Electric bathroom Heater - with switch ?

[Nearly Retired (I am now)]

I'm in England just now and have left my 2 French electrics book at the house in France and I'm not sure on the way forward with my next little project. In France we have an electric wall heater mounted on the wall about 100mm off the floor and say 1.5m away from the bath (the other side of the door opening plus a bit). It's on the same wall as the basin and about 1m away, but lower.

It looks 100 years old, we've never used it but know it works. So the simple plan is to replace it with an electric towel rail (400w to 700w, don't know yet). It is much easier for me to buy one in England now and fit it later. The trouble is that here they say a 5 amp fused spur is needed with the switch outside the room. In France we have no switch at all and the switch is actually on the old heater itself. Can I still fit a UK sourced towel rail with no switch and rely on the thermostat? Do they have switches on them and is the permissable? I emphasise "UK sourced" because the heated towel rail I'm thinking of getting is from Italy.

I really don't won't the bother of fitting a switch outside of the room and drilling through 700mm of rubble fill to do it. I really get confused with what's OK or not with electrics in a bathroom. We've already got a socket on the wall just above and to the side of the basin - surely this can't be right?

[hastobe]

Not sure what the legal distances are but I believe that it is perfectly acceptable in France to have a mains socket in the bathroom - provided it is an appropriate distance from the bath.  In fact shaver sockets in France often come with a second (i.e. mains) socket for a hairdryer.  The idea of plugs in bathrooms freaked us a bit (being used to UK regs) but seems that this is ok :S

Kathie

[shimble]

probably best to check that the towel rail is nf marked did here a rumour that its ok to have ce marked stuff now but would likethis verified your electricbook in france probably has the diagram of various zones in it that tell youwhat youcan and cant do your plug above the sink may not be within the regs so spend some time with your books and working out what is permissable dont forget to bring your books back with you next time. it may be easierto get yourtowel rail in france as then you can be sure it will conform.

[Nearly Retired (I am now)]

The trouble is, shimble, it saves me so much time to buy stuff in England and then to take it out with me on my next trip. I simply sit at the computer browsing the web and/or wander around the shops in my own time getting the best spec. and best prices. But, when in France I have say a only week or ten days to do so many jobs and I can fit a towel rail in maybe 2 hours and get on with other stuff. If I'm supposed to find one, buy it and get it back to the house then it's maybe 2 days gone (out of 7) and it'll be a compromise because that's all that's available locally at the time.

That's why I'm hoping someone here can help.I won't leave the electrical books behind next time either! But they'll probably be no use then because I'll need to be buying plumbing gear or some such thing!!!

[Dick Smith]

[quote user="hastobe"]Not sure what the legal distances are but I believe that it is perfectly acceptable in France to have a mains socket in the bathroom - provided it is an appropriate distance from the bath.  In fact shaver sockets in France often come with a second (i.e. mains) socket for a hairdryer.  The idea of plugs in bathrooms freaked us a bit (being used to UK regs) but seems that this is ok :S

Kathie

[/quote]

It isn't far - ours is about a metre from the bath. We have an oil-filled radiator plugged in. And we have a light over the hand basin which has a socket in it, we use it for the electric toothbrush. What happens if the charger falls into a full washbasin I haven't fully come to terms with.

Regarding buying in the UK, we find that by the time we have found something suitable and then changed the plug a quick trip to a retail outlet when in France is time-effective. Plus we are in some way supporting the local economy, we have some (possible) comeback if it fails and so on. And it's fun!

[Owens88]

A surveyor friend of ours visitted and commented that french electricity must be different than UK as there were sockets in the bathroom and outside. But is all legal.

 

p.s. momentarily more serious.

I would tend to buy locally in France as well, echoing Dick.

And many of the stores / manuacturers have web-sites for you to browse beforehand.

[Jc]

Double pole circuit breakers and remote fuses;in the UK,the fuse is in the plug;there's no safety device in the socket(except for shaver sockets).

[Nearly Retired (I am now)]

OK, OK...there seems to be a body of opinion developing here. I will take a look in France too, but before I do.....er,...what's an electric heated towel rail in French please?

[Eslier]

Try searhing for:

sèche serviette échelle

or

sèche serviette rayonant

You could start at www.castorama.fr where there is a big selection and you could even order on line to be delivered whilst you are there. You should find a selection at any of the brico stores, and yes - they usually have a switch on them.

[Nearly Retired (I am now)]

Thanks - I'll start looking.

"..and yes - they usually have a switch on them.."

Can't wait for the "buzz" when I switch it on for the first time just after a shower when I'm dripping wet and standing on the tiled floor with my bare wet feet.

I still don't understand.

[Misty1]

AFAIK It is also permittable to have a socket in a UK bathroom (or "room containing a fixed bath or shower") providing certain criteria is met, although this current criteria would be difficult to satisfy in most UK bathrooms. The UK regs are gradually being "harmonised" with EU regs and  I believe the next edition of the UK regs in 2008-2009 will relax some of this criteria. I'm not sure if this reduction will be suficcient to make UK bathroom sockets as common as French ones, but it may indicate that risks of socket outlets in bathrooms are not as high as we in the UK believe.  

[Eslier]

[quote user="Nearly Retired"]

"..and yes - they usually have a switch on them.."

Can't wait for the "buzz" when I switch it on for the first time just after a shower when I'm dripping wet and standing on the tiled floor with my bare wet feet.

I still don't understand.

[/quote]

On the ones I have, the switch is a pushbutton type beneath a rubber membrane - so completely waterproof. They also have a thermostatic control so you are more likely to switch it on and leave it on rather than be constantly switching it on and off. Mine are wired via an unswitched spur rather than a plug and socket.

[briwy]

   

We have a small chalet within a group of 16 or so in the Pyrenees and the guy who does all the admin etc lives on site and is a plumber.

He has a horror story of having mains sockets in a bathroom and tells of how he was working on a bath with some water in and the lead lamp he was using to see by fell in the bath and nearly killed him.  He has the scars and a dicky heart to prove it.

He strongly approved when I told him that mains sockets are not allowed in the UK and said he thought it should be the same in France.

[tracteurtom]

[quote user="briwy"]   

We have a small chalet within a group of 16 or so in the Pyrenees and the guy who does all the admin etc lives on site and is a plumber.

He has a horror story of having mains sockets in a bathroom and tells of how he was working on a bath with some water in and the lead lamp he was using to see by fell in the bath and nearly killed him.  He has the scars and a dicky heart to prove it.

He strongly approved when I told him that mains sockets are not allowed in the UK and said he thought it should be the same in France.

[/quote]

Let this be a warning to all the DIY leckys.  It is not a joke.  The regs/normes are written for a reason, ignore them at your own risk, not your families and friends.

[Gyn_Paul]

[quote user="briwy"]   

We have a small chalet

within a group of 16 or so in the Pyrenees and the guy who does all the

admin etc lives on site and is a plumber.

He has a horror story

of having mains sockets in a bathroom and tells of how he was working

on a bath with some water in and the lead lamp he was using to see by

fell in the bath and nearly killed him.  He has the scars and a

dicky heart to prove it.

He strongly approved when I told him

that mains sockets are not allowed in the UK and said he thought it

should be the same in France.

[/quote]

One can only conclude that the socket in this particular bathroom

didn't conforme to the normes or else as it shorted it would have

safely flipped at 30mA.

I can't recommend protecting EVERY circuit with a 30mA dijoncteur

differentiel too highly; I put a metal handled spade through a cable (a

pump in the garden by where I was digging) the other day and the first

I knew of it was the O/H popping her head round the door to enquire

quite why it had gone dark all of a sudden !  Had that been the

usual UK installation, there would have been - at best - a 15A ZAPP, at

worst I would have been writing this with the aid of a clairvoyant !

p.

[Nearly Retired (I am now)]

Update - I bought one in Brico Depot Boulogne on my way down to Charente Maritime last week. 1.4m x 0.5m, 750w and €130. It comes with a thermostat incorporating a switch and a two hour max heat option for quick drying / bathroom warming. I'm pretty pleased with it. The instructions show that as a minimum, the switch part (bottom RHS) needs to be 600mm away from the bath. 

[chirpy]

i bought a heater which is plumbed for oil central heating incorporating electic element for use in summer when heating off.it is wall mounted about 5feet high 18in,. wide and lots of horizintal bars to dry towels on.

bought in france but italian manufacture.

[Payrac-man]

Hi

I too had similar dilema and have solved it by not siting sockets in the bathroom and using a switched spur in the loft space (easy in a bungalow )

French regs are just not as good as UK regs and I sleep better at night now

 

 

[tracteurtom]

[quote user="Payrac-man"]

French regs are just not as good as UK regs and I sleep better at night now

 

 

[/quote]

Disagree, but cant be bothered to explain apart from you need to study the regs in detail and understand why things are done in certain ways.  There is nothing wrong with the French regs, they are different in many areas to the UK IEE regs, and both need applied properly and not mixed and matched.