How I electrified our towel rails

We disconnected our gas supply earlier in the year, and replaced our central heating with an air-to-air heat pump system. But that meant we no longer had a way to heat our towel rails, so in this video I show what I did to rectify that problem.
Link to the towel rail immersion inserts that I bought:
www.amazon.co.uk/Valdern-ELEC...
All the other stuff can be found in any good hardware store.
Total cost for upgrading these three towel rails was about £200 but that includes the extra tools and drill bits I bought that I can use for other projects.
Our system summary:
6.8 kWp solar array split E/W
5 kW Gen 2 GivEnergy hybrid inverter
14.7 kWh GivEnergy batteries
A2A heat pump heating system
Fiat 500e EV
00:00 Introduction
01:01 Part 1: basic setup
07:52 Part 2: DIY details
20:49 Closing remarks
Please note that Tim is not a professional consultant, just an enthusiastic amateur, so cannot reply to requests for advice or opinions on specific systems or green investment opportunities. Thank you for your understanding.
Support the channel and get £50 of credit by switching to Octopus Energy using my referral code:
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[@classictrafics]

Hi Tim, part p electrician here, only recently started watching your channel but enjoying so far. What you’ve done here is not only perfectly legal it is also done to a high standard. The bonding/earthing situation others have referred to is not a problem as the towel rail cannot bring in an earth potential from the water pipes as they’ve been disconnected (and were probably made of plastic further back anyway). The only reason you would need to earth the towel rail is because it is now an electrical appliance, and the earth wire in the element would do that. From a regs point of view these are not new circuits as they’re on a plug so just extended appliances essentially. The only thing I would be concerned with is those crimp connectors, if you use a heavy duty ratchet crimper with the right heads then they’re fine but most others like those wire strippers won’t really be up to it, I’d recommend in line wago connectors if you can fit them in the trunking, if not then redo the crimps with a ratchet crimper. Otherwise very good work and with the smart plugs this setup is actually better in my opinion than hard wiring them in.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Cool, thanks for the confirmation, I appreciate it. I'll take a look at getting a ratchet crimper, or else see if I can fit wago connectors. For the record, I did press as hard as I could when crimping those connectors and did a tug test to make sure they were gripping tightly but no harm in getting a better tool for the job.

[@classictrafics]

@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk Yeah, they're probably fine, just something to consider really. The tug test is a good check to do.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@classictrafics I've just ordered myself a ratchet crimper anyway as it looks like another useful tool to have available. I might redo those crimps just be sure. Thanks for the pointer!

[@Ben-gm9lo]

Awesome, some qualified reassurance of a job well done. Tim, perhaps you should try to get a contact for classictrafics. Always useful to have a proper spark to bounce ideas off and you already have him hooked with your content! Ofc this is a fairly futile comment, but comments raise your profile and I too like what you and the lovely Kat do on your channel.@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@Ben-gm9lo Haha! Yes, indeed, never hurts to have a qualified person to check with. Prior to starting this project I did research the options as thoroughly as possible to try and ensure I was doing things right, and couldn't find anything to suggest my plan was dodgy in any way, but you can never be 100% sure without professional input, as you say. I'm glad you enjoy the channel.

[@marks3056]

Tidy work, Tim!

[@hicksonb]

Did this leveraging this vid, great resource, thanks Tim!! Takes longer to heat up than I thought, circa 30 mins… but stays warm for an hour after turn off. Interest to hear what others are doing for their timings and automations

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Glad to hear it.

[@peterroper6055]

Thanks very much for the demo - will plan to follow your design now.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

No problem. Good luck!

[@boomerang2]

from a novice DIY'er i think you did a brilliant job Tim and I'd never be as creative in a solution. Great effort and research. I am having some refurbishment work done on my house and need to have fused spurs installed. A bit annoying that a wifi fused spur is ~£50 but a smart plug like yours is only a tenner! I need 4 including the h/w tank immersion.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Ah, I didn't know you could get WiFi fused spurs, that's neat. I guess that saves you needing to find a socket to plug them into. We were lucky that we had some unused sockets in convenient locations that allowed for the smart plug solution.

[@David-bl1bt]

well implemented, well explained.... a good job well done.👍

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Thank you.

[@Joe-lb8qn]

Thanks, I've been considering doing this.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

No problem. And good luck!

[@lyracian]

Great video (and feeding the algorithm)

[@nicflanagan6662]

An interesting project & well executed. Not cold enough yet, in our extension i put in zoned electric underfloor heating. Im looking to test the performance and consumption on the 2-5am element of the Flux tariff. 🤞

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Yup, I just run our one for half an hour in the off peak period and that dries the towels nicely so far. Don't really need it to heat the room at the moment but we'll see.

[@Pablo-tw7tt]

Nice work Tim. I took a slightly different approach and went for a belt and braces design. As our bathroom is fairly large, I added an additional 700w electric radiator and connected it to the Eddi unit in Hot-water tank cupboard, which conveniently is also in the bathroom. So now I can still heat on gas but if there's surplus solar energy or an Agile price plunge I can take advantage of it as well.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Ah, very neat. Theoretically we have a second eddi input we could use for the towel rails but it would mean putting in a whole extra dedicated circuit upstairs, which would be a pain to do, so we decided against that.

[@Pablo-tw7tt]

Agreed. But in the bathroom it was very convenient luckily.@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@Pablo-tw7tt yeah, very handy. I'd have certainly done it if it had been that convenient!

[@richardwilson31]

Hi Tim, I'm a retired building services engineer. Your installation looks very tidy, I can understand you being happy with what you have done, it looks a very nest jobs but I would like to make some comments on a couple of points that I think you have overlooked, please don't take this to heart. Your trunking looks very neat but I don't like your hidden taped crimped connection, to me the quality of the joint is suspect and could overheat, I think this is why electrical regs call for Wago connectors on hidden connections on mains circuits. Admittedly it doesn't apply in this case but practically it is still a heating circuit drawing a continuous load, it would of been better if the cable could of been replaced in its entirety with no hidden joints between the element and the plug, but that may not of been possible. Your point regarding not overfilling is very important and relevant, expansion must be allowed, however their is no pressure relief valve on this system, should the overheat contactor fail in the element the temperature could rise to boiling point and pressurise the radiator until a joint fails, releasing scalding hot water into the bathroom. I used to work with high pressure systems so my concerns may be excessive but worthy of consideration, Richy

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Yup, as it happens I have replaced the crimps with wago connectors, although this towel rail is rarely used so it's probably not a huge deal. We only have the main ensuite one on for an hour a day (the others are only used when we have guests), so hopefully also less likely to suffer from overheating, but I'll look into sourcing some pressure release valves just to be sure.

[@JohnR31415]

I’d also add a line of sealant across the top of the blanking plate - drip loop protects from one direction.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Yup, fair point.

[@paulanderson6903]

To be fair the electrical connection is not in the box. That’s just a vanity cover.

[@MrKlawUK]

we had electric radiators fitted years ago when we had the bathrooms done as they were never heated before..more recently I had shelly PM1s fitted behind the backbox to act like smart switches but without a plug. Aside from app control manually I also have an automatic humidity control using a wireless thermometer/humidistat (?) - in home assistant so if the humidity hits 80% in the bathroom it'll turn the towel rail on for a couple of hours because that means someone is having a shower.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Very neat. One day I'll get around to trying out Home Assistant.

[@nubie34]

I put in a TCP Smart 500w elec. towel rail, great, but complicated. Aiming to use cheap rate and excess energy for a lovely warm bathroom.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Yup, a reasonable alternative.

[@terrymackenzie6784]

You may want to check with an electrician but I think you may find you need a parent earth connection for metalwork in the bathroom

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Will do.

[@JohnR31415]

Yeah, without the pipes hooked up they have no earth any more - though if the elements have a protective earth wired in - you might be ok. Worth getting someone to check the earth.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@JohnR31415 the element definitely has an earth wire but I will get someone to check. I'm thinking if the pipes in the wall are earthed somehow (even though I think they connect to plastic pipes inside the wall) I could put an earth connection between the towel rail and the pipe stumps sticking out the wall?

[@Ben-gm9lo]

I am not a spark, but a keen DIYer with academic qualifications in the matter. Hopefully a Part P spark will see and respond to your question, but if not here is an observation. Such a modern house, your internal pipework will almost undoubtedly be PEX, not copper. Plastic being a poor conductor there would be no point in supplementary bonding (what is being suggested). The towel rail heating element has its own earth, or more pedanticaly Circuit Protective Conductor (CPC), to protect the metalwork of the towel rail from the line connector, or live mains if you prefer. TLDR, what Tim has done is totally adequate. I have the exact same in our en-suite that has subsequently passed an EICR, or safety inspection by a qualified Part P electrician.@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@Ben-gm9lo that's good to know. As far as I know the pipes are indeed plastic behind the scenes as all the radiators had plastic pipes.

[@stevengrace6712]

Thanks Tim, will you be sharing any energy consumption data - very intrigued on cost. Also, I know you’re going to get YT hate for the insulating type wrapped crimps in ducting . . Though not a sparky . . I suggest sinking a dry lining back box directly behind here the cable comes through the wall (good for zones too), perform the connections with Wagos or similar maintenance free connectors and then go into the trucking, or fish through the wall. Won’t be as clean looking as your current set-up, but an option if you ever need to switch out the inline connectors/tape situation.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

For 300 watts I'm pretty happy that this is all good. I will certainly be sharing the data in the stats update videos.

[@No3Snow]

FYI you could wire these in parellel to an eddi as well

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

That would require a separate electrical circuit which would be a bit of a pain to get added. But yes, in principle that could be done.

[@JurassicJungle]

Nice video but I wonder where this stands with Part-P? I appreciate you have wired into a socket in a different room but you had added a new electrical circuit into a bathroom which is a special location which I am not sure is allowed as a DIY under part-P of the building regs.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

This is a very common setup for towel rails, from what I can tell. I think part P only states you can't plug it in in the bathroom itself (unless the socket is more than 3m away, which would require a huge bathroom!)

[@Ben-gm9lo]

He hasn't added a new circuit, so this is not notifiable work. He has merely added a device on the end of a fused plug, so in the eyes of the regs it is much like plugging in a low powered kettle. Assuming his plug fuse is suitably sized (3 or 5 Amp), then he has taken all the reasonable steps to protect the towel rail heaters.@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@Ben-gm9lo yup, it's a fused plug with a 5A fuse.

[@olej24]

Great, I had a quote for £1,050 to do 3 towels rails last week!

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Blimey. I think this cost me about £200 all in, and that included buying tools that I can use for other projects later. Plus it took a fair while to do, so there's that.

[@olej24]

My cable runs aren’t as straight forward so I may still need to get an electrician to add some new sockets but the rest of it looks pretty straight forward. Do you have a link to a good video to drain the central heating system?

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@olej24 erm, I think I just did a search and watched a couple from different plumbers. Let me see if I can find one.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@olej24 right, apparently I watched this one according to my watch history. Although it turned out to be a bit more complicated for our system and I had to drain each radiator individually, annoyingly: kzbin.info/www/bejne/lZXMc2mCotGJp5Isi=YpYTIVpY-93_e3LN

[@nicflanagan6662]

Now you know why the electrician's apprenticeship is 5 years .... 1 year theory, 1 year practical & 3 years Offshore and International banking 😅

[@JohnR31415]

Cable strippers are genius - don’t let all that long if you do a lot of cables, but great for DIY.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

I should have bought one years ago.

[@danielwalls5150]

Quick question. Would you pair the immersion with a temperature sensor to operate automatically when it gets colder?

[@marks3056]

I can answer this ;-) with the givenergy plugs....probably not as the API doesn't allow access. With other smart plugs and home assistant for example, then absolutely (I have sensors and triggers for my home office radiators :-) )

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Looks like Mark has you covered on that one!

[@danielwalls5150]

@@marks3056 thanks. Didn’t know givenergy smart plugs didn’t work on the api.

[@paulanderson6903]

Question for you…. Would these now run from battery as would want towels warmed BEFORE sun comes up? Would three rads kick the battery hard? As not on cheap elec and not when suns up? Don’t get me wrong I’ve thought about doing something similar too.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

At the moment I'm running them during the off peak period overnight as that's enough to dry the towels. But yes, they would run from the battery easily. Even if all three were running they would total about 1kW, well within the capability of the inverter/battery. Since we'll also be running our heat pump heating system over winter we'll probably still keep the use of the towel rails to a minimum though. Just enough to ensure the towels are dry.

[@paulanderson6903]

@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk do like the idea though… and never thought of filling with oil. That said…. Did you put a drain off on them. Like a hose connection?

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@paulanderson6903 when I drained them initially I just put a washing-up bowl under one end and undid the bung.

[@paulanderson6903]

Fair enough

[@FUGDUBED]

Could you add elements into the radiators in your spare room also??

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

Those radiators are now gone so no, not as it stands! But I believe immersion inserts need to be vertical and those radiators wouldn't have allowed that anyway so they would have needed changing for different ones regardless.

[@boomerang2]

@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk hi TIm, what makes you think they can only be mounted vertically? I am hoping to fit one (horizontally) to a new cloakroom radiator. Can't find anything online (yet) which suggests can only be vertical, though all the pictures usually show a vertical mount into a towel rail (not radiator). Cheers.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@boomerang2 the instructions that came with the ones I got say they should be installed vertically. You may be able to find specific horizontal ones but most (possibly all?) are designed to work vertically (or at least all the ones I found while looking for towel rail ones).

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

@@boomerang2 a quick Google search reveals specific horizontal ones though for radiators rather than towel rails, e.g. www.justradiators.co.uk/dq-hgt-horizontal-thermostatic-heating-element?ps=OTM9MTE4NTEmMjY1PTE2OTc2&gclid=CjwKCAjwkY2qBhBDEiwAoQXK5SjgOO8CYeDBHiEcU-TgcXZfvqZy7_tvWO8Dt8oqqJSjItI5NcBdMxoC-dwQAvD_BwE#93=11851&265=16976&*CSS+%7C+Generic+%7C+H_P&hsa_acc=5690114029&hsa_cam=11427413721&hsa_grp=120301516748&hsa_ad=474485212742&hsa_src=g&hsa_tgt=pla-332869694290&hsa_kw=&hsa_mt=&hsa_net=adwords&hsa_ver=3

[@boomerang2]

@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk i also found the same via another website Tim :D Annoyingly they are somewhat more £ than the vertical variety. Does make me wonder if, for similar cost, to have undertile electric heating installed instead (along with the radiator to be solely running via boiler). Would be nice to have toasty feet all year round, in what is a cold cloakroom (north facing). Though my concern here is that it the electric mat will raise the floor height ever so slightly. Much to ponder! Cheers

[@stevengould2965]

Love your videos, but you really need to get an electrician to look at that. I’d be surprised if a straight ‘plug in’ passes regulations.

[@TimAndKatsGreenWalk]

As long as it's not plugged into a socket in the bathroom it's all good, was my understanding. Or if in the bathroom itself the socket needs to be more than 3m away (who has a bathroom that big?)