When I moved into my house in Texas, I would notice that in the shower I would have this funny feeling over my skin when I would touch the water controls or stand on the drain grate while taking a shower. I first thought it was just a mild allergic reaction to the water supply (I've lived in places before where some of the minerals/chemicals in the water were allergens). When I asked around the community and found that no one else had this problem, I started to investigate. The discovery occurred when I decided to check for stray AC voltage between the electrical socket and the neutral and ground of the supply socket in the bathroom. I found there was 30VAC going to neutral and ground from the drain grate, drain head, and water controls. I had the power company come out and disconnect the mains supply to my house at the pole outside, and checked again. There was still 30VAC. I now will say that I live across the street from a substation. Whatever I had said must have concerned the power company because over the next few days they began replacing insulators on the poles near my house and digging up and installing new, longer grounds in the substation lot. They did quite a lot of work over that week and after they were done I checked up on the power situation in the shower. The shower was still 'live' but the voltage had reduced to 8-10VAC, which I could no longer feel when taking a shower. I didn't live there much longer after, so I didn't worry about it too much especially since I didn't feel anything any longer. Just thought I'd share this with you as this video reminded me of that event.
In the UK there is a requirement to equipotential bond adjacent metalwork in areas like bathrooms and kitchens to prevent any potential difference occurring between metalwork like that.
Ah, in the USA I found they were not nearly as proactive for electrical safety as in my home in Canada. I wonder how much the difference in mains voltage makes in safety design considerations, since in the USA and Canada, are sitting at half the UK mains potential for the standard electric supply. I still wonder what the ultimate cause was for such a voltage to be present in the shower...? A bad ground in the substation? Current loops through my old piping? Bizarre distribution equipment fault? I'll likely never know now... but at least I lived to tell the tale.
cool_ohm Being disconnected from grid & getting voltage at shower you are getting a induced voltage from the power station. There is an electromagnetic field cutting the planes of your metal plumbing. A gauss meter can verify & measure. There's apps for that. Run a fence or wire paralell near a high voltage line & get free power possible.
Yeah, another crazy Brazilian here. As a kid, I used to disassembly these shower heads just for fun. I've used many of worse quality than this one that Big Clive reviewed on this video. It's relatively safe to use, as many other mentioned here. I've never heard of any serious problems with it, just minor shock sensations on some *very* bad installations. I mean, "the live wire touching the metal pipe leading to the metal shower head" type of bad installations. Other than that, I consider these perfectly safe. And it's not just me saying it - it's statistics. Almost every home in Brazil has one of those units working, in either 127v or 220v. Many of these are poorly installed. In 2019, ~700 people were killed by electric shocks in Brazil. Of those, 34,5% happened at home (let's say, 300 cases). I couldn't find how much of these accidents were actually by people showering, but let's say it's 20%. That would give us 60 cases per year, which may seem high, but mind you: our population is about 210 million. We have, on average, 110 people being struck by a lightning every year. ElectroBOOM has a follow-up video on his own video about this type of shower head that is worth watching. th-cam.com/video/06w3-l1AzFk/w-d-xo.html
That logic is flawed, by the way. Those 60 cases are not just statistics, they are people, someone's loved ones. And unlike lightning strikes, they are 100% preventable by safety measures.
Ah, yeah, I know, but, OTOH, we don't have the numbers from other countries to compare (or do we?), so your argument is 100% valid, but still fallacious like mine. If we're going strictly on logic, the data I found wasn't specific to shower shocks. Where's your data to support your logic? It may not exist...
@@viniciusvbf22 well, i based my point exclusively on logic, not statistics. If harm can be prevented, effort should be put into doing so, not dismissing it because it is insignificant due to statistics. Or else it is just sarcificing lifes for the money/effort, and i'm not a fan of that.
@@voidseeker4394 you don't get my point, but it's OK. You don't have any proof that it's insignificant due to statistics, or even if harm would be prevented otherwise, because, guess what? You don't have data to prove it. As far as we both know and have data to prove, using showers as this is as safe as any other. Your claim is based solely on what you think, which is illogical.
@@voidseeker4394 go live in a country that uses those showers and you’ll find out that those are the least of your problems. Traffic alone is much more likely to kill you. Also regarding the electrical installation, there may be life wires dangling down from a pole on the street. So, better look up. But not too much or you might miss the missing manhole cover and die from that.
I've since learned how standard these things are in parts of the world including Brazil. We do have electric showers here in the UK, but it has to be with a wall unit with grounded heating enclosure and sleeved element so there is no current leakage. The Ducha would not be allowed here because it would be considered a shock hazard, particularly in a wet environment where the person showering would have their feet on a wet grounded surface. But it's interesting to see it's widely used elsewhere.
I can see how it looks like a ridicule level of danger, but I have never ever heard of it causing any serious issues, even in those precarious instalations. It is not a continuous stream of water that hits the skin, but a bunch of droplets, so it would not conduct electricity even without a ground (or maybe as we say here, god protects the dumb).
Most of the incidents seem to involve tall tourists who make head contact with the shower while it's on. I'd guess it's a lot safer if mounted a modest height overhead.
They are usually mounted about 2.3m to 2.5m, but you can find them lower on cheap and old hotels, if you use one these in less than 5 or 10 cm from your body, you will get a eletrical shock. Now, the thing is people dont usually die from the shock it self but from passing out and hitting the head. Every body here in Brazil knows not to touch it while in use, but it is ez to imagine a tourist simple putting his hand on it to switch to "hot" while it is on.
I am a german engineer, spent 3 month in brazil. They know what they are doing, at least as much as non-MIT US engineers do. You find these showerheads there even in most hotels, also nice ones. They should be installed with heat-shrink wire, then they are as save es in-wall electric water heaters imho. Energy-efficient too.
Amar Ken Thanks for you post. As you know, there are millions of these in Brazil and no one is being electrocuted. Nor is anyone being killed by tank-type heaters which also have an electric element immersed in the water. "Shocking" isn't it? :)
Fun fact: here in Brazil people actually got upset (well, they still are) when the gvmt established that things had to be grounded. The VAST majority of electrical installations and appliances simply aren't, even to this day Edit: Those showers are the standard here in Brazil. Reading the label I actually think this is a copy of one of the most common models here
Not at all, no. You get them in on the south of the country (the little "appendage" hanging from the bottom) which has colder winters and even then most houses will have heating for showers only, rest of the house is straight from the water mains. It's also a "rich people thing" and even there most people will rely on electric showerheads like that one
I used to live in Paraguay, where these are pretty much in every house! I used to work as an electrician there and used to install them. I have installed and used these with RCD's, and they worked fine. And as long as they are earthed, they're absolutely fine. They're literally used by millions of people in South America, every day.
I usually go to Paraguay and most of the times I just open the faucet normally until I get shocked, at which point I just open it with my flipflops in my hands lol When I come back home the first thing I do is to take a nice little gas heated shower, it can't kill me unless I lock myself down in the boiler room (so it's a little less painful)
I once saw someone charging their phone with the two wires just jammed into the electrical socket with plastic fork spikes. He said the same thing to me, that it's perfectly fine. Glad I was one of the guards of that place at the time so I got them out from there before they shorted anything. -.- I'm also quite baffled that their phone was fine with being charged with 230 volts.
they are very popular in the caribbean also, however they are imported from Brazil, and they have a removable element for maintenance, we have been using these over 20 years now they typically last for 5 years, and work pretty well.
Hey clive, I'm from brazil and those showerheads are pretty much the standard here. The ones used here are different though and made in brazil following a few guidelines, it has a few safety things in it that makes it so even if you completely ignore all safety, it's still quite ok to be used. The one you have looks like a cheap ass version from china, which is no wonder since china perfected the art of making things as cheap as possible that are still functional.
+Icathiann You should see if you can figure out how to get one of your Brazillian made ones to Clive so he can compare them. That said, I am sure it probably would cost more to ship it to the Isle of Man than the cost of the unit itself.
That secondary pipe with the water outlet looks like it might be for redirecting the waterflow to wash yourself, A lot of showerheads are removable from the wall mount with a flex tube.
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
I live in Brazil, and these units are standard here. Amazingly, we dont hear about safety problems with that kind of shower. Particularly, I never heard of a single incident in my entire life, and I'm 38. Not that this a proof that this is safe, of course. ABNT, the regulatory responsible, is more worried about chaging the plug standard for one that is not used elsewhere in the world.
Those units are very popular here in Brazil, 9 out of 10 houses have one. I just asked a friend who used to work in IPT (IPT is a government organization who test out stuff) and he said me that the minimum requirements for sale are a maximum of 30ma in the ground wire and 5ma in the body (yes, 5ma in the plastic body! He said that he tested one with 10ma in the body!). And yes, i had a few bad experiences with this showers, electric shocks, explosions, two wires melted and shorted out ( the house had a 75A fuse in the shower circuit). Love the videos Clive, bye!
+ivanjacob I believe that it does, but it has a higher resistance, plus I would be concerned about calcium scale buildup, that would really block it unless some electrolytic action keeps it from forming.
Hey clive, we use this in Brazil, it is used in almost all houses. All the showers legally sold in Brazil must be avaliated by inmetro (and they are very serious) so the shower heads sold in stores here are quite safe actually (not a single accident that i know of). obviously that does not include the ones you can order in the internet from china. The big problem actually is badly done wiring, made by somebody that does not know what he is doing!, it is very commom in these bad installations to get a small electric shock when you touch the water valve handle, in really badly done ones you get a mild to somewhat strong shock when you touch that handle. Also this 3 heat thing is not used on newer showers, they now have something like a potentiometer that you turn to choose the optimal temperature.
Also due to their power use (up to 8kw is quite common), they also tend to use quite a lot of energy, and in the end of the month they are responsible for quite a big share in the energy bill.
i have spent quite a few minutes searching, and i only found 2 deaths: one was caused because the guy tried to change the damaged heating element inside WHILE it was live in 2014, and another one in 2013 caused by eletrocution while he was connecting the wires during installation. During bath i actually only found deaths caused by Carbon monoxide from gas heating. OH before i forget: ducha also means shower in portuguese.
The tubing you assumed to be used as venting or to avoid pressure is not at all. It's actually used so you get water from there. When you pull the pin, the shower head will stop dropping water as the tube will fill and after that water will come out, as a hose. It's quite useful when you want to take a shower and not wet your hair. Also this type of heating shower is very common in Brazil, and there isn't much concerns for safety. I never heard of people getting electrocuted with those. As you mentioned taller people Might get some shocks, but usually those should be mounted pretty high (around 2.5 meters from the ground) And lastly this model is quite cheap, there are better models with more safety features. Including shafts to change the temperature without having to reach the shower head.
Everybody uses these showers here in Brazil. If installed correctly there is no danger. But it must be installed by someone who are familiarized with it or a professional electrician.
Haha, this is the default shower technology on Brazil, probably 95% of bathrooms use that. And yes, in most installations people don't bother with the earth wire (in fact, a lot of houses in Brazil still don't have a earth wire anywhere at all, even though it's required by law!). If the local electrical regulations were enforced strictly, I'd guess about half the country would have to completely redo their properties' electrical systems.
The crazy Weaponcrafter English "shower" is of Germanic origin; it compares to the German word "schauer" which has been replaced in modern times by "dusche." It is also related to Swedish "skur," meaning a rain shower.
Hi Clive, Like me you'll be startled to hear that some UK shower manufacturers DID use this live coil in water principle up until just a few years ago! About twenty years back a friend asked me to have a look at their very expensive shower unit (Dolphin??) which had stopped heating. My jaw dropped when I opened the case to find a clear perspex manifold with a Ni-chrome coil directly in the water flow - albeit a lot fancier and with a much longer water resistance path than the Chinese one you stripped down, it looked equally dangerous to me. Nevertheless, when I checked it out with one of the Principle Engineers in the local electricity board he confirmed that BEAB had indeed (somewhat reluctantly) given approval for water heating devices using this principle. In the event all I had to do to repair it was to shorten the coil by half an inch (it had corroded at its termination) and off it went like new. I did hear that the owner ultimately died, but he was in his nineties by then so my conscience is clear! Love the channel, Cheers, Chris
Xavier Bacon In fact, you have never heard of anyone being electrocuted by one of these devices. The electric tank heaters work the same way. An electric heating elment is immersed in the water. This entire video and 99% of the responses are testimonies to ignorance and a determination to ignore the facts.
In the majority of countries using electrical water heating the heating element is enclosed in a grounded metal sleeve like a kettle element and does not make electrical contact with the water. I do realise these devices are widely used in places like Brazil, but they would not be allowed in the UK due to the genuine shock risk they carry.
bigclivedotcom You are totally wrong. I have repaired many electrical water heaters in the USA and not one was as you describe. Nor are the shower head heaters dangerous. There are millions of them in Brazil. If the were as dangerous as you claim, thousands of people would be electrocuted every day. That would cause talk. ;)
colonelerotic I know that. That's why I said USA. It makes no difference, it is still true and millions of these shower head heaters are used every day in Brazil alone. If they were even 1% ad dangerous as the claims in the video, thousands of people would be electrocuted every day. That would cause talk, wouldn't it? ;)
I've used these for years in Latin America and it's kind of funny to read the comments section. They are often just open wire nut connected to a 240v 2 phase connection. I've never even heard of them causing any harm to anyone. The heating coils are generally connected by brass crimp fittings and those are corrosion prone. My guess is that there might be some sort of galvanic action taking place that protects the copper grounding wires. When the brass connections fail you need to put in new coils, which are sold in nearly every hardware store. One thing that most people are not taking into account is that even though you are wet, your not touching anything that makes a good ground in nearly all the places these are used. The pipes in these countries are generally PVC and the floor and walls are either ceramic tiled or painted, none of which makes for a good conductor.
Another interesting video. Been watching you for a couple months and you always seem to get the oddest things in electrical wise. Never even heard of something like this, and I'm sure the electrical board in Canada would have a meltdown if anyone wanted this installed... Keep up the great vids.
I am from Brazil, in my house I use a 7500W 220V shower grounded and with GFCI with 30mA sensitivity, it works amazingly well. GFCI had pulled off with my electric oven on humid days, but never with the shower.
The little hose is not a blow off. Its just a spray hose to rinse off with. The water follows the path of least resistance when you full the little knob. Use these for over 30 years. Don't ever use a plastic pipe to the unit or pvc in the wall. Ground the pipe and metal extension well and it will never, ever shock you.
when you mentioned "naughty bits" and i saw the little switch pop out i got scared for a second but then "phew... ok relax, its just a switch to turn it on or off"
Hi there, nice video. Those are pretty common here in Brazil (even though this precise one you are showing is made in China). The Brazilian-made ondes come in decent quality and undergo quality control, even though they're not much safer than this one. Unfortunately that's what 99.999% of the people use in Brazil in spite of recent and somewhat though local regulations. I own a safe version of this called the Quatro Estacoes (Four Seasons) which has a shielded heating element (Just like the american water heaters), an Earth Fault Protection and a Triac based Power Control Unit but is also about 20 times more expensive than the conventional ones. It delivers 7.7KW to the load, which stands for an amazing (steam room-like) shower experience. The reason why we have that kind of shower head is because (for the most part of the country) our climate does not justify stocking heated water, most of it is heated as needed and the demand itself changes according to the season. On average, we tend to shower twice a day during summer, now imagine a household with 4 people and you would need a whole lot of hot water to meet the demand. For the record.... "Ducha" means shower in Portuguese..... I know...... pretty duchy..... but yeah, that's what it means no pun intended... For some 15 years now, there is an increasing number of households using solar heating systems, though those systems are mostly dedicated to swimming pools. Anyway, that's the perspective from a person who lives in Brasil and has already experienced the "tingling" a lot in the past. I do agree with you, those are indeed a death trap. If properly grounded (which is the case for about 20% of the users at best) it can be dangerous but acceptable. Unless, of course, you buy one of the safe versions with shielded elements, then it's actually pretty good. Thanks for sharing. Dennis
I mean, is no Brazilian going to comment on how the wee hose is actually not (at least not primarily) a pressure relief valve but rather a way of getting a manoeuvreable shower head for when you are showering kids or simply to help washing the bathroom? LOL
I'm brazilian, and I am amazed at how frightened people are about electric showers. People not used to it seem to have the feeling that there's no law or regulation on electric showers in latin countries. It is perfectly safe, we brazilians take 1 to 3 showers a day and I've never heard of anyone getting electrocuted by this type of showerhead.
A human that is wet doesn't stand a chance in case of electric shock. Electrical regulations in civilized countries forbid bringing electricity close to the water in bathrooms. Even simple power sockets are forbidden. For good reason. This device doesn't just bring the electricity near the water, it brings the electricty in the water! Yes, in order to kill a person certain conditions need to be met. So, normally you won't get an electrical shock. But that doesn't mean it is safe. All that is needed to kill you is a malfunctioning ground wire and just the life wire not being connected (which can happen during operating the switch). I call that a major hazard.
Even with the ground unplugged you don't get a shock. This type of product is sold everywhere, Canada, USA. What happens if you unplug the earth and lick the shower head? Nothing: th-cam.com/video/06w3-l1AzFk/w-d-xo.html
@@danielmantione funnily enough "civilized countries" allow people to bring gas inside every one of their homes even though it kills so many people every year just by monoxide carbon poisoning, not even talking about other problems related to it. All the while 210 milllions of Brazilians take a couple of these showers everyday without any problem at all and it has been like that for almost a hundred years. So do not disguise your stupidity and lack of knowledge as some kind of "superiority" or "safety issues", it's kind of pathetic you know...LOL
@@danielmantione the thing is that in Brazil those showers heads are very well regulated. All manufacturers take in consideration the water resistance and design the shower head in such way that the water travels such distance before getting out of the shower head that the resultant resistance is so huge that almost no current flows through it as the heating element is a way smaller resistance in parallel. Almost all of these showers sold today in Brazil are compatible with residual-current breakers, so those are leaking less than 30 mA...
Eu que o diga, levei um choque de um chuveiro desses mês passado, meti a mão atrás do chuveiro sem querer, olha que já levei muito choque consertando aparelhos eletrônicos, mas nenhum chega perto de uma descarga de chuveiro, o pior é que eu tava molhado, simplesmente perdi a força no corpo todo, horrível.
Do houses in Brazil not have a hot water supply? Just seems strange to not have a tank ,or even tankless residential water heater, which is normal in the US.
The real suicide shower were the old ones - made of bare metal. There norms in Brazil requiring ground and and all the other safety devices and it's not a surprise most deaths due to electricity happen in the poorer regions up north where, btw, people usually to turn the shower on because it's too damn hot even during the winter. You are correct - it correlates with poverty even within Brazil - and regulatory agencies don't look closer into the problem since they know how difficult it's for people to follow them. They should, however, not let a store like Leroy Merlin to sell insulated tubular connectors that don't crimp! 10 for one buck while the one with the Inmetro (national standards institution) seal and NBR (technical norms) number cost 1 buck each. (those are local bucks - 1/6 or 1/7 of a British but and 1/5 of a US buck). In 2018 the National Museum located on Rio de Janeiro went to dust after a fire that burned all historic documents, the oldest human found in the Americas and Egyptian mummies brought to Brazil by the Portuguese monarch in 1808. I bet both my arms it was electric failure. Those showers are safe - I don't like them because they leak water and the heating element breaks too often. Electric installations, however, make me worried when I find them. I must say something, though: why people worry about a buzzing coming from the water heater over their heads but don't worry about the buzzing from the kettle when it's on? Wow ... there's a video about the shower from ElectroBOOM also! Soon Veritasium will do one explaining why you can touch live wires - because electricity flows outside the wires!
I learned the hard way, just shocking, in Nayahuru Kenya, Arusha Tanzania and San Jose Costa Rica, that touching this suicide unit, even unplugged, can be an uplifting experience as even the potential difference between the shower head and the floor drain is guaranteed to lift the spirits.
In Latin America those are pretty commonplace. Hot water tanks are expensive (say, $250 or so where the average salary hardly comes to $10.000 a year) while one of those shower heads will run you about $10. I had a few in service for many years, never really gave me any trouble. Even had one installed for heavy use by a high-end certified electrical contractor, no real objections on their part except that a breaker switch needed to be installed near the head for protection of the cable run from panel to shower. In all my years I've never really heard of anyone being injured by one of those. Couple stories about a mild shock here and there, is about it. But then again, most places I've seen them installed have a more or less decent electrical system with protection devices, so a major fault would be stopped if it were to occur. I guess if you had really shoddy electrical work on the building, you might run into a bit more trouble. The most common fault you see with those is a heating element failure. If you look at the element, it's pretty thin, and if anything goes out of bounds by the least bit (water level, current, pressure), the element melts down and the shower is disabled. The upper contacts are plastic and will normally fail open, and the wire connections are high enough to keep away from water splash. Overall I'd say if properly installed and maintained, those showers are pretty safe.
+Mario Melendez I agree. The biggest problem is that many of them were installed by someone who had no business working with electricity. I've seen so many of them installed with exposed wiring and no ground, and that gives everyone the idea that it doesn't matter how you install it.
i used one of these in costa rica and was pretty nervous at first, but i didn't feel any tingling or electrical activity at all. still....no way i'd ever install it at my own house.
I can't decide if I'm more horrified at the fact that something as intrinsically unsafe (although clever) as this actually exists, or the fact that this is a chinese ripoff of said device.
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+Ellen Madden i took a shower on one of these for 5 years! Unless i had a bruise on my fingers i never felt any sign of electric current.
+André Campana Merétika My wife likes to take long showers, but 5 years seems a bit extreme even by her standards.
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***** Your comment only proves how much of a scumbag you are. swear words are not going to make me do anything for you, don't like it? Quit TH-cam then.
The little hose that comes off the shower head is for rinsing your difficult to reach areas. My landlord says we can't use the warmer setting - it will burn out the shower. The lower the pressure, the hotter it gets. We used one at a hotel that had a fuse in it somewhere. They had to change it as we had no warm water the first night.
A metal version of this has been used in the Caribbean. I've vacationed in mountain resorts there and the shower head is connected to regular plumbing with a simple A/C cord that is plugged into a socket about six feet away from the shower. When I first saw this the resort manager said that in all the years (since the 1960s) they've had them, they have never had anyone suffer electrocution. So I guess it must be a well made product.
Makes me think of my poor old fish years ago. There was a fault on the heater that let some current get in the water. I was getting tickled when I touched the water. It didn't seem to bother the fish, but I wonder if the poor buggers were just numb to it. I got them a nice new heater after that.
+Siskin's Bits and Bobs The electrical current in your fish tank wasn't bothering the fish because the fish weren't getting shocked; the electrical charge was the same all around the fish. It would have been the same thing as a bird sitting on a high-voltage power line without getting electrocuted.
People from first world countries seem to lose their utter shit about these, but if the electrical installation is done to code they're absolutely safe and not dangerous at all, not to mention much much more energy efficient than boilers and other such solutions that lose heat to the environment.
I expect a follow-up of this video. You know what to do, so take your camera and the shower head over to the bathroom, install it and show it to us in action ! You also demonstrated your piss illuminating colourful headlamp, so on with it I say.
my shower works this way, actually every eletric shower in brasil works like that, and when when i was a kid they did not had that ground wire and it caused a little, or not soo little, shock when you touch the valve, that was metalic by the way and it was quite probable that it was connected by the water with live from the shower because it wasn't grounded, it was not very safe i think. All brazillian eletric showers are suicide showers and almost all the shower in brazil are eletric. It is safe if well installed
Hi Clive, Yes, these are very common in Brazil. I have been using it all week and every time I visit. I have even replaced these for my mother-in-law. Very simple to install. Few things. the water connector, this you got correct, 2) the wires do feed through the shorter tubing and is generally spliced to a 3-prong plug which connects to a plug high on the wall, 3) the outlet it plugs into is controlled by a switch (you flip the switch on right before you turn on the water and off right after you are done,) 4) the longer hose is an additional shower head to wash your "private" areas or use it to cleans the walls etc, 5) yes I wouldn't advise changing the switch on the shower head while the main power switch is on, you can get a slight shock from that. If installed and used correctly, they arent a problem at all. I kind of wish we had them in the USA. The water is warm right away, the warm water doesnt run out, and you arent paying money to keep a tank of water hot and ready to use and it does save water by not having to leave the water running while waiting for the hot water to arrive. :-)
I live in Argentina and used one of those showers for three years until I moved out (then the unit kept working for two more years until finally broke down). I installed it myself, it was connected straight to the main power line, with wires twisted and insulated with duct tape. I lived in a camper and there was no earth grounding and also no RCD. The walls were of aluminium. I never felt anything but a friend, which is taller than me, took a shower on it and felt that tingling feeling. However I had no idea that the electricity was just running throught the water, I assumed there was some insulation between the resistors and the water. Funny thing, in the house I spend my childhood the house wasn't grounded either. Several metal stuff (like the computer case) would give you an unpleasant shock if you touched it and also touching the ground. We learned to live with it.
i showered in Brazil in a place with hot water shower in 1995. Not only was the shower head as you described,but the terminals were bare screws on the outside. while washing my underarms, I lifted my arm straight up and contacted the bare terminals while soaking wet in the shower. That was NOT the most dangerous thing I ran into in Brazil.
This kind of shower head basically is the only type available here in South America and most houses here don't even have earth circuit at all (mine is one of those lol). I personally dint't had any problem with this things because here we are told since childhood the electricity is very very dangerous. "kid never touch the shower while it is on" :D
+Fabio Guedes I think a good portion of electrical common sense really helps here. In many ways British kids are too sheltered. It usually just takes one mild shock to teach electrical respect. (Maybe more than one in my case.)
yeah I leaned early to not put metal things on wall sockets and well some years later I was graduating in electronic engineering, gonna be electrocuted for the rest of my life :)
Zazzilas Arden Then tell me why out of the millions in use every day, no one is being killed? You fools are like religious zealots. Refuse to admit all of the facts are against you. Have you noticed not one person has disputed that no one is being electrocuted by these? Stop being idiots and face the truth. No one is being electrocuted. Your beliefs, no matter how sincerely held, do not alter facts. Show me even one verifiable instance of someone being electrocuted. If you can't, show some ethics, swallow you pride and admit it. Otherwise, you are arrogant, ignorant fools.
Florian Münch You will note the article did not mention a shower head heater. It said "electric shower" referring that they were in the shower. It could have well been a tank-type heater that was improperly installed or maintained. You use a very thin example to offset the verifiable fact that million of shower head heaters are used every day and no one dies. How like "true believers" to ignore the most obvious facts to maintain ludicrous beliefs.
Wait, are you telling me that being shocked by your shower when you touch it isn't the norm? I've lost the count of how many cold showers I took because I was afraid of changing temperatures when I was a kid.
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It's a common practice in certain, let's say "odd" countries to earth every socket to the nearest conductive waterpipe. I wonder if people install these so that they "ground" it directly to the incoming water pipe...
+Toni Lähdekorpi To be fair, is the pipe was buried in the wall, and better still came from below then it would at least create an equipotential zone.
9 ปีที่แล้ว +18
bigclivedotcom That works in theory, yes. And will be just fine in most cases. But the problem is that it becomes "the norm" and people with no understanding of anything start to do it without having a clue on what they are grounding things into. In extreme cases people might be grounding things to plastic pipes... I've seen those, sadly.
+Sebas Eu I'm not sure which country Toni referred to but in Finland, where I live pipes are generally made of plastic. Old houses also have copper pipes and iron sewers but they begin to be already in need of renovation. In addition, nothing are grounded through the pipeline even though metal pipes supposed to be grounded. I must say though that my heat distribution room is plumbed with copper pipe despite all the incoming and outgoing pipes are made of plastic. I've never seen electric shower heads, not even in Brazil (I was on a business trip in Sorocaba, a few months ago)
Some people do drugs for over 30 years and are still alive, does that mean its safe? Fun fact, a $600 water heater will last on average over 20-30 years, and you have heat from all your faucets, and you don't have a death machine to shower under daily. I'd take a cold shower before I'd use this.
A sort of similar story: I recently lived in a rented apartment in a house that was built around 2012 (this is in Finland). A really nice place. One day I realized when I came back from the gym and took a shower that when I adjusted the water temperature and flow knobs, I felt a kind of tingling in my hand. I thought I just had a nerve compression or smth. It kept happening for weeks until I realized what was happening: I was standing on top of a metallic drain grid that connected me to the wet floor. When I touched the shower knobs I completed a circuit. It turned out the screws attaching the bathroom mirror closet (above the sink) had punctured a wire inside the wall on the living room side, and brought the entire wall into voltage, and when the wall was wet, it began to conduct.
I have been using this system for 14 years and have never heard of anyone ever receiving the slightest shock from one. You Americans are the most poorly educated, but arrogant ,people on earth. FYI, meathead, my two shower heads are on a single breaker of 30 Amps and draw less than 15 amps each at 220V, the standard where I live. In 14 years of living here, I have never heard of anyone being harmed by these They are probably installed in 90% of the homes in Brazil. But maybe Brazil has better standards than where you live.
Haha you're amusing but dumb. First of all I'm not an American, you judging peace of shit. I live in Denmark, where we also have 230V and actually have some standards in how you treat electricial components (with respect so to say). In Denmark it is ILLEGAL to install that shower head, because the safety is completely bullshit (I'm sorry you're to ignorrat to see that). You should not have ANY 230V near running water, and did you know that if 0.04 AMPS ran straight through your heart you would die? I guess not. Does Brazil have better standards than us? What a nice statement, when you do not know shit about me. We do not use those shower heads because we actually have hot water running. Oh is that standard too high? I feel bad for the 90% of homes in Brazil. In Denmark we REUSE the warmth of the heatet water, so is the same as our indoor air. Heat recycling. Why pay for the 5kW? Oh, that must be typical Brazillians. You don't care about how much energy you use.. So poorly educated and arrogant. -The electrician
Madsen You are the totally dumb shithead. An electric water heater works by a heating element immersed in the water, exactly the same as this shower head. Thank you for proving not everyone in Denmark is as smart or as nice as those I have met personally. If these were as dangerous as you claim, people would die every day here. That is not happening, so you would be better served to stop posting here instead of exposing your ignorance. Maybe you are a mental masochist and get a cheap thrill from it?
Wtf is wrong with you, do you market and sell theese shower heads? Its like you're trying to sell me one. I'm telling you, from my perspective in the world - Theese shower heads should not be used because you're putting yourself in danger with 230V/20A straight above your head while you're soaked!! If that makes you hate Denmark, fuck you man! I'm not saying you should change your standards where you live. I didnt start calling everybody stupid.
Madsen WTF is wrong with you? I told you, not one person here has ever been harmed with these. No I do not sell them. I recognize your problem. You are determindly stupid. You know nothing and want to stay that way. Look it up shit for brains. Exactly how many people world-wide have been harmed by these? If any were being electrocuted, especially in an advanced, informed populance such as in Brazil, ever one of these shower heads would be in the trash. You also have ignored the fact that an electric tank-type water heater works exactly the same way. An electric heating element is immersed in the water. Thank you for continuing to demonstrate exactly how stupid you are. Now, kill youself. You are too goddamned dumb to live. Don't bother replying. I will neither reply or eeven read your astonishingly asinine posts. You must be the most ignorant person in Denmark. Are you in a mental institution? Fuck off, you cretin.
I would rather have a cold shower, at least that would not kill me. First found out about these death traps when I did a video tearing down a electric shower and was not to impressed on it's design, but at least it was not this bad.
9 ปีที่แล้ว +2
+TheEPROM9 i took a shower on one of these for 5 years! Unless i had a bruise on my fingers i never felt any sign of electric current.
+André Campana Merétika Yes, this is the exact same comment you are copy-pasting on all videos related to this showers. Are you a seller by any chance?
+TheEPROM9 No you wouldn't. Lived in Central America for years and when these things would break, a cold shower was miserable. Took a shower every day for a year with these and never had a problem.
We have this type of shower everywhere basicly in Brazil. It's pretty safe man, no one ever died eletrified with that. We use cause we have kinda warm water, so no need to ultra hot gas devices, this do the job perfectly
Those are common in Brazil. The hose is not a pressure release valve but actually just a hose to wash your private parts. Most houses don't have a ground wire so shocks are common. I've never heard of any electrocution though, although I think I must happen sometimes.
David Ribeiro Shocks are common? Sorry to break it to you but here in the first world we take exception to getting zapped while washing. I assume by electrocution you mean death. We don't take life that cheaply.
Comprehensiveboy Comprehensiveboy the shower is common. Shocks caused by these showers are not as far as I am aware. And yes... life is ever so precious in USA... suuure.
Hey clive, I live in mexico and these are fairly common here. I had one in my house for a while. Even with proper ground there was a slight electrical "tingle" when touching the shower head. You are wrong about one thing though. the long tube that your said was some sort of pressure relief is actually not a safety mechanism. it is for washing your arse... That aside these things are definitely sketchy but I used it for about 3 years and am still alive...
I live in Ecuador and we used to have a 110V 40A shower like this, a slightly higher end type but the same basic heating approach. Earthing was done, but in any case, this was connected to a decent (but insufficient) size cable, in turn connected to another cable, to another, to a switch, to undersized wiring through a chimney (without any protection). It was replaced by a proper electric instant water heater on a 50A 220V circuit from Stiebel-Eltron with a properly fused new connection with appropriate cable direct from the heater to the meter. The danger of the equipment is the installation. The people that typically have this type of shower, will potentially run it of a simple extension lead and/or worse, twist together the wires with a bit of electrical tape over it. Not safe at the best of times, but near water and with the current this pulls, scary. Also the earthing in many buildings here leaves a lot to be desired, and I'm getting ready to rip out what I can and rewire the majority of the property.
If it's properly connected with brass connectors and 6mm2 wires for 220-250V directly from electric box, it's harmless, the main problem with electric showers with bare coil heater is leakage current in underrated circuits. A shower like this in a sturdy and well dimensioned circuit will be long lasting and will provide hot bath even in cold seasons. In 220 - 250V it's even better, because you can choose for a model even powerful, rated at 7.8kW in the max. level for the European winter. Bare coil heater doesn't require fuses or thermostat because the coil heater will be act like a fuse in case of an overload power or lack of water. Bare coil heater is cheap and easy to replace, the main issue is the terrifying sound of high voltage arc light when it's working, but it's safer than a hair dryer - if well installed...
It is worth mentioning that plain water is mostly non-conductive. Or at least not conductive enough to give a lethal jolt over a distance through a stream of water. It seems like the electrocution potential of this thing stems from introducing a wet human into a situation where there can be exposed mains power and something grounded -- somewhere that the wet human can accidentally touch them at the same time, in a way that completes the circuit through some vital organ. That seems like a lot of things that need to go awry... I wonder how many have actually died from this type of shower head while taking a shower?
It's safe. I think there in northern countries it's less common because it will need to heat much more the water than in tropical countries, resulting in extreme currents and energy consuption. If it weren't by that, they would probably exist there too
It's unsafe and luckily it even cannot be installed in modern houses because of the mandatory 30mA leakage current switch for bathrooms. That will trip instantly with nonsense like this.
As long as the wires are well secured, the body is _completely_ filled with water before you turn on the power and you don't switch temperature with the water running, they are actually quite safe (extra safe if you connect the ground wire to a grounded system). I can understand the shock (no pun intended) of most people in the comments here but as someone who does use one of these, I can safely state that they are far less scary than you guys are thinking (actually not scary at all). I assure you all you are simply not accustomed to the idea of having water and electricity together in the same device and right above your head. These showers are extremely common in Brazil, for example. That bit about being shocked by the water if you get too close to the shower head is silly, though. I've never heard about a single person ever being electrocuted by one of these in my entire life. Just make sure the wires are well secured and keep your hands away from them and there is 0 danger. They are at a certain distance from where the water comes out for a very good reason, you know. As for the reason the wires seem so short, it is because they are meant to be connected directly to the wires coming out of the wall. Electrical showers must not be connected to an outlet due to the heat they can produce so for safety, the wires are supposed to be connected directly to the system, but not simply any wire, either. Houses that use these kinds of showers must have a separate system exclusively for them so to not overload all rest. If for some reason the system or the wires do overheat, the circuit breaker should automatically shut off for safety and to prevent a fire. Also the wires must be of the appropriate thickness and type to they won't overheat with the flow of electricity. Electric showers, if installed correctly, are as safe and harmless as the light bulb above your head in the ceiling right now. Millions of people use these every single day in Brazil, have been for decades and there have never been reports of electrocution by these things. If they were as dangerous as the video made they seem, that country (which mind you, is huge) would have migrated to another type of heating system decades ago, by now.
These videos help me realize the sort of things we take for granted here in the states. I have never even heard of anything so nonsensical! It never even occurred to me that other countries have these bizarre solutions to heating water. Are these even used in the states? I have never seen or heard of it before now.
If you have an electric water heating tank, it's exactly the same thing with some fancier gadgetry Also if the insulation on your wiring wears down as it tends to do over the years, you run the risk of electrifying all of the metal pipes in your house. The only difference is you can't see it if it's worn down unless you check your water tank frequently.
Alexander Unguez not true pal sorry! we use what’s called main and supplementary bonding also cpcs! Coupled with rcd and over current protection! And now arc fault protection
I have an identical shower brand Lorenzeti. I use these for years and years and I am still alive. The important is to keep it to ground and use a circuit braker.
I’m in Colombia right now. I’ve seen some of those showerheads till now, none of them earthed. The one in the apartment I am at now is broken, so we may get a new one and I’ll see whether they even have an earthing connection.
The video is old and there are tons of similar comments here, but I have to say my point of view. Judging by the label, this unit is a copy of a Lorenzetti model. Before finishing the video, as you mentioned, I saw many and many videos entitled "Suicide shower", as they show a badly/poorly installed, scalped(broken/exposed/removed selector), usually in a very low height, mostly of them were in a shithole, even the person that tested it in its own home. This kind of shower is mostly common in houses, as they don't have central heating system. Not in defense of it, as they aren't perfect, and, as any product, they may be defective. If you buy a good brand, and install it properly, including the ground, directly to the wall through a 3 way ceramic connector instead of using a outlet, the most dangerous thing that can happen when the resistor/heater blows, is you taking a cold or less warm bath. Doing a bad installation like the ones shown on stupid sensationalist videos, or changing the resistor/heater without disconnecting the wires, of course it will be deadly. Anyway, like the many others of yours, I enjoyed the video.
Fun fact: in Italy the max amount an household can ask for is 3KW/h. So, unless I am doing the math very wrong, that thing would make my lights go off as soon as I turn it on (or, like a 1 minute after to be more precise)
The water resistivity requirements are best measured between a metal central post and a surrounding pipe. The distance between the two electrical/water contact surfaces should be no more than 0.75 CM apart. The total surface area of each of the contact surfaces should be 1CM^2. I hope this helps!
I remember all of the wiring in my room exploding everytime my roomate tried to use this. That was the wiring's fault though not the unit. Also, most places I lived in didn't have the greatest water pressure so you don't need as much power since the water has more time to heat up in the unit before drizzling on your face.
I've definitely been buzzed by these things a few times. Luckily the countries where I encountered them have climates that are perfect for nice, cold showers :) Your Spanish is great btw :D
TBH this sounds like a good thing for off-grid living seeing as it'd probably be less energy sucking than most other options. Like you suggested, just put it up higher so you can't contact it on accident as easily.
I see a lot of comments from Brazil. About 15 years ago a friend sent me an all metal one from Puerto Rico, and was told they are very common there. It has no ground wire, only a 2 wire chord like you would find on a table lamp. I have never been brave enough to try it.
The non grounded will be better as it will make the shower more refreshing. It will energize you while you get clean (better than a cup of coffee).
+Razor2048
That's a hell of a way to wake up in the morning :/
+gamerathebrave everybody needs a morning kick sometimes :))
+Razor2048 energize is a understatement D:
+john smith LOL
+Razor2048 You could shower with coffee. BAMMMM I'm awake.
When I moved into my house in Texas, I would notice that in the shower I would have this funny feeling over my skin when I would touch the water controls or stand on the drain grate while taking a shower. I first thought it was just a mild allergic reaction to the water supply (I've lived in places before where some of the minerals/chemicals in the water were allergens). When I asked around the community and found that no one else had this problem, I started to investigate.
The discovery occurred when I decided to check for stray AC voltage between the electrical socket and the neutral and ground of the supply socket in the bathroom. I found there was 30VAC going to neutral and ground from the drain grate, drain head, and water controls. I had the power company come out and disconnect the mains supply to my house at the pole outside, and checked again. There was still 30VAC. I now will say that I live across the street from a substation.
Whatever I had said must have concerned the power company because over the next few days they began replacing insulators on the poles near my house and digging up and installing new, longer grounds in the substation lot. They did quite a lot of work over that week and after they were done I checked up on the power situation in the shower. The shower was still 'live' but the voltage had reduced to 8-10VAC, which I could no longer feel when taking a shower. I didn't live there much longer after, so I didn't worry about it too much especially since I didn't feel anything any longer.
Just thought I'd share this with you as this video reminded me of that event.
In the UK there is a requirement to equipotential bond adjacent metalwork in areas like bathrooms and kitchens to prevent any potential difference occurring between metalwork like that.
Ah, in the USA I found they were not nearly as proactive for electrical safety as in my home in Canada. I wonder how much the difference in mains voltage makes in safety design considerations, since in the USA and Canada, are sitting at half the UK mains potential for the standard electric supply.
I still wonder what the ultimate cause was for such a voltage to be present in the shower...? A bad ground in the substation? Current loops through my old piping? Bizarre distribution equipment fault? I'll likely never know now... but at least I lived to tell the tale.
cool_ohm f
Guess you could say that you helped them make an...electrifying revelation?
cool_ohm Being disconnected from grid & getting voltage at shower you are getting a induced voltage from the power station. There is an electromagnetic field cutting the planes of your metal plumbing. A gauss meter can verify & measure. There's apps for that. Run a fence or wire paralell near a high voltage line
& get free power possible.
Yeah, another crazy Brazilian here. As a kid, I used to disassembly these shower heads just for fun. I've used many of worse quality than this one that Big Clive reviewed on this video. It's relatively safe to use, as many other mentioned here. I've never heard of any serious problems with it, just minor shock sensations on some *very* bad installations. I mean, "the live wire touching the metal pipe leading to the metal shower head" type of bad installations. Other than that, I consider these perfectly safe. And it's not just me saying it - it's statistics. Almost every home in Brazil has one of those units working, in either 127v or 220v. Many of these are poorly installed. In 2019, ~700 people were killed by electric shocks in Brazil. Of those, 34,5% happened at home (let's say, 300 cases). I couldn't find how much of these accidents were actually by people showering, but let's say it's 20%. That would give us 60 cases per year, which may seem high, but mind you: our population is about 210 million. We have, on average, 110 people being struck by a lightning every year. ElectroBOOM has a follow-up video on his own video about this type of shower head that is worth watching.
th-cam.com/video/06w3-l1AzFk/w-d-xo.html
That logic is flawed, by the way. Those 60 cases are not just statistics, they are people, someone's loved ones. And unlike lightning strikes, they are 100% preventable by safety measures.
Ah, yeah, I know, but, OTOH, we don't have the numbers from other countries to compare (or do we?), so your argument is 100% valid, but still fallacious like mine. If we're going strictly on logic, the data I found wasn't specific to shower shocks. Where's your data to support your logic? It may not exist...
@@viniciusvbf22 well, i based my point exclusively on logic, not statistics. If harm can be prevented, effort should be put into doing so, not dismissing it because it is insignificant due to statistics. Or else it is just sarcificing lifes for the money/effort, and i'm not a fan of that.
@@voidseeker4394 you don't get my point, but it's OK. You don't have any proof that it's insignificant due to statistics, or even if harm would be prevented otherwise, because, guess what? You don't have data to prove it. As far as we both know and have data to prove, using showers as this is as safe as any other. Your claim is based solely on what you think, which is illogical.
@@voidseeker4394 go live in a country that uses those showers and you’ll find out that those are the least of your problems. Traffic alone is much more likely to kill you. Also regarding the electrical installation, there may be life wires dangling down from a pole on the street. So, better look up. But not too much or you might miss the missing manhole cover and die from that.
I'm actually surprised the Chinese manufacturer of these hasn't advertised the tingling sensation as a feature!
They're made in Brazil
Lucas Rodmo not only in brazil? lmao
@@Spooks12 you're right, I thought this one in specific was a Brazilian brand, but it is a knock off
Who needs a toaster in a bathtub when you can install a heater in your shower
Dang beat me to it by four whole years
Hahaha!
As a brazilian this video was extremely amusing to watch. Like I was watching an alien talking about what cars are.
I've since learned how standard these things are in parts of the world including Brazil. We do have electric showers here in the UK, but it has to be with a wall unit with grounded heating enclosure and sleeved element so there is no current leakage. The Ducha would not be allowed here because it would be considered a shock hazard, particularly in a wet environment where the person showering would have their feet on a wet grounded surface. But it's interesting to see it's widely used elsewhere.
I can see how it looks like a ridicule level of danger, but I have never ever heard of it causing any serious issues, even in those precarious instalations. It is not a continuous stream of water that hits the skin, but a bunch of droplets, so it would not conduct electricity even without a ground (or maybe as we say here, god protects the dumb).
Most of the incidents seem to involve tall tourists who make head contact with the shower while it's on. I'd guess it's a lot safer if mounted a modest height overhead.
They are usually mounted about 2.3m to 2.5m, but you can find them lower on cheap and old hotels, if you use one these in less than 5 or 10 cm from your body, you will get a eletrical shock. Now, the thing is people dont usually die from the shock it self but from passing out and hitting the head. Every body here in Brazil knows not to touch it while in use, but it is ez to imagine a tourist simple putting his hand on it to switch to "hot" while it is on.
It happens, but it is a quite rare ocurence, i only know of one guy that died this way.
This is a BAD copy of brazilian Lorenzetti electric showerhead. The brazilian version is also simple, but is certified. This copy is a big trap!
certified in Brazil maybe...
Certified by a bunch of guys that are barely human (in brazil)
I am a german engineer, spent 3 month in brazil. They know what they are doing, at least as much as non-MIT US engineers do. You find these showerheads there even in most hotels, also nice ones. They should be installed with heat-shrink wire, then they are as save es in-wall electric water heaters imho. Energy-efficient too.
Thiago Teixeira You could be right. There are millions of shower head heaters in Brasil and no one is being electrocuted.
Amar Ken Thanks for you post. As you know, there are millions of these in Brazil and no one is being electrocuted. Nor is anyone being killed by tank-type heaters which also have an electric element immersed in the water. "Shocking" isn't it? :)
ElectroBOOM brought me here
Me too☝
Same here.
X3
Same.
me to. lol so funny to find this forst comment :)
Fun fact: here in Brazil people actually got upset (well, they still are) when the gvmt established that things had to be grounded. The VAST majority of electrical installations and appliances simply aren't, even to this day
Edit: Those showers are the standard here in Brazil. Reading the label I actually think this is a copy of one of the most common models here
Are central hot water heaters not common there?
Not at all, no. You get them in on the south of the country (the little "appendage" hanging from the bottom) which has colder winters and even then most houses will have heating for showers only, rest of the house is straight from the water mains. It's also a "rich people thing" and even there most people will rely on electric showerheads like that one
The general idea is that having earthed appliances is pointless and that standardizing plugs and connectors is futile and wasteful.
+Vile Lasagna, yeah it's totally pointless if the people give no regard whatsoever to others or their own safety. hahaha.
So what do you wash your hands with? Cold water? That doesn't kill any germs.
I used to live in Paraguay, where these are pretty much in every house! I used to work as an electrician there and used to install them. I have installed and used these with RCD's, and they worked fine. And as long as they are earthed, they're absolutely fine. They're literally used by millions of people in South America, every day.
but you at least earthed it. My friend was in cuba and he said, he never had to drink coffee after morning shower.
I usually go to Paraguay and most of the times I just open the faucet normally until I get shocked, at which point I just open it with my flipflops in my hands lol
When I come back home the first thing I do is to take a nice little gas heated shower, it can't kill me unless I lock myself down in the boiler room (so it's a little less painful)
Addicted to Projects bullshit in Argentina and Uruguay they don’t have this rubbish device
Where i live in Dominican Republic theres a lot of houses that use this, and it works great as long that is properly grounded.
I once saw someone charging their phone with the two wires just jammed into the electrical socket with plastic fork spikes. He said the same thing to me, that it's perfectly fine. Glad I was one of the guards of that place at the time so I got them out from there before they shorted anything. -.-
I'm also quite baffled that their phone was fine with being charged with 230 volts.
they are very popular in the caribbean also, however they are imported from Brazil, and they have a removable element for maintenance, we have been using these over 20 years now they typically last for 5 years, and work pretty well.
Hey clive, I'm from brazil and those showerheads are pretty much the standard here. The ones used here are different though and made in brazil following a few guidelines, it has a few safety things in it that makes it so even if you completely ignore all safety, it's still quite ok to be used.
The one you have looks like a cheap ass version from china, which is no wonder since china perfected the art of making things as cheap as possible that are still functional.
Esses chuveiro de 10 conto ahueha
+MasterPlay Essa galera nos comments com medo das Lorenzetti. Mal sabem que nossas gambiarras são de qualidade.
+Icathiann You should see if you can figure out how to get one of your Brazillian made ones to Clive so he can compare them. That said, I am sure it probably would cost more to ship it to the Isle of Man than the cost of the unit itself.
+Caseosio correct
+Caseosio Is there a Brazillian ebay listing with them?
That secondary pipe with the water outlet looks like it might be for redirecting the waterflow to wash yourself, A lot of showerheads are removable from the wall mount with a flex tube.
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
Correct! I can say from first hand experience of using these in South America, that the secondary hose is to wash yourself. When earthed properly, they're fine. Used them for 10 years!
+mictho100 Wow! You replied four times!
+mictho100 Wow! You replied four times!
You Brits are too afraid of electricity. I've been hit with the American 125 volts many times and I'm still fineaeidaksjoaskdjas;
+Braeden Hamson It's just a flesh wound. .! xD
Aye but we have 240 volt which will kill you.
It's not the voltage that kills you.
Witheredgoogie it’s not the amps either
It’s both
@@Alucard-gt1zf , wrong...
I live in Brazil, and these units are standard here. Amazingly, we dont hear about safety problems with that kind of shower. Particularly, I never heard of a single incident in my entire life, and I'm 38. Not that this a proof that this is safe, of course.
ABNT, the regulatory responsible, is more worried about chaging the plug standard for one that is not used elsewhere in the world.
Those units are very popular here in Brazil, 9 out of 10 houses have one. I just asked a friend who used to work in IPT (IPT is a government organization who test out stuff) and he said me that the minimum requirements for sale are a maximum of 30ma in the ground wire and 5ma in the body (yes, 5ma in the plastic body! He said that he tested one with 10ma in the body!). And yes, i had a few bad experiences with this showers, electric shocks, explosions, two wires melted and shorted out ( the house had a 75A fuse in the shower circuit). Love the videos Clive, bye!
For Real.... A bare copper wire stub in the warm water flow, that would form oxide in a day, and then goodbye earth, literally .
Copperoxide conducts, doesn't it?
+ivanjacob I believe that it does, but it has a higher resistance, plus I would be concerned about calcium scale buildup, that would really block it unless some electrolytic action keeps it from forming.
+Helios Haul that's not true.
maybe i should say "that doesn't happen at all".
because it doesn't.
+Helios Haul just put your head between your knees , and kiss your ass goodbye ...
+Helios Haul It should be gold plated
Hey clive, we use this in Brazil, it is used in almost all houses. All the showers legally sold in Brazil must be avaliated by inmetro (and they are very serious) so the shower heads sold in stores here are quite safe actually (not a single accident that i know of). obviously that does not include the ones you can order in the internet from china.
The big problem actually is badly done wiring, made by somebody that does not know what he is doing!, it is very commom in these bad installations to get a small electric shock when you touch the water valve handle, in really badly done ones you get a mild to somewhat strong shock when you touch that handle.
Also this 3 heat thing is not used on newer showers, they now have something like a potentiometer that you turn to choose the optimal temperature.
Also due to their power use (up to 8kw is quite common), they also tend to use quite a lot of energy, and in the end of the month they are responsible for quite a big share in the energy bill.
i have spent quite a few minutes searching, and i only found 2 deaths: one was caused because the guy tried to change the damaged heating element inside WHILE it was live in 2014, and another one in 2013 caused by eletrocution while he was connecting the wires during installation.
During bath i actually only found deaths caused by Carbon monoxide from gas heating.
OH before i forget: ducha also means shower in portuguese.
@@thelbp you're completely wrong.
That extra pipe is for washing your arse!
970357ers I'm laughing out loud here!
I suspect it would give your arse a very special tingle.
What a wonderful idea!
WTF?????
(°ロ°)☝ up the bum bum???
thought you said dippin your testies in the water to check voltage @ 4;45 lol hell of a test kit
The tubing you assumed to be used as venting or to avoid pressure is not at all. It's actually used so you get water from there. When you pull the pin, the shower head will stop dropping water as the tube will fill and after that water will come out, as a hose. It's quite useful when you want to take a shower and not wet your hair. Also this type of heating shower is very common in Brazil, and there isn't much concerns for safety. I never heard of people getting electrocuted with those. As you mentioned taller people Might get some shocks, but usually those should be mounted pretty high (around 2.5 meters from the ground)
And lastly this model is quite cheap, there are better models with more safety features. Including shafts to change the temperature without having to reach the shower head.
When I was backpacking in Peru, these were standard in every hotel/hostel. A few smoked when we turned them on!
Aquatic Logic you sure it wasn't steam from water inside?
yes, sometimes you can also see the spark when you turn them on
Oh man it looks so freaking cheap it hurts
Everybody uses these showers here in Brazil. If installed correctly there is no danger. But it must be installed by someone who are familiarized with it or a professional electrician.
Haha, this is the default shower technology on Brazil, probably 95% of bathrooms use that.
And yes, in most installations people don't bother with the earth wire (in fact, a lot of houses in Brazil still don't have a earth wire anywhere at all, even though it's required by law!).
If the local electrical regulations were enforced strictly, I'd guess about half the country would have to completely redo their properties' electrical systems.
hi clive, where is that made? ducha means shower.
The labeling is in Spanish, but judging by the company name, it's probably from China
The labeling is in Spanish, but judging by the company name, it's probably from China
The labelling is in Spanish, but judging by the company name, I'd guess it's from China
Stupid TH-cam errors, telling me that the comment was not posted and making me type it in 3 times before giving up.
The crazy Weaponcrafter English "shower" is of Germanic origin; it compares to the German word "schauer" which has been replaced in modern times by "dusche." It is also related to Swedish "skur," meaning a rain shower.
Wow, I think they don't allow these even in death row.
+John Obmar That's the best reply yet!
+John Obmar Maybe they should. Save the tax payer some money, and remove the anxiety from that fateful date to a random fateful day.
+John Obmar I agree and this is only because the CO's got tired of resetting the breaker switch or replacing the fuses... lol
+John Obmar rotflmao :DDDDDDD
Showers that kill you? Clearly an idea stolen by Hitler.
The silicone was probably on the earth wire to stop false RCD triggerings. Exciting!
Hi Clive,
Like me you'll be startled to hear that some UK shower manufacturers DID use this live coil in water principle up until just a few years ago! About twenty years back a friend asked me to have a look at their very expensive shower unit (Dolphin??) which had stopped heating.
My jaw dropped when I opened the case to find a clear perspex manifold with a Ni-chrome coil directly in the water flow - albeit a lot fancier and with a much longer water resistance path than the Chinese one you stripped down, it looked equally dangerous to me. Nevertheless, when I checked it out with one of the Principle Engineers in the local electricity board he confirmed that BEAB had indeed (somewhat reluctantly) given approval for water heating devices using this principle.
In the event all I had to do to repair it was to shorten the coil by half an inch (it had corroded at its termination) and off it went like new. I did hear that the owner ultimately died, but he was in his nineties by then so my conscience is clear!
Love the channel, Cheers, Chris
I saw the panel from inside one of them a long time ago. A long snaking channel with the element inside it.
Xavier Bacon In fact, you have never heard of anyone being electrocuted by one of these devices.
The electric tank heaters work the same way. An electric heating elment is immersed in the water. This entire video and 99% of the responses are testimonies to ignorance and a determination to ignore the facts.
In the majority of countries using electrical water heating the heating element is enclosed in a grounded metal sleeve like a kettle element and does not make electrical contact with the water. I do realise these devices are widely used in places like Brazil, but they would not be allowed in the UK due to the genuine shock risk they carry.
bigclivedotcom You are totally wrong. I have repaired many electrical water heaters in the USA and not one was as you describe. Nor are the shower head heaters dangerous. There are millions of them in Brazil. If the were as dangerous as you claim, thousands of people would be electrocuted every day. That would cause talk. ;)
colonelerotic
I know that. That's why I said USA. It makes no difference, it is still true and millions of these shower head heaters are used every day in Brazil alone. If they were even 1% ad dangerous as the claims in the video, thousands of people would be electrocuted every day. That would cause talk, wouldn't it? ;)
I've used these for years in Latin America and it's kind of funny to read the comments section. They are often just open wire nut connected to a 240v 2 phase connection. I've never even heard of them causing any harm to anyone. The heating coils are generally connected by brass crimp fittings and those are corrosion prone. My guess is that there might be some sort of galvanic action taking place that protects the copper grounding wires. When the brass connections fail you need to put in new coils, which are sold in nearly every hardware store.
One thing that most people are not taking into account is that even though you are wet, your not touching anything that makes a good ground in nearly all the places these are used. The pipes in these countries are generally PVC and the floor and walls are either ceramic tiled or painted, none of which makes for a good conductor.
So its a shower head made out of a toaster? 😰
Another interesting video. Been watching you for a couple months and you always seem to get the oddest things in electrical wise. Never even heard of something like this, and I'm sure the electrical board in Canada would have a meltdown if anyone wanted this installed...
Keep up the great vids.
I am from Brazil, in my house I use a 7500W 220V shower grounded and with GFCI with 30mA sensitivity, it works amazingly well. GFCI had pulled off with my electric oven on humid days, but never with the shower.
is that the Chinese version of Lorenzzetti showers?
The little hose is not a blow off. Its just a spray hose to rinse off with. The water follows the path of least resistance when you full the little knob. Use these for over 30 years. Don't ever use a plastic pipe to the unit or pvc in the wall. Ground the pipe and metal extension well and it will never, ever shock you.
The Brazilian Lorenzetti are the best I've ever used.
when you mentioned "naughty bits" and i saw the little switch pop out i got scared for a second but then "phew... ok relax, its just a switch to turn it on or off"
Hi there, nice video.
Those are pretty common here in Brazil (even though this precise one you are showing is made in China). The Brazilian-made ondes come in decent quality and undergo quality control, even though they're not much safer than this one. Unfortunately that's what 99.999% of the people use in Brazil in spite of recent and somewhat though local regulations.
I own a safe version of this called the Quatro Estacoes (Four Seasons) which has a shielded heating element (Just like the american water heaters), an Earth Fault Protection and a Triac based Power Control Unit but is also about 20 times more expensive than the conventional ones. It delivers 7.7KW to the load, which stands for an amazing (steam room-like) shower experience.
The reason why we have that kind of shower head is because (for the most part of the country) our climate does not justify stocking heated water, most of it is heated as needed and the demand itself changes according to the season. On average, we tend to shower twice a day during summer, now imagine a household with 4 people and you would need a whole lot of hot water to meet the demand.
For the record.... "Ducha" means shower in Portuguese..... I know...... pretty duchy..... but yeah, that's what it means no pun intended...
For some 15 years now, there is an increasing number of households using solar heating systems, though those systems are mostly dedicated to swimming pools.
Anyway, that's the perspective from a person who lives in Brasil and has already experienced the "tingling" a lot in the past.
I do agree with you, those are indeed a death trap.
If properly grounded (which is the case for about 20% of the users at best) it can be dangerous but acceptable. Unless, of course, you buy one of the safe versions with shielded elements, then it's actually pretty good.
Thanks for sharing.
Dennis
Those are actually very commom in Brazil. I've used one of those for 20+ years and i'm fine...
I mean, is no Brazilian going to comment on how the wee hose is actually not (at least not primarily) a pressure relief valve but rather a way of getting a manoeuvreable shower head for when you are showering kids or simply to help washing the bathroom? LOL
I'm brazilian, and I am amazed at how frightened people are about electric showers. People not used to it seem to have the feeling that there's no law or regulation on electric showers in latin countries. It is perfectly safe, we brazilians take 1 to 3 showers a day and I've never heard of anyone getting electrocuted by this type of showerhead.
A human that is wet doesn't stand a chance in case of electric shock. Electrical regulations in civilized countries forbid bringing electricity close to the water in bathrooms. Even simple power sockets are forbidden. For good reason.
This device doesn't just bring the electricity near the water, it brings the electricty in the water! Yes, in order to kill a person certain conditions need to be met. So, normally you won't get an electrical shock. But that doesn't mean it is safe.
All that is needed to kill you is a malfunctioning ground wire and just the life wire not being connected (which can happen during operating the switch). I call that a major hazard.
Even with the ground unplugged you don't get a shock. This type of product is sold everywhere, Canada, USA.
What happens if you unplug the earth and lick the shower head? Nothing: th-cam.com/video/06w3-l1AzFk/w-d-xo.html
@@danielmantione funnily enough "civilized countries" allow people to bring gas inside every one of their homes even though it kills so many people every year just by monoxide carbon poisoning, not even talking about other problems related to it. All the while 210 milllions of Brazilians take a couple of these showers everyday without any problem at all and it has been like that for almost a hundred years. So do not disguise your stupidity and lack of knowledge as some kind of "superiority" or "safety issues", it's kind of pathetic you know...LOL
@@NaFran49 Damn, I love u so much ❤️❤️❤️
@@danielmantione the thing is that in Brazil those showers heads are very well regulated. All manufacturers take in consideration the water resistance and design the shower head in such way that the water travels such distance before getting out of the shower head that the resultant resistance is so huge that almost no current flows through it as the heating element is a way smaller resistance in parallel. Almost all of these showers sold today in Brazil are compatible with residual-current breakers, so those are leaking less than 30 mA...
What I learned from this... there are areas of the world that don't have water heaters. I'm amazed by that.
We do, It's on the video watch again
@@udontneedtoknowmyname Who's we? I never mentioned a specific country in this comment from years ago
Every house in Brazil has those and i've bathed with those in my entire life.
They're usually fine, it's just if you fuck it up it's going to electrocute you.
You mean like every electronic device?
Poppin' Loch Ness Hopster It's much easier with these things, most devices don't have water and electricity sitting right next to each other.
Eu que o diga, levei um choque de um chuveiro desses mês passado, meti a mão atrás do chuveiro sem querer, olha que já levei muito choque consertando aparelhos eletrônicos, mas nenhum chega perto de uma descarga de chuveiro, o pior é que eu tava molhado, simplesmente perdi a força no corpo todo, horrível.
Do houses in Brazil not have a hot water supply? Just seems strange to not have a tank ,or even tankless residential water heater, which is normal in the US.
The real suicide shower were the old ones - made of bare metal. There norms in Brazil requiring ground and and all the other safety devices and it's not a surprise most deaths due to electricity happen in the poorer regions up north where, btw, people usually to turn the shower on because it's too damn hot even during the winter. You are correct - it correlates with poverty even within Brazil - and regulatory agencies don't look closer into the problem since they know how difficult it's for people to follow them. They should, however, not let a store like Leroy Merlin to sell insulated tubular connectors that don't crimp! 10 for one buck while the one with the Inmetro (national standards institution) seal and NBR (technical norms) number cost 1 buck each. (those are local bucks - 1/6 or 1/7 of a British but and 1/5 of a US buck). In 2018 the National Museum located on Rio de Janeiro went to dust after a fire that burned all historic documents, the oldest human found in the Americas and Egyptian mummies brought to Brazil by the Portuguese monarch in 1808. I bet both my arms it was electric failure. Those showers are safe - I don't like them because they leak water and the heating element breaks too often. Electric installations, however, make me worried when I find them. I must say something, though: why people worry about a buzzing coming from the water heater over their heads but don't worry about the buzzing from the kettle when it's on?
Wow ... there's a video about the shower from ElectroBOOM also! Soon Veritasium will do one explaining why you can touch live wires - because electricity flows outside the wires!
I learned the hard way, just shocking, in Nayahuru Kenya, Arusha Tanzania and San Jose Costa Rica, that touching this suicide unit, even unplugged, can be an uplifting experience as even the potential difference between the shower head and the floor drain is guaranteed to lift the spirits.
The little head is supposed to be for cleaning the private parts, not a safety valve. These are standard here in Brazil. Zanussi makes them too
In Latin America those are pretty commonplace. Hot water tanks are expensive (say, $250 or so where the average salary hardly comes to $10.000 a year) while one of those shower heads will run you about $10. I had a few in service for many years, never really gave me any trouble. Even had one installed for heavy use by a high-end certified electrical contractor, no real objections on their part except that a breaker switch needed to be installed near the head for protection of the cable run from panel to shower.
In all my years I've never really heard of anyone being injured by one of those. Couple stories about a mild shock here and there, is about it. But then again, most places I've seen them installed have a more or less decent electrical system with protection devices, so a major fault would be stopped if it were to occur. I guess if you had really shoddy electrical work on the building, you might run into a bit more trouble.
The most common fault you see with those is a heating element failure. If you look at the element, it's pretty thin, and if anything goes out of bounds by the least bit (water level, current, pressure), the element melts down and the shower is disabled. The upper contacts are plastic and will normally fail open, and the wire connections are high enough to keep away from water splash.
Overall I'd say if properly installed and maintained, those showers are pretty safe.
+Mario Melendez I agree. The biggest problem is that many of them were installed by someone who had no business working with electricity. I've seen so many of them installed with exposed wiring and no ground, and that gives everyone the idea that it doesn't matter how you install it.
i used one of these in costa rica and was pretty nervous at first, but i didn't feel any tingling or electrical activity at all. still....no way i'd ever install it at my own house.
I can't decide if I'm more horrified at the fact that something as intrinsically unsafe (although clever) as this actually exists, or the fact that this is a chinese ripoff of said device.
+Ellen Madden i took a shower on one of these for 5 years! Unless i had a bruise on my fingers i never felt any sign of electric current.
+André Campana Merétika YEE
+André Campana Merétika My wife likes to take long showers, but 5 years seems a bit extreme even by her standards.
***** Your comment only proves how much of a scumbag you are. swear words are not going to make me do anything for you, don't like it? Quit TH-cam then.
André Campana Merétika
boo hoo.
The little hose that comes off the shower head is for rinsing your difficult to reach areas. My landlord says we can't use the warmer setting - it will burn out the shower. The lower the pressure, the hotter it gets.
We used one at a hotel that had a fuse in it somewhere. They had to change it as we had no warm water the first night.
A metal version of this has been used in the Caribbean. I've vacationed in mountain resorts there and the shower head is connected to regular plumbing with a simple A/C cord that is plugged into a socket about six feet away from the shower. When I first saw this the resort manager said that in all the years (since the 1960s) they've had them, they have never had anyone suffer electrocution. So I guess it must be a well made product.
Makes me think of my poor old fish years ago. There was a fault on the heater that let some current get in the water. I was getting tickled when I touched the water. It didn't seem to bother the fish, but I wonder if the poor buggers were just numb to it. I got them a nice new heater after that.
+Siskin's Bits and Bobs The fish was not grounded , you where . The fish would be fine .
+Siskin's Bits and Bobs The electrical current in your fish tank wasn't bothering the fish because the fish weren't getting shocked; the electrical charge was the same all around the fish. It would have been the same thing as a bird sitting on a high-voltage power line without getting electrocuted.
Don't people fish by electrocuting water, though?
+Travis B coley shanoz
+Siskin's Bits and Bobs I had a fish tank heater crack once and it fried, I mean boiled, my fish!
I would say about 95% of showers in Brazil works like this one. I have two myself at my home, and they are pretty safe
kkk sim, nunca vi ninguém morrer
People from first world countries seem to lose their utter shit about these, but if the electrical installation is done to code they're absolutely safe and not dangerous at all, not to mention much much more energy efficient than boilers and other such solutions that lose heat to the environment.
Luiz Fellipe Carneiro needs a ground /earth or can end badly
Electricity is more expensive than gas.
uK8cvPAq not over here it isn't.
I expect a follow-up of this video.
You know what to do, so take your camera and the shower head over to the bathroom, install it and show it to us in action !
You also demonstrated your piss illuminating colourful headlamp, so on with it I say.
dear God don't encourage that.
+Peter “Crackpot Pete” Carlson It has to be done, I'm afraid.
+Phrea Nix no, it doesn't. that's why we have the equations of physics that tell us exactly how much water 5 kw will heat and to how many degrees
+Peter “Crackpot Pete” Carlson No, I'm with Phrea, we definitely need video evidence to be sure. Equations are often wrong.
+JamstaUK To be fair, I don't think you can fault the laws of thermo-dynamics.
my shower works this way, actually every eletric shower in brasil works like that, and when when i was a kid they did not had that ground wire and it caused a little, or not soo little, shock when you touch the valve, that was metalic by the way and it was quite probable that it was connected by the water with live from the shower because it wasn't grounded, it was not very safe i think. All brazillian eletric showers are suicide showers and almost all the shower in brazil are eletric. It is safe if well installed
Peoples that die with gás sistem for warm water: hundreds for year.
Peoples that die with electric showers: 0 for year.
The very definition of nope.
Hi Clive,
Yes, these are very common in Brazil. I have been using it all week and every time I visit. I have even replaced these for my mother-in-law. Very simple to install. Few things. the water connector, this you got correct, 2) the wires do feed through the shorter tubing and is generally spliced to a 3-prong plug which connects to a plug high on the wall, 3) the outlet it plugs into is controlled by a switch (you flip the switch on right before you turn on the water and off right after you are done,) 4) the longer hose is an additional shower head to wash your "private" areas or use it to cleans the walls etc, 5) yes I wouldn't advise changing the switch on the shower head while the main power switch is on, you can get a slight shock from that.
If installed and used correctly, they arent a problem at all. I kind of wish we had them in the USA. The water is warm right away, the warm water doesnt run out, and you arent paying money to keep a tank of water hot and ready to use and it does save water by not having to leave the water running while waiting for the hot water to arrive. :-)
on this episode of 1000 ways to die:
in the shower.
I live in Argentina and used one of those showers for three years until I moved out (then the unit kept working for two more years until finally broke down). I installed it myself, it was connected straight to the main power line, with wires twisted and insulated with duct tape. I lived in a camper and there was no earth grounding and also no RCD. The walls were of aluminium.
I never felt anything but a friend, which is taller than me, took a shower on it and felt that tingling feeling.
However I had no idea that the electricity was just running throught the water, I assumed there was some insulation between the resistors and the water.
Funny thing, in the house I spend my childhood the house wasn't grounded either. Several metal stuff (like the computer case) would give you an unpleasant shock if you touched it and also touching the ground. We learned to live with it.
i showered in Brazil in a place with hot water shower in 1995. Not only was the shower head as you described,but the terminals were bare screws on the outside. while washing my underarms, I lifted my arm straight up and contacted the bare terminals while soaking wet in the shower. That was NOT the most dangerous thing I ran into in Brazil.
This kind of shower head basically is the only type available here in South America and most houses here don't even have earth circuit at all (mine is one of those lol). I personally dint't had any problem with this things because here we are told since childhood the electricity is very very dangerous. "kid never touch the shower while it is on" :D
+Fabio Guedes I think a good portion of electrical common sense really helps here. In many ways British kids are too sheltered. It usually just takes one mild shock to teach electrical respect. (Maybe more than one in my case.)
yeah I leaned early to not put metal things on wall sockets and well some years later I was graduating in electronic engineering, gonna be electrocuted for the rest of my life :)
Ehh id rather go showerless for a month than die
Donteo50 I would rather shower on a river. Or thermal waters
why would anyone use it after knowing how dangerous and risky this piece of shit is.
It is not dangerous. Only the idiocy of the poster of this video is dangerous.
Truth teller It is dangerous
Zazzilas Arden Then tell me why out of the millions in use every day, no one is being killed?
You fools are like religious zealots. Refuse to admit all of the facts are against you. Have you noticed not one person has disputed that no one is being electrocuted by these? Stop being idiots and face the truth. No one is being electrocuted. Your beliefs, no matter how sincerely held, do not alter facts. Show me even one verifiable instance of someone being electrocuted. If you can't, show some ethics, swallow you pride and admit it. Otherwise, you are arrogant, ignorant fools.
Florian Münch You will note the article did not mention a shower head heater. It said "electric shower" referring that they were in the shower. It could have well been a tank-type heater that was improperly installed or maintained. You use a very thin example to offset the verifiable fact that million of shower head heaters are used every day and no one dies. How like "true believers" to ignore the most obvious facts to maintain ludicrous beliefs.
www.reddit.com/r/travel/comments/14cu9b/my_sister_got_electrocuted_in_peru_while/
it is very dangerous to use it when it is raining... lightning strikes can kill you while you using eletronics in your house.
That is totally true. Number one thing you learn in Brazil is never take a shower when is lightning.
Wait, are you telling me that being shocked by your shower when you touch it isn't the norm?
I've lost the count of how many cold showers I took because I was afraid of changing temperatures when I was a kid.
It's a common practice in certain, let's say "odd" countries to earth every socket to the nearest conductive waterpipe. I wonder if people install these so that they "ground" it directly to the incoming water pipe...
+Toni Lähdekorpi To be fair, is the pipe was buried in the wall, and better still came from below then it would at least create an equipotential zone.
bigclivedotcom That works in theory, yes. And will be just fine in most cases.
But the problem is that it becomes "the norm" and people with no understanding of anything start to do it without having a clue on what they are grounding things into.
In extreme cases people might be grounding things to plastic pipes... I've seen those, sadly.
+Toni Lähdekorpi Best "ground" I've seen was a very large earth wire bolted to a brick wall with a rawlbolt.
+bigclivedotcom I would've loved to see the "desing meeting" where that solution was laid out...
+Sebas Eu I'm not sure which country Toni referred to but in Finland, where I live pipes are generally made of plastic. Old houses also have copper pipes and iron sewers but they begin to be already in need of renovation. In addition, nothing are grounded through the pipeline even though metal pipes supposed to be grounded. I must say though that my heat distribution room is plumbed with copper pipe despite all the incoming and outgoing pipes are made of plastic.
I've never seen electric shower heads, not even in Brazil (I was on a business trip in Sorocaba, a few months ago)
have you ever been in Marokko?
HORRIBLE electrics there. (and other countries like them)
a nightmare
Morocco*
Unless you speak dutch like me.
*****
yes never been in this region
30 years using this shower every day and i still alive.
No. A good eletric shower works for years.
Some people do drugs for over 30 years and are still alive, does that mean its safe?
Fun fact, a $600 water heater will last on average over 20-30 years, and you have heat from all your faucets, and you don't have a death machine to shower under daily.
I'd take a cold shower before I'd use this.
@@Towlieee 400 million people do drugs for over 30 years? If not, its a bad analogy
@@Towlieee The problem never was the costs of a gas water heater, but the gas itself.
A sort of similar story: I recently lived in a rented apartment in a house that was built around 2012 (this is in Finland). A really nice place. One day I realized when I came back from the gym and took a shower that when I adjusted the water temperature and flow knobs, I felt a kind of tingling in my hand. I thought I just had a nerve compression or smth. It kept happening for weeks until I realized what was happening:
I was standing on top of a metallic drain grid that connected me to the wet floor. When I touched the shower knobs I completed a circuit. It turned out the screws attaching the bathroom mirror closet (above the sink) had punctured a wire inside the wall on the living room side, and brought the entire wall into voltage, and when the wall was wet, it began to conduct.
2:30 dood, i think that that thing is a little shower bit to have a precise shower at your dirty or something.
No-one ever uses those for anything
5kW and 20 amps?? Get that shit out of your shower and burn it!
I have been using this system for 14 years and have never heard of anyone ever receiving the slightest shock from one. You Americans are the most poorly educated, but arrogant ,people on earth.
FYI, meathead, my two shower heads are on a single breaker of 30 Amps and draw less than 15 amps each at 220V, the standard where I live. In 14 years of living here, I have never heard of anyone being harmed by these They are probably installed in 90% of the homes in Brazil. But maybe Brazil has better standards than where you live.
Haha you're amusing but dumb. First of all I'm not an American, you judging peace of shit.
I live in Denmark, where we also have 230V and actually have some standards in how you treat electricial components (with respect so to say). In Denmark it is ILLEGAL to install that shower head, because the safety is completely bullshit (I'm sorry you're to ignorrat to see that). You should not have ANY 230V near running water, and did you know that if 0.04 AMPS ran straight through your heart you would die? I guess not.
Does Brazil have better standards than us? What a nice statement, when you do not know shit about me. We do not use those shower heads because we actually have hot water running. Oh is that standard too high?
I feel bad for the 90% of homes in Brazil. In Denmark we REUSE the warmth of the heatet water, so is the same as our indoor air. Heat recycling. Why pay for the 5kW? Oh, that must be typical Brazillians. You don't care about how much energy you use.. So poorly educated and arrogant.
-The electrician
Madsen You are the totally dumb shithead. An electric water heater works by a heating element immersed in the water, exactly the same as this shower head.
Thank you for proving not everyone in Denmark is as smart or as nice as those I have met personally.
If these were as dangerous as you claim, people would die every day here. That is not happening, so you would be better served to stop posting here instead of exposing your ignorance. Maybe you are a mental masochist and get a cheap thrill from it?
Wtf is wrong with you, do you market and sell theese shower heads? Its like you're trying to sell me one.
I'm telling you, from my perspective in the world - Theese shower heads should not be used because you're putting yourself in danger with 230V/20A straight above your head while you're soaked!! If that makes you hate Denmark, fuck you man!
I'm not saying you should change your standards where you live. I didnt start calling everybody stupid.
Madsen WTF is wrong with you? I told you, not one person here has ever been harmed with these. No I do not sell them.
I recognize your problem. You are determindly stupid. You know nothing and want to stay that way. Look it up shit for brains. Exactly how many people world-wide have been harmed by these? If any were being electrocuted, especially in an advanced, informed populance such as in Brazil, ever one of these shower heads would be in the trash.
You also have ignored the fact that an electric tank-type water heater works exactly the same way. An electric heating element is immersed in the water.
Thank you for continuing to demonstrate exactly how stupid you are. Now, kill youself. You are too goddamned dumb to live.
Don't bother replying. I will neither reply or eeven read your astonishingly asinine posts. You must be the most ignorant person in Denmark. Are you in a mental institution? Fuck off, you cretin.
Am I the only one who's wondering why its in my recommended, and why I watched the whole thing
You watched the whole thing because that's what people do when a BIGCLIVEDOTCOM video is on! As Mr. Holmes would say, " It's elementary dear Watson "
I would rather have a cold shower, at least that would not kill me. First found out about these death traps when I did a video tearing down a electric shower and was not to impressed on it's design, but at least it was not this bad.
+TheEPROM9 i took a shower on one of these for 5 years! Unless i had a bruise on my fingers i never felt any sign of electric current.
+André Campana Merétika Yes, this is the exact same comment you are copy-pasting on all videos related to this showers. Are you a seller by any chance?
+TheEPROM9 No you wouldn't. Lived in Central America for years and when these things would break, a cold shower was miserable. Took a shower every day for a year with these and never had a problem.
+André Campana Merétika I took a shower using one of these and it killed me instantly.
Ian Gacek
Cold showers are insainly unpleasant.
We have this type of shower everywhere basicly in Brazil. It's pretty safe man, no one ever died eletrified with that. We use cause we have kinda warm water, so no need to ultra hot gas devices, this do the job perfectly
Those are common in Brazil. The hose is not a pressure release valve but actually just a hose to wash your private parts. Most houses don't have a ground wire so shocks are common. I've never heard of any electrocution though, although I think I must happen sometimes.
David Ribeiro Shocks are common? Sorry to break it to you but here in the first world we take exception to getting zapped while washing. I assume by electrocution you mean death. We don't take life that cheaply.
Comprehensiveboy Comprehensiveboy Actually in America we take life cheap as hell as long as we don't have to actually see it happen
Comprehensiveboy Comprehensiveboy the shower is common. Shocks caused by these showers are not as far as I am aware.
And yes... life is ever so precious in USA... suuure.
If I felt even a small tingle from my shower the electrician would be in deep shit and probably risk having his certificate revoked.
The whole thing seems extremely dodgy.
Hey clive, I live in mexico and these are fairly common here. I had one in my house for a while. Even with proper ground there was a slight electrical "tingle" when touching the shower head. You are wrong about one thing though. the long tube that your said was some sort of pressure relief is actually not a safety mechanism. it is for washing your arse... That aside these things are definitely sketchy but I used it for about 3 years and am still alive...
I'm waiting for the inevitable electrode-boiler version of this, for maximum danger.
I live in Ecuador and we used to have a 110V 40A shower like this, a slightly higher end type but the same basic heating approach. Earthing was done, but in any case, this was connected to a decent (but insufficient) size cable, in turn connected to another cable, to another, to a switch, to undersized wiring through a chimney (without any protection). It was replaced by a proper electric instant water heater on a 50A 220V circuit from Stiebel-Eltron with a properly fused new connection with appropriate cable direct from the heater to the meter. The danger of the equipment is the installation. The people that typically have this type of shower, will potentially run it of a simple extension lead and/or worse, twist together the wires with a bit of electrical tape over it. Not safe at the best of times, but near water and with the current this pulls, scary. Also the earthing in many buildings here leaves a lot to be desired, and I'm getting ready to rip out what I can and rewire the majority of the property.
If it's properly connected with brass connectors and 6mm2 wires for 220-250V directly from electric box, it's harmless, the main problem with electric showers with bare coil heater is leakage current in underrated circuits. A shower like this in a sturdy and well dimensioned circuit will be long lasting and will provide hot bath even in cold seasons. In 220 - 250V it's even better, because you can choose for a model even powerful, rated at 7.8kW in the max. level for the European winter.
Bare coil heater doesn't require fuses or thermostat because the coil heater will be act like a fuse in case of an overload power or lack of water. Bare coil heater is cheap and easy to replace, the main issue is the terrifying sound of high voltage arc light when it's working, but it's safer than a hair dryer - if well installed...
why tf am i watching this randomly at 4 in the morning?
Suicide shower? Where can I buy this?!?!
Kiyomi no pls don't live LIVE!
Ben Biggs www.amazon.com/electrical-shower-head174
Kiyomi Every where in Mexico.
I use it everyday, I ain't afraid of it.
It is worth mentioning that plain water is mostly non-conductive. Or at least not conductive enough to give a lethal jolt over a distance through a stream of water. It seems like the electrocution potential of this thing stems from introducing a wet human into a situation where there can be exposed mains power and something grounded -- somewhere that the wet human can accidentally touch them at the same time, in a way that completes the circuit through some vital organ. That seems like a lot of things that need to go awry... I wonder how many have actually died from this type of shower head while taking a shower?
It's safe. I think there in northern countries it's less common because it will need to heat much more the water than in tropical countries, resulting in extreme currents and energy consuption. If it weren't by that, they would probably exist there too
It's unsafe and luckily it even cannot be installed in modern houses because of the mandatory 30mA leakage current switch for bathrooms. That will trip instantly with nonsense like this.
Never heard of anyone being killed by this type of shower. It is not the best one out there but it works just fine in a tropical country like Brazil.
As long as the wires are well secured, the body is _completely_ filled with water before you turn on the power and you don't switch temperature with the water running, they are actually quite safe (extra safe if you connect the ground wire to a grounded system). I can understand the shock (no pun intended) of most people in the comments here but as someone who does use one of these, I can safely state that they are far less scary than you guys are thinking (actually not scary at all). I assure you all you are simply not accustomed to the idea of having water and electricity together in the same device and right above your head. These showers are extremely common in Brazil, for example. That bit about being shocked by the water if you get too close to the shower head is silly, though. I've never heard about a single person ever being electrocuted by one of these in my entire life. Just make sure the wires are well secured and keep your hands away from them and there is 0 danger. They are at a certain distance from where the water comes out for a very good reason, you know.
As for the reason the wires seem so short, it is because they are meant to be connected directly to the wires coming out of the wall. Electrical showers must not be connected to an outlet due to the heat they can produce so for safety, the wires are supposed to be connected directly to the system, but not simply any wire, either. Houses that use these kinds of showers must have a separate system exclusively for them so to not overload all rest. If for some reason the system or the wires do overheat, the circuit breaker should automatically shut off for safety and to prevent a fire. Also the wires must be of the appropriate thickness and type to they won't overheat with the flow of electricity.
Electric showers, if installed correctly, are as safe and harmless as the light bulb above your head in the ceiling right now. Millions of people use these every single day in Brazil, have been for decades and there have never been reports of electrocution by these things. If they were as dangerous as the video made they seem, that country (which mind you, is huge) would have migrated to another type of heating system decades ago, by now.
That's just sounded kind of rude, but i can see your point.
These videos help me realize the sort of things we take for granted here in the states. I have never even heard of anything so nonsensical! It never even occurred to me that other countries have these bizarre solutions to heating water. Are these even used in the states? I have never seen or heard of it before now.
Deeker Jones Now you understand the invisible benefits of basic government safety regulations
That's shithole country safety standards for ya.
If you have an electric water heating tank, it's exactly the same thing with some fancier gadgetry Also if the insulation on your wiring wears down as it tends to do over the years, you run the risk of electrifying all of the metal pipes in your house. The only difference is you can't see it if it's worn down unless you check your water tank frequently.
Alexander Unguez not true pal sorry! we use what’s called main and supplementary bonding also cpcs! Coupled with rcd and over current protection! And now arc fault protection
I have an identical shower brand Lorenzeti. I use these for years and years and I am still alive.
The important is to keep it to ground and use a circuit braker.
I’m in Colombia right now. I’ve seen some of those showerheads till now, none of them earthed. The one in the apartment I am at now is broken, so we may get a new one and I’ll see whether they even have an earthing connection.
So it's a toaster in a showerhear. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't that.
+Rabid Rabbit Rabbi There's a switch to adjust how dark you want your human to be.
I'm not risking my life under one of these. This looks utterly dangerous!!
200 million people use it daily and no one dies
@@piadas804 Hi okay well in that case it has to be safe.
The video is old and there are tons of similar comments here, but I have to say my point of view. Judging by the label, this unit is a copy of a Lorenzetti model. Before finishing the video, as you mentioned, I saw many and many videos entitled "Suicide shower", as they show a badly/poorly installed, scalped(broken/exposed/removed selector), usually in a very low height, mostly of them were in a shithole, even the person that tested it in its own home. This kind of shower is mostly common in houses, as they don't have central heating system. Not in defense of it, as they aren't perfect, and, as any product, they may be defective. If you buy a good brand, and install it properly, including the ground, directly to the wall through a 3 way ceramic connector instead of using a outlet, the most dangerous thing that can happen when the resistor/heater blows, is you taking a cold or less warm bath. Doing a bad installation like the ones shown on stupid sensationalist videos, or changing the resistor/heater without disconnecting the wires, of course it will be deadly. Anyway, like the many others of yours, I enjoyed the video.
Fun fact: in Italy the max amount an household can ask for is 3KW/h. So, unless I am doing the math very wrong, that thing would make my lights go off as soon as I turn it on (or, like a 1 minute after to be more precise)
The water resistivity requirements are best measured between a metal central post and a surrounding pipe. The distance between the two electrical/water contact surfaces should be no more than 0.75 CM apart. The total surface area of each of the contact surfaces should be 1CM^2. I hope this helps!
Instead of hooking into the mains, wouldn't it be safer to give a waterproof battery pack and stick a 9V or a couple of D cells in there?
These things are rated about 5000W so the battery pack would have to deliver about 1000A for the duration of the shower.
Yikes... would need a pretty large pack then...
not very safe for your bank account
What about using an isolation transformer? Would that do much to make it safer?
Yosef MacGruber The cost of a 5000VA (5kVA) transformer would be huge.
I remember all of the wiring in my room exploding everytime my roomate tried to use this. That was the wiring's fault though not the unit. Also, most places I lived in didn't have the greatest water pressure so you don't need as much power since the water has more time to heat up in the unit before drizzling on your face.
I've definitely been buzzed by these things a few times. Luckily the countries where I encountered them have climates that are perfect for nice, cold showers :)
Your Spanish is great btw :D
TBH this sounds like a good thing for off-grid living seeing as it'd probably be less energy sucking than most other options. Like you suggested, just put it up higher so you can't contact it on accident as easily.
I see a lot of comments from Brazil. About 15 years ago a friend sent me an all metal one from Puerto Rico, and was told they are very common there. It has no ground wire, only a 2 wire chord like you would find on a table lamp. I have never been brave enough to try it.