Getting hot water to 3rd floor bathroom

[Rollin]

I'm in the process of enlarging and renovating a third floor bathroom in a victorian house. The current bathroom has a cold water feed and an electric shower. At the moment there is a strange arrangement for getting hot water to the sink tap. There is an ancient electric water heater fixed behind some wood cladding, with the controls poking through. The knobs on it control the flow and temperature of the water. The hot water tap itself doesn't control the flow at all.

Obviously this is crap and I would like to know whats involved to get hot water up there from the combi boiler in the cellar. Costs involved would be a help.

[Hugo a Gogo]

what almost everyone has in germany is an on-demand water heater, no tank (ironically, for the germans)

similar to a 'power shower' thing, but plumbed into the sink and taps too

does the job perfectly well for me

[Rollin]

Hugo a Gogo said:

what almost everyone has in germany is an on-demand water heater, no tank (ironically, for the germans)

similar to a 'power shower' thing, but plumbed into the sink and taps too

does the job perfectly well for me

I think that's what is there now, albeit a very old one. I am hoping to fit a new shower and bath. Will that type of thing supply enough hot water as cheap as the gas boiler.

[Hugo a Gogo]

dunno about price, but it's got to be a piss-about getting it up 4 floors at a good enough pressure for a shower and keeping it insulated

[Ferg]

It's just a matter of running a pipe up there from the nearest hot supply below.
However, I can see you never waiting for the hot to arrive in all honesty. It's going to be a fair while for the Combination boiler to get it hot and then deliver it up there.
A house of that size with only a combination boiler for hot water sounds like a bit of a plumbing error. There are better electric alternatives which would be my option if you really want hot up there.

http://www.ariston.co.uk/products/water-heaters/eu...

[Rollin]

Ferg said:

It's just a matter of running a pipe up there from the nearest hot supply below.
However, I can see you never waiting for the hot to arrive in all honesty. It's going to be a fair while for the Combination boiler to get it hot and then deliver it up there.
A house of that size with only a combination boiler for hot water sounds like a bit of a plumbing error. There are better electric alternatives which would be my option if you really want hot up there.

http://www.ariston.co.uk/products/water-heaters/eu...

Cheers. The nearest hot water is directly below so should be straight forward then. The boiler in the cellar is directly below all the hot water supplies so I'm hoping the wait for hot water won't be too bad.

[jeff m]

There is also the option of fitting a circulating pump and a return.
Think electric ring main

The system used in hotels.

[herewego]

Rollin said:

Hugo a Gogo said:

what almost everyone has in germany is an on-demand water heater, no tank (ironically, for the germans)

similar to a 'power shower' thing, but plumbed into the sink and taps too

does the job perfectly well for me

I think that's what is there now, albeit a very old one. I am hoping to fit a new shower and bath. Will that type of thing supply enough hot water as cheap as the gas boiler.

Electricity heated water is three times the price of gas heated water. If you want to install a bath then you'll need to run a large(normal bath hot water size 22mm) pipe to get a reasonable flowrate suitable for a bath. Showers and basins have a much lower flowrate so smaller diameter pipes are more suitable. Insulating that pipe is no problem. If you run only the one large pipe then when using the basin tap you will have to wait a while for the hot water due to the lower flowrate from the basin tap. You could run two pipes all the way from the boiler, a large one for the bath and a smaller one for the basin(say 12mm) Pipe is cheap enough. Both should be insulated obviously.
Unless you are in a very low water pressure area there should be no problem getting water up there.

Edited by herewego on Saturday 23 October 14:12

[Ferg]

jeff m said:

There is also the option of fitting a circulating pump and a return.
Think electric ring main

The system used in hotels.

Not with a combination boiler, I'm afraid.

[andy43]

Whatever you do with the combi, it'll be a week before the water gets hot. If you don't want to go electric, you could always stick a small unvented cylinder on the top floor, heated by the combi on a Y plan-type affair. Not the cheapest option, but probably the best performance.