I have a hotwater tank on the 1st floor of my house and a cold water tank in the loft. Hot and cold water pipes are both 22mm and are split in the loft to feed 2 showers on the 1st floor. One of the showers seems to be designed for low-pressure and the other for high pressure because the low pressure one has adequate pressure while the other one barely has a trickle. I want to install a pump to improve the situation but I'm not sure where to do so or which make/model to use. Do I install a pump in the loft before the pipes split so that the supply is pumped to both showers or do I just install one for the shower that needs boosting and if so where should I put the pump? In the loft after the supply has split or in the access cupboard which gives access to the shower pipe connections of the shower that needs boosting? Any help appreciated as the plumbers I've asked have quoted me over £1200 for running new pipework etc from the hot water tank which it beyond my budget so if I can tell them exactly what I want then hopefully I can get a more reasonable price or if I can just add a pump using the existing pipework and someone can recommend exactly what I need in terms of pump make/model, location of pump and any extras I need such as valves etc, then I can do it myself. Thanks!
1. The best place for a pump is in the airing cupboard at the base of the Hot Water Cylinder (HWC). Your access cupboard would probably do provided you could run dedicated pipes and a mains electricity supply. 2. Any pump requires dedicated feeds from the HWC and also from the Cold Water Storage Cistern (CWSC) in the loft. 3. The connection into the CWSC needs to be a little lower than the cold feed from the CWSC to the HWC. So if the cold runs out, the hot water is cut off before the cold and you don't get scalded. 4. The connection from the HWC needs to be air free, and is normally from a special flange (Surrey, Warix, Essex). If the hot feed from the cylinder runs up at an angle of 45 degrees, some manufacturers allow a downward pointing Tee from this pipe. 5. Personally, I'd only pump the high pressure shower to reduce the work required. You could pump both but you'd need to check the maximum pressure the low pressure one can take (almost certainly OK). 6. Might be easier just to change the high pressure shower for a low pressure one.
Thanks for the advice and quick reply. Is there any reason I can't put the pump in the access cupboard behind the shower AND use the existing split supply, i.e. just put the pump inline with the current pipework? I just want to get the shower working at this point in time, it doesn't need to be amazing and there is power in that area already that I can make use of. I was thinking to put in a 1.5-2 bar positive head pump in the access cupboard using the existing hot and cold feed pipes that have split from the supply in the loft. Something like a 2 bar salamander or stuart turner pump for £100-£150? I think I've found the type of shower I have and it says that anything above 1 bar is a suitable supply pressure.
The only Stuart Turner pump that will feed two showers is the Monsoon, not sure about the salamander but at the price your looking at I would sugest that they are single shower pumps. The supply for any shower pump must come directly from the cold watwer storage tank and the hot water cylinder as they cannot be interrupted from any other source.
Fitted a Stuart turner monsoon pump last year supplying two showers. Good bit of kit and quiet too. As mentioned, needs its own dedicated feed and pipework to shower...22mm as far as you can to your mixers.
When I took a closer look at the pipes in the loft I realised that some of the clips holding the pipes in place had broken so the pipe had lifted a little creating an air trap. When I repositioned the pipe and got the air out I had a usable shower. The pressure isn't great but it is usable. Thanks for the advice.
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