Rod writes:

Jon Fairbairn wrote:
Rod writes:

Jon Fairbairn wrote:
Rod writes:

Which made me think, I'd quite like electric fires to switch
off entirely of the power fails.
You want one of these:
http://www.poolewood.co.uk/acatalog/..._Switches.html

And the styling is so in tune with the domestic setting!

(Yes - in principle, exactly right.

I'm not sure, now I think about it. If there's a thermostat
in there that simply interrupts all the current, it'll run
till the room's up to temperature and then switch off
permanently...

But even if a thermostat cuts out current, it won't remove
volts from the supply, will it?

True. It depends precisely how those switches work; if they
live up to their name, they're exactly right. I'd assumed a
certain design, which is probably wrong!

Incidentally, the cheapest on that page is under £15.

I suspect the reason I got the wrong idea is that what I'm
looking for myself is a slave socket arrangement like the
ones on dust extractors, so that I can DIY a dust cyclone
and have it turn on with the tool. I can find ones intended
for PCs (daft: just get a distribution board with one big
switch), but haven't found the info to show whether they're
rated for the amount of current a power tool + vacuum take.

--
Jón Fairbairn
http://www.chaos.org.uk/~jf/Stuff-I-dont-want.html (updated 2009-01-31)