Best Shower Faucet/Mixer

[TECMike]

Looking for a better quality shower faucet, along with hose, that better and more accurately mixes hot and cold water when showering. Our present faucet looks to be on four inch centers.

Thanks in advance for your recommendations!

[bcbigfoot]

I also was having problems with proper temp. control until I installed check valves on the hot and cold line just before the faucet. I also replaced the dribble valve with a on/off valve on the shower wand. Now my temp regulation is as good as my house, very happy with the mods..

[Ron3rd]

dadmomh wrote:
Know ahead of time that when you shut the water off at the little push button, it will leak a bit. Not to worry, as we were told, it helps to stop the boiling hot or ice cold water from blasting out first when you turn it on. It's just a small trickle. We had the Oxy Spa in both our HTT and TT and wouldn't consider any other. Love them.

This is correct. All the shower heads will trickle; this is a anti-scald feature and intentional. We kind of like the trickle as it's great for soaping up hands.

[dadmomh]

Know ahead of time that when you shut the water off at the little push button, it will leak a bit. Not to worry, as we were told, it helps to stop the boiling hot or ice cold water from blasting out first when you turn it on. It's just a small trickle. We had the Oxy Spa in both our HTT and TT and wouldn't consider any other. Love them.

[TECMike]

Ended up buying an Oxygenics "Spa" shower head to use on our original faucet. Got it installed today and looking forward to using it for the first time.

Thanks again for all the valuable input and help!

Mike

[mobeewan]

SailingOn wrote:
There were two problems:
- The hot water from any of the taps could be scalding, and the water heater temp is not adjustable.
- Shower water temp varied widely; even raising or lowering the spray head messed it up.
We installed one of the Watts thermostatic mixing valves (some call these tempering valves) at the water heater. The temp is adjusted so hot water at any of the taps is a comfortable temperature for dish washing or showering, with the cold left off.
- dishwashing is easier; no searching for the right water temp.
- shower temp is constant without fiddling, and does not vary with the incoming city water temp.
- mixing cold with hot as it leaves the water heater extends the hot water supply.

I might give one of these a try. I want to replumb my shower valves higher up the wall anyway and can install it in the shower lines then. I don't really care about the sinks. I like the water hotter there.

[LarryJM]

SailingOn wrote:
There were two problems:
- The hot water from any of the taps could be scalding, and the water heater temp is not adjustable.
- Shower water temp varied widely; even raising or lowering the spray head messed it up.
We installed one of the Watts thermostatic mixing valves (some call these tempering valves) at the water heater. The temp is adjusted so hot water at any of the taps is a comfortable temperature for dish washing or showering, with the cold left off.
- dishwashing is easier; no searching for the right water temp.
- shower temp is constant without fiddling, and does not vary with the incoming city water temp.
- mixing cold with hot as it leaves the water heater extends the hot water supply.

Interesting solution, but wouldn't work for us since we like the water for washing dishes ... especially really messing ones EXTREMELY HOT for the inital soak and washing hands much hotter than for say showering. As I originally said we have just learned to live with what we have and adjust. A little more fiddling, but hey we're camping and have the time to fiddle anyway:W

Larry

[SailingOn]

There were two problems:
- The hot water from any of the taps could be scalding, and the water heater temp is not adjustable.
- Shower water temp varied widely; even raising or lowering the spray head messed it up.
We installed one of the Watts thermostatic mixing valves (some call these tempering valves) at the water heater. The temp is adjusted so hot water at any of the taps is a comfortable temperature for dish washing or showering, with the cold left off.
- dishwashing is easier; no searching for the right water temp.
- shower temp is constant without fiddling, and does not vary with the incoming city water temp.
- mixing cold with hot as it leaves the water heater extends the hot water supply.

[GrandpaKip]

We went with the Oxygenics head and just left the original faucet. We like it.

[TECMike]

Thanks Mobeewan, Biscuit and Larry. You all nailed it for me and saved me a lot of trouble. Again, many, many thanks!

Mike

[LarryJM]

mobeewan wrote:
Pretty much the problem with the faucet and hot and cold water mixing is the water heater usually has a check valve on the outlet and a minimum supply of hot water.

As long as the shower is flowing both hot and cold water are flowing. When using the shower head shut off the cold water continues to trickle and the check valve on the WH seats since the flow thru the WH is now restricted. When the flow starts the hose is full of cold water and the hot water flow has to catch up.

The other problem is that as you use hot water from the WH the water in the WH becomes colder and colder. So the only way to fix this would be to have some sort of temperature regulated mixing valve set up that can adjust the cold water flow to the shower head, but you still have that limited supply of hot water that ain't gonna last.

I myself just keep on reaching down and cutting back the cold water valve as needed and take navy showers.

I haven't seen any all in one faucet/temperature mixing with shower hookup with 4 inch centers. Sink faucets only, yes. You might look at adding a separate through the wall shower hose/line connection and adding separate mixing vale in the plumbing to supply the separate shower line.

IMHO that is a pretty good assessment of the RV water system in general and trying to get it to work like a home system or those in $3M Prevost MHs is most likely a losing proposition. This is why we prefer to use the CG facilities and reserve our onboard facilities basically for emergencies. In other words we just live with what we have and accept that it's in a trailer and as such is what it is and work with it.

YES I realize the above is not really an answer, but it's the ole "lipstick on a pig" quandry ... in the end it's still just a PIG:B

Larry

[Old-Biscuit]

Unfortunately RV shower faucets with diverters are basically all the same......

Here is a wide selection (appearance)LINK

[mobeewan]

Pretty much the problem with the faucet and hot and cold water mixing is the water heater usually has a check valve on the outlet and a minimum supply of hot water.

As long as the shower is flowing both hot and cold water are flowing. When using the shower head shut off the cold water continues to trickle and the check valve on the WH seats since the flow thru the WH is now restricted. When the flow starts the hose is full of cold water and the hot water flow has to catch up.

The other problem is that as you use hot water from the WH the water in the WH becomes colder and colder. So the only way to fix this would be to have some sort of temperature regulated mixing valve set up that can adjust the cold water flow to the shower head, but you still have that limited supply of hot water that ain't gonna last.

I myself just keep on reaching down and cutting back the cold water valve as needed and take navy showers.

I haven't seen any all in one faucet/temperature mixing with shower hookup with 4 inch centers. Sink faucets only, yes. You might look at adding a separate through the wall shower hose/line connection and adding separate mixing vale in the plumbing to supply the separate shower line.

[TECMike]

Any faucet recommendations?

[TECMike]

Does Oxygenics also make a shower faucet?