This answer comes from my friend, Brian, in the plumbing supply business and is a Grohe/Toto/Danze distributor.
You are correct that generally the larger the shower head the less pressure you will have. With the rain shower heads arenÂt made to really have a powerful flow, they are supposed have a rain type flow. If you are going to have the rain head and a hand shower I donÂt see any need for the standard shower head because the hand shower can take the place of it. Most all heads should have a 2.5 gpm flow

Here is a link that might be useful: National Builder Supply

lainie,

I have a hand held on a vertical slide bar and a 12" rainshower head coming out of the ceiling.

They are on independent supply (flow and temp) valves.

We have absolutely NO NEED for a third head, and I offered my wife every option in the book (and some that weren't!) when I built our shower.

The 12" does have a 2.5gpm restrictor in it. I did not remove it. The rain head gives great flow. As faucetman inferred, it's not a large "jet spray" head, it's a gentle stream of water. Very nice, very different from a spray head.

We often have both heads going at the same time and neither flow suffers.

I'd never recommend having just a rain head, as people with thick hair might have difficulty getting a thorough hair rinse.

I don't recommend having a rain head on a wall arm where the head can't be parallel to the floor, as the water will simply dribble out/off of one edge of the head.

I don't recommend rain heads being installed close to a wall, as again, the water falls straight to the ground, so you'd have to be standing close to the wall to get the effect of the fall on your head.

Not all rain heads are equal, so see if you can check out the flow before you buy.

Our rain head does not have rubber tips. It's not a fancy one either. My wife picked it out, she liked the flow characteristics. She felt that some that had machined tips, or rubber tips, the flow was too needle-like instead of a gentle rain fall. Our rain head has been in for several years, no lime issues, no clogged tips/outlets, and I'm on well water.

Mongo

Thanks so much "faucetman" and Mongo. You confirmed what I thought was best/wanted to do, i.e, an additional 3rd showerhead is really not needed AND to "go for it" with the 12 inch rainshower from the ceiling, and not worry much about the "rubber tips."

Hey we don't have well water, and our water is very soft, so I can't imagine having much of a "lime deposit" problem, despite the plumbing supply store's concern.

REALLY good to hear that you get a decent (although of course, more like rainfall and gentle) amount of water from the 12 inch rainshower even with the 2.5 gpm restrictor!!

Yeh, I knew that rainshower would not serve to rinse hair, etc. It's more for the "experience" or fun.

Thanks a million!!
Lainie

To throw out the possibility, we are putting a 3rd showerhead in our shower - we'll have standard wall mount, a rainshower, and a hand held. We thought about whether we really needed them all, and actually I doubt we'll ever use all 3 at once, but we had needs for each of them. Mainly, we often use the shower with young children, and wanted the ability to stick them under one head (the hand held set to a low height) to rinse off while the adult is using the standard one. At least that's the theory - we'll see how much we use them all once it's finished!

Gregarious,

1. What did you mean by pre-pitted? (The chrome had little holes on the surface, that obviously shouldn't be there?) If so, that's bad news.

Well, we dished out the extra bucks for sterling finish (Grohe's polished nickel; dumb of them cause it matches no one else's polished nickel).

2. What brand rainshower head did you get?

Thanks,

Lainie