New Bathroom - Recommendations Wanted

Hunnymonster

weatherwax wrote:

Is the 9.5kW shower from the Mira Essentials range definitely suitable for use with a combi boiler? Our Mira shower has sprung a leak and is so ancient that Mira told us it can't be fixed, so we need a new one asap. When our present shower was installed (about 15 years ago!), we had to have a pump installed under the bath because we don't have a high enough head of water.

It runs purely from the cold supply (totally independant of the hot water system) - and my cold water supply came in at some ridiculous rate (something to do with 22mm pipe right to the shower unit I'm sure) - so all down to your cold water pressure/flow rate.

On the plus side if your cold doesn't come out like Niagara, you could step down to a lower rated shower as the heating element doesn't have to heat the same volume of water passing by as a superfast/superhigh pressure supply.

Julesdevon

My husband is a bathroom fitter/plumber/carpenter/tiler/plasterer! - I'm going off the top of my head now but he was very unsure of the dolphin sheets to begin with, but more and more people do seem to be choosing them! - try visiting a local bathroom showroom for inspiration!

B&Q had an excellent shower reduced last week (DH almost ran to get one for us for a spare!) - it was powerful and either mira or triton for 65 quid! - shop around (as ever!) - sorry if this is jumping in but I've been getting the mails for a while and just joined the forum here!

If there is any specific query you have please dont hesitate to contact me and I'll get the 'Old Man' to answer!!

quoia

AuntyJean wrote:

Quoia, many thanks for that. The guy who is doing the bathroom for us already suggested the plastic wall cladding which I thought was a brilliant idea but, I only wanted this around the lower part of the walls up to about 3ft with the shower/bath area tiled to ceiling.

Have taken note about the grout discolouring. I must admit we do not suffer from mould in our bathroom. Maybe because it is small & well ventilated or it could be because two of the walls are stud partitoning. Suppose I could go for coloured grout but that would spoil the whole effect.

What about vinyl wall covering in tile effect? Has anyone used this (or even seen such a thing)? Checked out the wall panelling but seems quite expensive (one panel 375mm by 4m £27.99).
Aunty Jean.

We bought ours locally in the January sale with a 25% discount.
Paid £9.75 (instead of £12.99) for 2.7metres by 250mm wide.
This equates to £14.43 a square metre.

Your 4m x 375mm equates to 1.5 square metres which at £27.99, is £18.66 per sq.m

Initially this might look high compared to your tiles, but remember you will need grout and tile adhesive, and the time to cut & fit tiles, and then grout, is significantly greater than these plastic boards, so labour costs will be higher assuming you are not doing it yourself.
The cladding will need an adhesive (No Nails or an equivalent) but it's only about £2 a tube and this will do several boards since, unlike tiles, all over coverage is not required. The cladding will also hide a 1000 sins if the wall is uneven etc far better than tiles.
Have you asked the guy that will be doing it for the difference in labour time for tiles against cladding ? The cladding should be a lot less making the overall cost about the same.

Regards only doing about 3ft up the wall except for the shower/bath area, this is how my brother-in-law has his, although the half panelled bit is more like half - ie. 4ft. You finish off the top edge with a proper edging strip - costs about £1/metre.
One issue to consider with the cladding is WASTAGE.
However if you went for cladding and had the 4m boards that would be ideal. You would cut them into 1m lengths (about 3feet) each one doing a 1.5m run along a wall. If your bathroom is similar in height to mine (and most others) the top of the bath to the ceiling is about 2 metres, so cutting a board in half does this.
If bath top to ceiling is a little over 2m, say 2.2, this would leave 1.8m.
Cut the 1.8 in half and use these 900m (almost exactly about 3ft) for the other low level clad areas.

Hope this helps.

Just to round off this new bathroom and make it sheer luxury, have you consider floor tiles and underfloor heating ?
That's what we did.
Tiles were only £4.50 sq/m from Focus and got a 2sq metre underfloor heating mat with a thermostat/timer/controller from eBay for £70 (sells in Homebase for approx £250)