Fully renovating a mid-terrace, boiler is ground floor in kitchen. There’s a main bathroom downstairs which I want to split into a small shower, WC and basin with the other half a utility with a washer and dryer in there, poss another small sink for hand washing muddy kit

Upstairs there was a tiny 4th bedroom that you’d struggle to get a single bed in with corridor next to it with a random tiny door at the end going through to a small shower, WC and basin – I’ve broken the stud wall down here to be the main bathroom on the first floor

Would you spec an electric shower upstairs only and have the downstairs non-electric as it’s close to the boiler? Or both electric, both non…?

Electrician needs to put 10mm cable in once I’ve decided, it’s a decent length run from and to the C/U for both and like he said, ‘it ain’t cheap!’

First floor space. Not sure the pic worked!

If I was fully renovating a house, I wouldn’t have an electric shower in any room to be honest.

Depends on how it’s being fed.

Combi boiler I’d just get a normal, i.e. not electric, shower. Providing the boiler isn’t undersized or a heap of crap you should be good.

Old style vented cylinder in the loft or airing cupboard, get electric as the hot water pressure for a normal shower will be useless.

The boiler is a combi Worcester Greenstar 2018 – it’s about the only thing in the place worth keeping!

If I had two showers I’d have one off the boiler(main shower) and one off the leccy.

If I only had one shower it’d be leccy as even when the boilers down the leccy still works.

When the leccy ain’t working neithers your boiler.

Good logic TR!

What trail rat says is a decent idea and one my plumber pal recommends but IMO electric showers are useless.  A dribble of lukewarm water ( my boiler heats 3 times as much water)

I don’t think I ever used an electric shower and thought “that was good”. They seem to be universally poor. If you can get a hot water feed from the boiler I’d do that.

I can only echo @trail_rat logic.

Currently without a boiler as it decided to crap itself about an hour after I went to work.
Apparently a fair amount of water came out before the pressure was gone.

The electric shower has been our only source of hot water since Thursday. Roll on tomorrow when the new one goes in.

IMO electric showers are useless. A dribble of lukewarm water

Well mines not a dribble but I am cleaning my self not pressure washing my skin off.

I thought a 9.5kw Mira would be pretty decent strength wise? The electric would go in the ground floor as back up I think, the main bathroom I’ll run it off the boiler, tbh it’s directly above the kitchen/boiler so couldnt be much better placed

If I had two showers I’d have one off the boiler(main shower) and one off the leccy.

If I only had one shower it’d be leccy as even when the boilers down the leccy still works.

When the leccy ain’t working neithers your boiler.

I’ve two mixer showers running off one ideal combi boiler, even with both showers on, they’re better than any leccy shower I’ve ever used.

I’ll take that over having a leccy shower that you have to run about in to get wet, just in case my boiler breaks down!. 🤣

I’ve a bristan bliss 10.5 with some kind of airiate head thing on it as recommended by the fitter.

Does us fine. The 9.5kw Mira sport we had before was a bit pants but it was all the cable that was in before could take.

I guess we can’t all have perfect non failing boilers but since I can’t use two showers at once. I’m golden

Trailrat – my boiler is 37 kw equivalent – a lot more hot water than an electric.  Modern electrics are not to bad but nothing like a proper shower

But no hot water if your boiler fails is a pain

I guess we can’t all have perfect non failing boilers.

Not saying for a minute my boiler can’t fail, that would be silly. Merely that I’ll take those odds, over having an inferior shower.

Each to their own.

The OP is looking for opinions, they may not always match yours.

No, thanks, they all go in the pot, I have been in that situation a few times before at my old place where the boiler had gone down and I had to use the small on-suite, was handy.

Worst comes to worst the showers at work ain’t bad, I could call security and say I’d left something there on a weekend if needed 🙂

10kW shower will cost you around £2 per hour to run….

over the course of a year the saving from running one off the boiler will be considerable, and it’ll also probably be cheaper to purchase

I’ve two mixer showers running off one ideal combi boiler, even with both showers on, they’re better than any leccy shower I’ve ever used.

This. Two showers running off our Worcester Bosch combi is still more powerful than the electric shower in our last house.

Electric shower? No thank you.

If it’s likely both showers will be frequently running at the same time and your combi boiler was under-sized then one of them being electric might make sense (what size was your boiler?) but other than that I’d stick with non-electric.

We’ve had three days in 25 years of marriage where we had to be patient with dead boiler and no showers.

The benefit is that the combi fed mixers are cheaper to run and much more powerful.

The risk benefit judgment to me is clear.

I would add: make sure you lag every pipe…

I have done exactly as the OP suggests, electric upstairs and fed off combi downstairs.

It’s good. If you really can’t stand the electric shower you can wait 10mins to get in the downstairs one…

Electric shower? No thank you

This. They cost too much to buy, too much to run and give a crap shower. There is no way I’ll ever install one, even as a backup (how often realistically does a boiler break). Just use a friends, family, neighbors, work or gym one for those rare occasions. I’d even rather have a cold shower than install one.

I guess we can’t all have perfect non failing boilers but since I can’t use two showers at once. I’m golden

Golden showers are not really what I think the OP has in mind. Could be wrong of course…

Conventional boiler here & when we had 2 bathrooms refurbed we put an Aqualisa power job in the en-suite running off the tank & a decent leccy one in the main bathroom, depends what leccy shower & rating you pick as to whether it’s crap or not. Ours is better than our old conventional one that ran off the tank.

Electric showers aren’t brilliant, but I’m not sure they’re as bad as people are making out.

Our bathroom had an electric shower already in it when we moved in & we’ve not felt the need to replace it yet.
The original one was 10.5kw which was too much for the wiring, although it had been in for years before we realised this. That shower was fine.
When it finally died, I replaced it with a 9.5kw Mira Sprint which suited the wiring and cost £90 or so from Screwfix so they are hardly expensive to purchase (although you can spend a lot more).
This shower is not quite as powerful, but it’s also perfectly fine. It’s not mega powerful, but neither is it a pitiful dribble. Obviously in the winter the performance drops a bit as the incoming feed is cooler. This part of the country is relatively mild so perhaps that’s why the performance is OK compared to some people’s experiences. I guess if you live in a colder area, the shower will not seem as powerful.

In a 2 shower house, I would be tempted to run one electric and one from the boiler to have some redundancy if the boiler packs up.
But, realistically how often does that happen? And if the boiler-fed shower is much more powerful than the electric, then the chances are that the electric won’t get used.
One of those tricky choices where there probably isn’t a right or wrong answer.

FWIW, we’ve only got one shower in the house which as I say is electric. When the bathroom gets replaced, we are likely to replace it with a boiler fed shower, as we’ve not long replaced the boiler with an Ideal combi that I think has plenty of oomph.

This shower is not quite as powerful, but it’s also perfectly fine. It’s not mega powerful, but neither is it a pitiful dribble.

Its about what you are used to.  My shower run off the boiler is 4 times the amount of hot water of any electric shower.  so to me any electric shower is a pitiful dribble being used to at least 4 times the hot water output.  I loathe having to stand under it for a period if time to wet my luscious locks and even worse when it comes to rinsing the shampoo out 😉  I guess electric are OK for slapheads!  🙂

Isn’t electric the future? ​I mean when the price of gas means we can’t afford to use our boilers?
​(the electricity will come from small scale nuclear not from burning gas before you ask!)

What about new houses which aren’t going to have local gas boilers? Assume they will have electric showers?

I’m a little surprised at the electric shower hate on here. Everyone is happy to embrace electric cars but don’t you dare try to take away our high pressure hot showers?

I wouldn’t be putting a shower downstairs TBH.
I always look at resale and what would appeal to Mrs Potential buyer.
A downstairs cloakroom with a bigger utility or incorporate the space into a bigger kitchen/whatever.
Never seen the appeal of a shower downstairs when you’ve got one upstairs – especially if space is at a premium.

My shower run off the boiler is 4 times the amount of hot water of any electric shower

do tell me again how that’s cheaper than using an adaquate amount of water.

tjagain

Its about what you are used to.

Which is why I said:

And if the boiler-fed shower is much more powerful than the electric, then the chances are that the electric won’t get used.

loathe having to stand under it for a period if time to wet my luscious locks and even worse when it comes to rinsing the shampoo out 😉 I guess electric are OK for slapheads!

Us slapheads, can’t help the genetic hand we were given. 😉
Although my Wife seems to manage OK with it and she isn’t a slaphead.

Oh its not terry – apart from Gas is a lot cheaper than electric but I guess my shower still costs more.  I don’t really care.  Its my petty environmental crime

I am against electric cars as well because they are greenwash.  they do not reduce CO2 output significantly.  all they do is con folk into thinking they are reducing co2 footprint so can carry on with their energy wastage

Yeah it’s not clear cut, I’m seeing the main bathroom being mains fed, standalone bath and all looking pretty nice without spending a fortune,
The second I’ll keep as electric, it’ll very much be the back up and I cant see it being used that much if at all, it’ll be a bonus when the house gets sold is all, there’s only myself at the property and that’s not likely to change anytime soon, if we were a family of 5 etc I’d probably go with the two mains fed to keep everyone happy, I’ll just use the main bathroom, I’m not giving the silicon in the spare shower a reason to go black without good cause!

I always used to have electric showers as I had it in my head a combi boiler would struggle to give decent pressure/heat. The only electric that was half decent was a 10.5kw Mira.

When the last electric died I fitted a decent, boiler fed shower and it’s night and day better. Curse whoever told me otherwise all those years back!

If I were you I’d defo fit boiler fed in the main shower but then possible electric in the second if it will be low use as then you are covered for boiler problems.

This shower is not quite as powerful, but it’s also perfectly fine. It’s not mega powerful, but neither is it a pitiful dribble. Obviously in the winter the performance drops a bit as the incoming feed is cooler.

+1
We have a 9.5kw Mira and it does the job. I’ve had much worse, also had better but that was an unvented system with hot water tank which we don’t have in this house.
I’ll be glad of having an electric shower this year while we have an extension built and the gas will be swtiched off for a couple of months. However, the 2 new showers in the extension will be fed from the combi-boiler (upgraded from the current to suit the bigger house size). Electric shower will remain in the main bathroom, probably used more as a back-up as it’s an over bath which just isn’t as nice as a proper shower cubicle.

Another electric shower person here – had 9-10kwh ones in the past. Currently have a new Mira – easy to fit. It’s a back up if the boiler goes, but we find it works well. Water pressure is fine though.

Isn’t electric the future? ​I mean when the price of gas means we can’t afford to use our boilers?
​(the electricity will come from small scale nuclear not from burning gas before you ask!)

What about new houses which aren’t going to have local gas boilers? Assume they will have electric showers?

I’m a little surprised at the electric shower hate on here. Everyone is happy to embrace electric cars but don’t you dare try to take away our high pressure hot showers?

You can in theory have an electric system with pressurised tank that supplies the showers that will give a good flow of hot water, a bit like a gas combi. I lived in a newish rented flat with this type of system. The issue is you combine the worst aspects of a gas system (high water and energy use) but then compound it by making it cost twice as much. It was OK for me at the time, but for a family house with current prices it would be ruinously expensive.

Gas will go but probably not in the average lifetime of a bathroom, so wouldn’t go electric just for this reason.

I wouldn’t be putting a shower downstairs TBH.
I always look at resale and what would appeal to Mrs Potential buyer.
A downstairs cloakroom with a bigger utility or incorporate the space into a bigger kitchen/whatever.
Never seen the appeal of a shower downstairs when you’ve got one upstairs – especially if space is at a premium.

I agree with this, dont see the point in two showers for the property as described, scrap the downstairs shower but leave the WC and basin, upstairs go electric, as others have said, if the boilers down you’ll still have a source of hot water in the house.

I see the chat about electric vs boiler for pressure, I’ve experienced both where its like a dribble out of a straw, I assumed the pressure was all down to the water pressure coming into the property?

In all my adult life I can only recall one time when I haven’t been able to shower due a fault (a frozen overflow during that really cold winter (2010?). Given that, I would rather have a nicer showering experience for the all the other times there are no problems with the boiler.