News
Too Hot to Legislate?
10/01/06
Intatec investigates the common sense behind new Anti-Scald regulations
In Scotland, legislation is pending for this spring to limit the temperature of hot water to safe temperatures in bathrooms. We anticipate it will apply to any new build and possibly for refurbishment, it doesn’t mean that every household needs to rush out to fit a thermostatic mixing valve (TMV), although with 580 serious injuries and around 20 deaths caused each year in the UK through bath time scalding, that wouldn’t be a bad idea.
The Anti-Scald regulations aren’t terribly complicated, they break down broadly into domestic applications, covered by TMV2 and hospitals, leisure and other applications that fall into TMV3. This means in practice that baths at home will have to have a TMV2 valve and baths and other outlets in care environments need a TMV3.
North of the border, the maximum outlet temperature is expected to be set at a 48?C, whilst in England and Wales, the regulators are still having a great debate about how hot is too hot. There has been some resistance to the introduction of legislation at all, with comments from some quarters about the ‘nanny state’ dictating how we wash and pouring cold water on a hot bath, declaring that a “good hot bath will be a thing of the past”.
At Intatec, we manufacture what we believe is Britain’s best and most comprehensive range of thermostatic products, and we thought we’d take a look at the correlation between what the Scottish legislation demands, the English legislation is talking about and what the great bathing public want.
Because very young children are at much higher risk of scalding in the bath, we asked a cross section of people, including parents and grandparents about their ideas of how hot is too hot for themselves and the children that they bathe. The group included some pretty responsible people, Fire Officers, Police Officers, Teachers an Accident and Emergency Nurse and a full time young mum.
To set the scene, we offered a simple idea of what temperature different everyday things are. 0?C is freezing; 20?C is room temperature and a washing machine cool wash. 37?C is body temperature, 40?C is a warm wash and 60?C a hot wash.
The first question – how hot does a bath have to be before it causes scalding? The answers averaged at 56.5?C, which is hot enough to cause partial skin thickness burns in an adult after only 30 seconds. Scalding actually occurs from only 45?C. Scarily three people said that they thought scalding only happened over 70?C – that’s hot enough to cook, not just burn!
Bearing that in mind, we asked, “How hot you think you’d like a bath for yourself?” Guesses ranged from 20?C to 60?C, which is fairly extreme! Then, armed with the latest high tech apparatus – a basin of hot water and a thermometer, we discovered that the temperatures that these people really like is between a cool 35?C and what turns out to be a piping 42?C. The man who thought he wanted 20?C actually opted for 39?C and the 60?C man settled for 41?C.
With hand basins, I envisaged that our team would decide that TMV regulated water wouldn’t be hot enough for wet shaving, especially with my particular extra-hot craving. It turns out that the men like an average of 41?C for dealing with whiskers, which is pretty handy, as it’s the recommended temperature for basins, straight out of the tap.
So what’s the problem? Can water flowing through a TMV provide a bath hot enough for all these people, but still cool enough not to scald? Of course it can. But unfortunately, it’s not all plain sailing; some TMV’s do have limitations. This is basically in situations where there’s a low pressure hot water feed and a metal bath. This combination can lead to the bath water cooling too much before there’s enough to actually have a bath in. This mainly happens when a bath is at the same level as its supplying hot water tank. A TMV can’t improve the flow rate if it’s already poor, but the right choice of TMV can make sure it doesn’t get any worse.
It’s very important that the Anti-Scald valve you choose not only has TMV2 or TMV3 accreditation as appropriate, but also that it has a good flow rate, so that it doesn’t impede the rate of bath fill and leave you with a cold water. Naturally, we’d recommend our own Inta range, not just because of the range-wide accreditation, but for the highest flow rates on the UK market too.
Back to the survey. We asked about bathing babies and toddlers - I particularly wanted to know if parents used their elbows to test temperature. Only one did, the others used their hands. In general, the group guessed on the cold side for a kids’ bath – an average of 34?C. Recommended is 36?C to 38?C, but when we put it to the basin and thermometer test they came out exactly right at 36?C.
What we’ve discovered from this is that an Anti-Scald valve under the new legislation can deliver enough hot water for a happy bath, even for the hottest blooded of us and our group has learned though playing with hot water and a thermometer that scalding can occur at a lot lower temperature than they thought.
To help everyone through the introduction of legislation, Intatec are publishing a free guide - Everything You Need to Know about Anti-Scald, which is intended for plumbers and merchants and explains the various options there are for different types of installation. Look out for it in merchants very soon. In the meantime Intatec have technical information available on-line at www.intaco.co.uk and on the phone at 01889 207200.
ENDS
For more information please contact Clive Reeves on 01543 501111 or email clive@wardlovett.com