Shower lighting

[young sparky]

Hi all, found this site very useful before so Thot I'd use your knowledge again lol,
Have to wire a light into a shower, have a light, ip44 gu10 downlighter and the customer is wanting it to come on when he pulls the pullcord for the shower.
Was just going to come out of the load side of the shower pullcord to a fused spur then into the light, don't think there is anything wrong with this but just checking before hand

 

[nickblake]

No No and No , any thing above 3 kw should be on its own circuit so adding anything to it would be a crontravention of the regs , showers can be a right pain especially the isolator if you have a 10mm cable there is in no way you should have another cable installed in there fused or not fused its poor workman ship , if i was going to add a light in the shower cubicle then i would install a PIR as telex has said and connect to the light you walk in the light come on , i have had experiance with other appliances connected to shower IE extract fans wire from the shower connections and yes £15,000 for a new roof after the loft caught fire due to the cable si9lly in my eye's

 

[Rikki Barrett]

Thats good, thanks for pointing that one out malcolm, interesting. Still dont like it myself.

 

[Rikki Barrett]

IQ, when you say overcurrent protection does not have to be upstream, even if there is say 5m from the shower pullcord to the fcu, surely that could allow 40a through with a fault to that cable?
Be gentle.............

 

[Absolute]

Totally agree Nick. When i discuss stuff like this with my client i just say NO. If the regs say it's ok and i don't like it, i don't do it. I like to sleep at night, not wondering if the house, etc will burn down.

 

[1shortcircuit]

Tie a separate light cord and shower cord together, One pull both on

Everyone's a winner and charge double for your efforts :cool

 

[nickblake]

Think about it guys if you get a low insulation resistance fault on the cable caused by this type of lighting it is possible , but the fault does not produce enough fault current to operate the protective device then what will happen is the cable will heat up and due to the fact that the cable is underated will eventually catch fire as what happened in a previouse post ( no the post didnt catch fire )that is the whole reason why we do cable calculations useing installation methods and protective devices to select a cable that will accomadate any fault current

 

[Absolute]

Tie a separate light cord and shower cord together, One pull both on

Everyone's a winner and charge double for your efforts :cool

What a great idea!

 

[1shortcircuit]

Tell the lazy arse to not be so damn.... er... LAZY.

Is there any specific reason that both MUST come on at the same time?

What about when they shower in the daytime? The light will be on therefore wasting energy which as Electricians we (sorry not I as I haven't qualified yet) must comply with .......

Approved Document L1 - Conservation of fuel and power (energy efficient lighting)
L1a - New Dwellings
L1b - Existing Dwellings

It's a route out

 

[IQ Electrical]

Tell the lazy arse to not be so damn.... er... LAZY.

Is there any specific reason that both MUST come on at the same time?

What about when they shower in the daytime? The light will be on therefore wasting energy which as Electricians we (sorry not I as I haven't qualified yet) must comply with .......

Approved Document L1 - Conservation of fuel and power (energy efficient lighting)
L1a - New Dwellings
L1b - Existing Dwellings

It's a route out

You're right about the energy, how about a flow-switch in the shower cold feed, in series with a photocell, set at a sensible lux level?

It's so simple when you think about it lol!

 

[young sparky]

the light is in zone 1, the customer has got the wrong light for me, as for the wiring of the light what about splittin the cable from the load side of the pullcord to the shower in a henley block, and feeding a 3amp fused spur from this, from the spur a bit of 1mm to light

 

[topquark]

the light is in zone 1, the customer has got the wrong light for me, as for the wiring of the light what about splittin the cable from the load side of the pullcord to the shower in a henley block, and feeding a 3amp fused spur from this, from the spur a bit of 1mm to light

Sorry, deleted my earlier post. I was trying to "encourage" some discussion on it. A lot of showers are borderline zone 1/out of zone for ceiling fittings these days, particularly those in loft extensions (not much more than 2.0M floor to ceiling) and the tendancy is to assume out of zone.

 

[young sparky]

what about splittin the cable from the load side of the pullcord to the shower in a henley block, and feeding a 3amp fused spur from this, from the spur a bit of 1mm to light, would this be ok? thanks

 

[Absolute]

what about splittin the cable from the load side of the pullcord to the shower in a henley block, and feeding a 3amp fused spur from this, from the spur a bit of 1mm to light, would this be ok? thanks

In my opinion, as i already said, I would tell the client it can't be done and wire it from the lighting pull cord.

 

[IQ Electrical]

In my opinion, as i already said, I would tell the client it can't be done and wire it from the lighting pull cord.

I must say I agree, when you see the amount of melted terminations at shower pull cords that I've seen, the mere idea of putting an uneccessary joint in a shower circuit sets alarm bells ringing!

 

[Absolute]

On a related topic, i did a test today, that the previous owner of the house was a qualified electrician, and he had wired a 1G socket in 2.5mm from the input of the shower circuit (6mm) and it was all protected my a 40a MCB. Nice.......and now disconnected!