Extractor fans in toilets

[danifr]

Hi - we've just had an electrician round to give us a devis for a total rewiring of the house - I'm trying to keep it as simple (cheap) as possible. I haven't had the devis back yet but one of the things the electrician said was that every room with running water has to have an extractor fan. Is this correct? I understand in bathrooms but just opening the window in a downstairs toilet is a lot cheaper.

[Cendrillon]

A good VMC system is worth having.

[idun]

VMC, for kitchen and all 'wet' rooms.

[Chancer]

You ask him to quote for what you the customer requires not what he wants to stiff you for by quoting normes which are not relevant to a rewire of an existing property.

 

Good luck with finding an electrician or any tradesman in France that will have even the slightest comprehension of that concept .

[suein56]

Danifr said : I haven't had the devis back yet but one of the things the electrician said was that every room with running water has to have an extractor fan.

Not strictly true. If you look up on vosdroits.fr it will talk about the installation of VMC having become a custom, especially in renovations like yours. It does talk about an openable window situation such as you have being acceptable.

Though if you have a basin in the cloakroom then it might be a good idea to go for the VMC.

Sue

[idun]

Well, we would have had to have been like that expression, mad as a box

of frogs to have an opening window in our toilet, north facing, in the

Alpes, and we certainly had getting on for -30c one winter and in double

minus figures for quite a few winters and single figures for many.

We

had a well insulated house. Wooden shutters. Trickle vents pointing

upover, unlike in the UK where they direct the outside air down? do not

get that, seems mad to me. All the windows apart from the kitchen and

wet rooms had these trickle vents, and the internal doors had slight

gaps underneath. Therefore sucking the air through to the damper rooms and evacuating it. (There are also air recovery systems these days). 25 years owning that house and it was warm, dry, and

well ventilated.

My french neighbour kept turning theirs on and off and had all sorts of problems, ours was on all the time as it should be.

We did start off with an expensive VMC, but after a number of years bought a cheaper one and it worked just as well.

I think so much of them that I have one in this house in England. Highly recommended.

[mint]

Have just had our old, original vmc unit changed.  Haven't had the bill yet but we have a trusted electrician, possibly the ONLY artisan we have ever found in France who would tell it like it is and wouldn't up his bills just because we are Brits.

He is a very rare find and we dread it when he retires!

[Jonzjob]

We have 2 VMCs. 1 in the kitchen which vents straight into the LOFT!!! It is switched off at the breaker and has been for the 11 years we have been here, no problems at all. The other is the toilet/bathroom and until I stuffed a pipe through an outer wall that too vented into the loft! That is used in the winter after we have had a shower. The rest of the time it too is off. It was replaced a short while back and, for us, it is definitely not needed on all the time. Plus, at night here it is so quiet that you would be able to here it. Not the motor, just the air movement.

[woolybanana]

Personally, my pong is so perfumed that the VMC in the loo is not really necessary; others may have rotten enough guts to need more airflow.

The days of outside loos may be largely over but the did after all have something to recommend them - clean air!!

[idun]

The only VMC's I know of have the box in the loft and have a tube that goes outside through some sort of vent and not just pumped  into the loft space..... how odd if it is.

Our neighbour had two problems when they were switching theirs off a lot of the time, one was that the box in the loft ended up filling up with water, all that gathered condensation, and they started getting some damp in their home too. We both had the same builder and both houses were built at the same time.

If a house is naturally ventilated, then ofcourse there is little need for one, but many modern homes are so well insulated that they need an air flow that does not cause drafts and unwanted coldness.

 

[Chancer]

Both my living accomodations, the old hôtel kitchen in France and my old timber outbuildings in the UK would both be uninhabitable after one winter were it not for VMC's, I know what they were like before and I know how dry and healthy they are now.

On the other hand my house in the UK that is rented out, I have never had damp or condensation problems in 30 years and the same is true of all my previous tenants, the South Africans always had loads of Windows wide open even in winter. The house is now better insulated than ever thanks to all the UK grants but I have a "modern" family that are so obsessed with the health of their asthmatic son that they are in my view, as someone who had asthma as a child slowly killing him, they take no end of showers but will never open any of the fanlights on any of the Windows (Wonder what they are for [I][I]) and guess what, they complain about condensation on the Windows and the beginnings of mould in the bathroom. My parents used to make sure I got lots of fresh air.

Either they will have to go or they will have to suffer the installation of a VMC which will be wired in such a way that they cannot turn it off.

Landlord friends in France have shown me the results where tenants switch off the VMC's.

Modern houses definitely need them but dont listen to any sparky who says that you must have one when upgrading an existing installation, roll over on that one and they will take you to the cleaners with a €2K coffret de communication, RJ45's in the toilet etc etc.