Water Meters

Couldn't be without a bath. But I do get that climbing in the bath for an over bath shower has its problems as we grow older, not least the slipping problem. To fit both the walk in shower and the bath into a bathroom it's worth considering the small baths that are available now, also you use less water, you just can't stretch out. The salesperson recommended a steel bath to us, cheaper, fitted with handles and it holds the heat for longer, good suggestion.

Thanks BB and DEBSC, that sounds good.

Yes, it is expensive,  we have just had it installed in the toilet area at the local guide hall, but easy to clean as you say.

Our en-suite is quite large, so we could easily fit a large shower instead of the large bath, with enough space to put the shower-wall over the tiles.  The main bathroom we would leave with a shower over the bath.

We also have a bathroom upstairs  in the former "granny flat", but it is possibly not big enough to fit in the shower we want if we left the tiles in place, every mm will count in that bathroom!

( We have an "upside-down" house, with the living area upstairs and the bedrooms/bathrooms etc downstairs. )

We only have the one bathroom, so obviously it couldn't be out of service for too long. Van lives at a storage site, so not possible to make do with that.

I took out the bath tub, and fitted a 'Kubex' one piece shower cubicle in its place. Specially sized to pass through a domestic doorway, although it took three of us to carry it up the stairs, and I had to take off a couple of doors along the route.

I got it up and running inside one day, but I had done the preparatory plumbing and electrical work in advance. Plenty of large bore stop valves and an RCD, just in case.

Cost around £1k, plus sundries. I don't how much some of the companies in the Sunday glossies charge for a similar installation.

And to avoid retiling the rest of the bathroom I used UVPC cladding from Wickes, which actually looks quite smart. Probably not suitable for use inside the shower area though.

And returning to water meters. The leak that I mentioned in an earlier post was fixed on Friday, they dug up the road and replaced someones stop cock. Then went home at 2:30, leaving the hole open, surrounded by barriers, blocking half a dozen kerb side parking spots, chaos this weekend.

I've just been on the phone asking them when it would be made good. Reasonable reply was that they leave it for a few days, to see if the repair has worked. Obviously confident in their workmanship. Told to phone back in a day or so if nothing had happened.

30 minutes later, a truck arrived, and they are now filling in hole. Coincidence, or the power of Victor Meldrew ?

Just as long as I don't end up like the bloke on the Bernard Cribbins song ...