Refreshing Shower

Man,
I bet Japan found that shower...
shocking.

@MrJones ...and revolting.
He looks... amped up.
"Watt's that? Ohm my god!" he's currently resisting to blurt out.

Huehuehuehue it’s always funny to watch the the look of despair on the gringos face when they see our electric showers (brazilian here btw). It’s something we’re already used to, like the australians playing with their deadly animals. Normally these showers are safe, you only have to be careful while you are manipulating them (months ago I almost got myself electrocuted while repairing my brother’s shower, he turned off the wrong electric switch).

Fun fact (a positive outcome): since most of the foreign countries dont use this technology, brazilian companies developed an up-to-date technology in electrical resistence and circuits for temperature control, which in consequence, are also largely employed in the ceramic industry (trust me, I’m an engineer).

@warpfactors I spent 2 years in Paraguay, and I have to admit, I was a little scared to use the electric shower heads, but I quickly got used to them (it beats taking cold showers in the winter). I think the worst thing that ever happened to me with those showers was when I got slightly shocked after reconnecting a new head without help (and they would sometimes short-circuit my already sketchy wiring), but not once did I actually get shocked while showering.

@DamaOscuraDeTodos yeah, I'd also got shocked a few times, although only lightly. most of the times this problem is caused by a poorly built (or an old) home circuit, because the rules concerning the manufacturing of electric showers became more rigid 10 years ago, I guess.

@warpfactors
There are very entertaining YouTube videos with the topic "trust me, I'm an engineer", but I haven't seen any about electric shower heads so far. Something begging to be done?

@Myrica that would surely be something like the MTV series "Jackass" huehuehue.

Indeed. I first came across these showers when visiting Nicaragua. I was always terrified that I would either get electrocuted or die in a fire. And yes, one day one of those contraption caught on fire. "My shower is on fire" is a strange sentence.

@jonr I was on a mission trip and boy was the level of thrown together dangerous equipment in Nicaragua scary.

@jonr Some wise guys managed to "set on fire" lake nearby. Also someone called fireman. I guess thats one of the strangest things to hear "Lake is on the fire".

@MiskisM
Well, not as strange as to hear the hay / bush fires of Kaliningrad / Prussia in February.

@MiskisM Let's not forget Cuyahoga river AKA "The Burning River" in Ohio, US of A. The river was so polluted that it actually caught on fire several times between 1868 and 1969.

Bah...... That's nothing.. my friend just installed a hot shower.....

https://artgrappler.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/augij6y.jpg

:P

Ah, yes! The electric showers! There's nothing better than a refreshing dose of electricity to your body when trying to adjust the temperature of the water. I had a shower that did that every time. Every. Single. Time. Ah, the memories... -gazes the horizon nostalgically-

On a side note, nice to see you Brazil. I feel so... Represented.

@SpacePotato

Are you Brazilian?
Are this actually a thing in Brazil then - electrical showers?! :-0
Why?!

@Nisse_Hult That's just how we roll. Maaaaaaybe we didn't think this whole thing through, but it's not like water and electricity have ever killed anyone...

@Nisse_Hult brazilian (and engineer) here. Due electrocution hazard, it may sound senseless to use such showers. but you forget that almost all homes here dont need/have a heating or a boiling system (althought some germans friends of mine came here during winter and complained about the cold huehuehue). Most of the country have temperatures over 15oC the whole year. therefore, building a boiling system JUST for showers would be a waste of money, so the combination electrical shower + electrical power is more intelligent.

@warpfactors

Ok but you still shouldn't have electricity that close to water and ground connection - that's really, really dangerous of course.
Why don't you just have a small waterheater somwhere else in the house or flat? There are small ones to. My mother keeps one in her summerhouse here just to get hot water for washing up and washing your hands and so on. Then you wouldn't have to have the electrical parts in the actual bathroom but somwhere else in the house and just draw heated tap water for your needs to the bathroom or kitchen when you need it.
Heating cold water in the actual showerhead (which is what I imagine the Brazilian showers does then?) seem extremely dangerous! :-(

@Nisse_Hult yes, the water is heated by an electrical resistance inside the shower head. If it is old or poorly installed, it can be very dangerous indeed, but the cost benefit is still very favorable (more than 10x cheaper). Anyway, the manufacturing, isolation and installing rules had become more rigid, so the electric showers became safer.

In fact, a water boiler is not that uncommon, specially here in south Brazil, where is colder. In my parents’ home we always had one, but only because my parents included it while they were building the house. But in rental places (like a summer beachhouse, for example), normally you’ll find only electric showers, because it is cheaper to the owner.

@warpfactors

Yes I'm sure it must be cheaper since there is definitely no other advantage in it but I wouldn't risk my life every time I took a shower even if I saved some money.
Are water heaters terribly expensive in Brazil? Because here for a 100 litre one that more then cover your need for a shower you'll have to pay from about 250 USD and up depending on quality.

To explain my horror at learning this I should explain that in Sweden no electrical sockets above small 110 V ones meant for electrical razors where even allowed in bathrooms at all until the late 1990's and even then I didn't even see a regular socket that carries main current (which is 230 V in Sweden) in any bathroom until just a few years ago. People simply didn't want them anywhere near bathrooms.

Electrical regulations used to be very strict in bathrooms and where only relaxed when we joined the European Union to match up with looser EU standards.

The very idea that you have plug-in sockets usable for main electrical appliances in a bathroom is breathtakingly dangerous as it's easy to see how people plug in their standard hairdryers and if you drop that in the bathtub or you have any contact to current in your hand you practically always connect the circuit to ground when you're in a wet bathroom.
Wet feet on wet tiles, easy access to ground everywhere - it's a really bad place to have live current in anything but wallmounted, watertight casings.

So to me this idea of electrified showerheads comes as a complete surprise.
Please don't take this as me knocking Brazil or anything - you do this your way and you're used to it - but it's just SO dangerous I'm really surprised that it's allowed anywhere.

Thank you for all the information - it's been interesting learning this fact of life (and death)! ;-)

@Nisse_Hult As far as I could find out, a 100L boiler here costs at least 450 USD , while a good electrical shower can be bought with 25 USD. And keep in mind that the average monthly income of a brazilian worker is about 350 USD. Moreover, the monthly expenses of a boiler is twice of an electrical shower (due thermal losses).

So, given the circumstances, the current solution seems to be the least worst. I like to see it like nuclear energy: it is potentially very deadly, but can be very useful if handled with care.

Yeah, I’m aware of the risks of having an electrical plug inside the bathroom, we had some discussions about this issue during my undergraduation. But I would say that a residual-current circuit breaker (which became mandatory here, but is not widespread yet) can give you enough safety. If some electrical accident with an hairdryer or even a shower happens, the circuit will automatically open before causing you any harm.

Don’t worry, I dont take your concerns as an offense, I’m already used to see the same reaction from the gringos here. It’s nice to see such small details about Brazil here in SATW, in the same way that I learnt a lot about scandinavian small facts by reading the comics.

@warpfactors

Ok, with an average income of about 350 USD to put 250 on a waterheater is quite an investment then.

The comparison with nuclear plants is an apt one - only on a much smaller scale. A terrifyingly dangerous potentially leathal maschine only inches away from you head whenever you take a shower.

Yes, the residual-current circuit breakers are a very good invention. Let's hope they become standard everywhere as soon as possible.

Good that your not offended by my comments. As you said - I'm just generally concerned for peoples safety. The Nordic countries have a long history of strong safety regulations and safe design features. The three-point seatbelts in cars and ejector seats in airplanes are both Swedish inventions for example.

You Brazilians seems to enjoy life a lot more with your Samba and Carnival - we're more Protestantly square and controlled. As you might have learned from SatW, in the Scandinavian countries Denmark is seen as the wildest country and still residual-current circuit breakers became mandatory there in new buildings as early as 1975.
We worry about safety issues a lot... ;-)

@Nisse_Hult @warpfactors I finally got around to making a SATW account because I really want to say thank you to you two for this really interesting engineering, safety, and economics lesson, with a bit of policy history thrown in. Here in the US all new homes have GFCI circuits (different name for what you call residual-current circuit breaker) in all bathroom and outdoor outlets, but older homes my husband and I have lived in don't always. My husband is an electrical engineer, so being concerned with safety, he bought a device that lets you test if a circuit is GFCI, and when the outlet in the bathroom doesn't have it, we use an external GFCI adapter. Whew I said more than I expected to haha.

@Nisse_Hult @MayLaBelle I guess that the only issue of employing the residual-current circuit breaker (or GFCI) is that, sometimes when the grid is old or poorly installed, the leakage currents end up activating the device. So, it’s not uncommon to be obliged to renew all your electrical installation in order to make it work properly. But anyway, safety first ;).

Yeah, I lived some months in Germany and also have some friends that lived (or are living) in Sweden, so I'm a bit familiar with this Protestantly attitude of having everything controlled, classified and in order. In most of cases, the brazilian reaction towards those issues would be “are you really worrying about this???!” huehuehue.

But of course this more flexible and carefree behaviour has also its negative points, and becomes the root of all our evils. The Rio 2016 has been an embarrassing showcase of them. So, I wouldn’t mind having a more scandinavian-approach in some areas, it would certainly benefit the whole population.

@Nisse_Hult Besides the grounding and other measures the electricity can't run directly from the shower head to you through the water because the water drops are not continuous so even in an poorly installed electric shower you probably will only get shocked when you touch the metal faucet and not by the water drops (and I had this experience before, not as bad as you might think, just startling). Also considering how poorly maintenance and "improvised repairs" are common in Brazil an electric shower is safer than a boiler.

Anyone else mistake Japan for England again?

@StuckovertheAtlantic when does brother Japan's eyes become such big, lol

@StuckovertheAtlantic Looks like England and Sweden had a kid. lol

@StuckovertheAtlantic And I thought I was the only one xD

I remember when I was in Japan the first time and the hotel we stayed at had toilets that opened the lid themself when you came into the restroom. My first thought was literally "Shit! Decepticon!" and one of my friends said his first thought was "So do I trust the transformer or not?"

A verdade dói na alma , quando você é brasileiro olha pra isso e você ver o seu banheiro e é realmente assim.

@Brazilianislonely Nossa, sim! Dei até um suspiro de conformação... Não dá nem pra reclamar hahaha

@mscandalous Isso parece uma eletrocussão esperando por acontecer.

That's one "electrifying" shower!

Real men shower cold.