort. Just the thermostatic tap, very simple and requiring no adaptation. About that yes, washers every 20 years!
 
I don't know what sort of plumbing/hot water systems exists in France but it won't fundamentally be much different from here in the UK.

Here we have, mainly, high pressure systems either via a combination boiler and all mains cold supply in houses or similar with unvented cylinders and cold mains supply, the cylinders are heated by a boiler or in some cases by electricity and there's also low pressure systems with tanks in the roof space and vented cylinders heated by central heating boiler or by electric immersion heaters.

There's also solar hot water and air source heat pumps and ground source heat pumps.

But basically to deliver hot water through a tap or a shower mixing valve the hot water will be delivered at a certain temperature via the boiler/cylinder and the cold water will be from the mains or from a tank in the loft or a combination of both.

A shower mixing valve will thermostatically control both the hot and cold water so that you receive a constant temperature at the shower outlet usually 38 degrees C however mixer taps for baths, wash basins and kitchen sinks are generally not thermostatically controlled so you have cold cold water at the cold tap and hot hot water at the hot tap so the cold water temperature is just above the cold mains temperature going into the house and the hot water temperature is determined by the boiler thermostat/heater thermostat/cylinder thermostat ie it is possible to be scalded with hot water delivered direct from a boiler etc.

I can only presume in France that all taps are thermostatically controlled or there's a thermostatic mixing valve installed somewhere in the house so that all outlets are at the same temperature much like we have here in hotels and hospitals and swimming pools etc.

BTW OP, I've not read this entire thread but if I were you I would install a thermostatic bar shower mixer which are dirt cheap but more importantly they are simple to replace when they go faulty.

The Mira Excel is probably the best shower available on the UK domestic market though but I certainly wouldn't advise having one built in mainly for future maintenance/repalcement reasons yes you can replace the cartridge easily enough but what happens when the cartridges are no longer available?
 
My cousin had a roof tank and thought his water tasted a bit different for a few months.

Plumber went into the roof and found that someone had left the cover off allowing a few rats to drown in there.

Great amusement all round!
 
twotone said:
I can only presume in France that all taps are thermostatically controlled or there's a thermostatic mixing valve installed somewhere in the house so that all outlets are at the same temperature much like we have here in hotels and hospitals and swimming pools etc.
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We have a 300 litre nuclear boiler, the main cold water feed and that’s it. The water arrives with a relatively high pressure of 3 to 5 bars (nice in the garden or to wash the car). Adjustable reductors where needed (floor heating circuit, water softener).
That’s it.
Thermostatic shower mixer, normal mixer taps elsewhere.
 
chartz said:
We have a 300 litre nuclear boiler, the main cold water feed and that’s it. The water arrives with a relatively high pressure of 3 to 5 bars (nice in the garden or to wash the car). Adjustable reductors where needed (floor heating circuit, water softener).
That’s it.
Thermostatic shower mixer, normal mixer taps elsewhere.
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Sounds like an unvented set up, same as here.

Presume that you mean electric when you say ‘nuclear’?
 
mil46 said:
Interesting , the same thing happened to me 18months ago. However we had artex ceiling which contained asbestos. So everything was put in the skip (sofas , carpets, computers, 65” tv etc etc) however to be fair to my insurers they paid for everything including rebuilding my en-suite upstairs. Unfortunately 18 months on and I am having to replace the en-suite again as there is still staying in my lounge downstairs ( again the insurers have agreed that this is their responsibility). Hence why Im reluctant to have a recessed valve and wondered if the Mira bar valves were any good.
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Please share who your insurer is. I'm looking for a new insurer following their reluctance to pay out in a similar situation.
 
chartz said:
@twotone Of course ;) electricity is dirt cheap here.
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Bloody expensive here @chartz I’m in the process of changing supplier at the moment 17p a kw/hr plus 21p per day standing charge, gas is much cheaper though.

Last year we used 8500 kw/hrs of electricity but hopefully that will half as my two adult kids have moved out but the new supplier has estimated £1600 for electricity next year based on last year’s usage.
 
Here 22,000 kW/h a year for £ 2,500. Sounds reasonable. Comprises subscription.
About 10 p at night and 12 p during the working hours. Boiler and heating only work at night. When I had the Zoe it cost me about £1.50 every night. Not even beer money.
Gas is much less interesting.
 
brian2957 said:
Please share who your insurer is. I'm looking for a new insurer following their reluctance to pay out in a similar situation.
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Aviva… they are not cheap but they have been fantastic. When It first happened, they were there and straight in to it, no questions asked and there mission was to sort me and my family out which they did. They allocate d a loss adjuster who was absolutely brilliant. When the leak came back after 18 months or so, they accepted that the original install wasn’t good enough and agreed to redo the en-suite, without raising a second claim.
I can’t praise them enough.
 
Didn't they say with the first nuclear power stations that the electricity would be free? I suspect that the French are not paying for the clean up costs...
 
gavreid said:
Didn't they say with the first nuclear power stations that the electricity would be free? I suspect that the French are not paying for the clean up costs...
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Aye those charges @chartz quoted above for electricity is dirt cheap compared to here 22000 kw/hrs would cost me about £4000
 
mil46 said:
Aviva… they are not cheap but they have been fantastic. When It first happened, they were there and straight in to it, no questions asked and there mission was to sort me and my family out which they did. They allocate d a loss adjuster who was absolutely brilliant. When the leak came back after 18 months or so, they accepted that the original install wasn’t good enough and agreed to redo the en-suite, without raising a second claim.
I can’t praise them enough.
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Thanks, I'll have a look.
 
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