my rented house has the worlds worst shower – the power output is dismal!

with just hot water running, if you invert the shower head, the water doesn’t spray up, just dribbles off the side.

it takes between 7-8 mins from turning the hot water on, to getting hot water out of the shower head.

the shower is downstairs, the boiler is upstairs.

is there anything which can be done? it’s wasting water, time and money at present! and it’s shit at washing mud off muddy legs!

is your water particularly hard? maybe de-scaling the shower head would help?

Are the head and hose full of limescale ? That would be the first thing to check if you are in a hard water area

unusual to have a shower running straight off the hot water tank without a pump? Is there a pump that’s not switched on/broken?

what’s pressure at the hot water tap in the bath like? if it’s good then either shower knackered and report to landlord or maybe get one of tose shower heads with the hose that fits over the bath taps and use that instead?

Firstly always try the showers in rented houses – it’s a deal breaker!

Try asking the landlord if there is a problem or if it’s “Just Like That”

If it’s mains then there shouldn’t be much to go wrong better than a power dribble shower normally. How is the pressure through other taps?

get one of tose shower heads with the hose that fits over the bath taps and use that instead

it is one of those toss shower heads 🙁

pressure i the kitchen (next to shower) is reasonable. dunno if bristol is particularly hard, water wise, but it doesn’t look that bad. mebbe i’ll pull the shower thingy off the taps and see how that is.

If your water comes from the Mendips (which is likely) it will be hard

ok – i’ll have a tig around at the taps tomorrow…

I just have a tap-fed shower myself (and it’s at the same height as the hot water tank) but pressure is reasonable. I’m in Bristol to though and find you either need to keep the head descaled or replace it once in a while.

Also any slightly leak where the shower connects into the tap makes a huge difference to the pressure you get from it. Mines actually a mixer with a dedicated connection on the tap and after replacing the hose + head once I had a small dribble coming from the hose/tap connection and pressure at the head was rubbish, I thought it must be the new head was crap as the dribble was only small but once I’d used some PTFE tape there the pressure was miles better again.

No advice here, but I feel your pain. The shower in my flat has been crap for the last two years. Then again, before we moved in the flat didnt have a shower, so it could of been worse 🙁

vinegar is good for descaling – buy a big bottle of white vinegar, pour it into a bowl and immerse the whole head and hose in it.

Dave

Dont screw around with vinigar. Buy some kettle de scaler . disconnect flexi pipe from shower mixer and make a large U bend . now with your third had pour the neat de scaler down the pipe. some fizzing might be heard and some foam may appear . this is good. taking the shower head in one hand and the flexi pipe in the other , swish the descaler back and forth.

Wrap a bread bag round the shower head , secure with red eleastic band the postie has thrown on your drive, and leave this end in the bath and soak for a few hours / as long as poss.

watch out for acid in your eyes , and maybe wear gloves if your are sensitive in any way.

Get mrs hungry monkey to join you in the shower and ask her to distract you. You’ll soon not notice the rubbish shower!

Dont screw around with vinigar. Buy some kettle de scaler

Not so sure about that. I bought some kettle de-scaler the other day. On the back of the pack it reads “ingredients: citric acid.” So, it’s just dried lemon juice. Can’t immediately see how it’d be any better or worse than using vinegar.

How is the pressure form the hot tap on the bath?

Is the shower hose one of those corrugated chromed outer pipes with a nylon hose inner? If so they can get crimped by people rotating the hose off the cradle and returning it with out unwinding it – bit like an old phone flex.

thanks for all the tips!

have descaled loads of kettles with vinegar before, but usually whilst boiling the vinegar with water. will give something like this a go tomorrow if i ascertain that the water pressure from the tap is all good.

Get mrs hungry monkey to join you in the shower and ask her to distract you. You’ll soon not notice the rubbish shower!

haha, i’m off to hers tonight – main reason – to have a decent shower.

descale the shower head, ours is ains presure and is pretty decent

what really made a difference was getting the heating system flushed by the plumber-, boom!! loads more pressure, ask your landlord nicely?

least you have a shower in the UK tom. good luck with backdoor smashing tonight

>unusual to have a shower running straight off the hot water tank without a pump? Is there a pump that’s not switched on/broken?<

Nothing unusual about that at all.

If the shower is gravity fed off the hot water cylinder (and delivered via a thermostatic mixer valve)the pressure is dictated by the vertical head (differential in metres) from the cold water tank to the shower head. Try cleaning the hose and shower head obviously as that can make a huge difference. It may be the mixer valve is buggered and or leaking.

If the shower is electric then it will be mains fed so the only problem would be a blocked shower head and or a very low powered shower unit.

Nothing worse than a weak shower…

It’s all about relative strengths though.

Citric acid, although a “weak” acid can used at very high concentrations ~70% and you might get a bit of a skin reaction.

Acetic Acid (vinegar) is a flammable liquid at high concentrations and much stronger (the pKa puts it as a weak acid but it’ll rip your skin apart and has associated corrosive risk phrases). It’s also very smelly and takes longer to water wash compared to citric acid.

So if i was selling a de-scaler I’d be selling the easier to handle one that stank less and advising longer soak times.

Strongest vinegars are normally the brewed cider versions, typical table types were 8.5-12.5% when I assayed them, some of the cider ones were nearly 18%.

Fair enough.

I wonder then, assuming comparable concentrations, would a cheaper option be to buy a job lot of citric acid from a chemist’s? Do they still sell stuff like that?

Forget citric acid, just pick up some potassium permanganate (for cleaning ovens;), from the chemist. You can mix it with car battery acid (H2SO4) to make explosive.

You can use either to clean the shower head – as to which would be better at comparable concentrations, the vingar is better.

I’d use whichever is to hand or cheapest tbh.

As for potassium permanganate, a damp match’s worth dipped into a washing up bowl of water is ace for clearing up atheletes foot – does make you foor purple for a while though.

I had exactly the same symptons a while ago. It was an unvented hot water system and it turned out that the pressure reducing valve had seized\got clogged up with limescale.

Before you do anything you need to know what water system you have.