I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

We have a supply which comes from a large pole mounted (two telegraph
poles in fact) transformer at the end of the road, the transformer
itself appears to be quite ancient and even the 'In event of
emergency' telephone number is only three digits indicating it is
indeed from a bygone era. We are supplied via overhead cables courtesy
of a 'telegraph' pole in the garden.

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Regards,
Jason.

---
Replace nntp with my name to reply.
N0 5pAm H3r3: Include this tagline to pass my spam filter.

In article ,
Jason Arthurs writes:
I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Max voltage is 230+10%=253V.

It might be worth complaining about the brownouts and cuts.
I was working for a small software company some years ago in
a small village, and we used to get power cuts like this, in
our case more often when it started raining. I supplied the
log from our UPS with all the evidence in it. It turned out
the power company didn't know anything about the problem (it
had been going on as long as anyone could remember). They
found a fault on the 11kV feeder, and the problem almost
completely went away. Still got the odd one when a squirrel
hopped across the 11kV lines, and one quite spectacular one
when a digger outside went through an 11kV underground cable
just after the driver had been told exactly where it was.
(Could have been worse -- the other thing he could have hit
was a high pressure sewage pipe from the sewage pumping
station which pumped several villages' sewage up hill to the
sewage works 5 miles away;-).

--
Andrew Gabriel

In article , Jason Arthurs
writes
I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

We have a supply which comes from a large pole mounted (two telegraph
poles in fact) transformer at the end of the road, the transformer
itself appears to be quite ancient and even the 'In event of
emergency' telephone number is only three digits indicating it is
indeed from a bygone era. We are supplied via overhead cables courtesy
of a 'telegraph' pole in the garden.

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Regards,
Jason.


Sounds to me like that is within tolerance. Just because your
transformer is old and one a pole doesn't mean that its faulty as such.
The interruptions to supply could be caused anywhere on the overhead
network feeding it.

Other than that has it been dropping which is usually more of a problem.
Ours is up at 245 to 8 a lot of the time but the waveforms on it are
sometimes "interesting".

Midlands electricity are the people to complain to in this instance but
I suspect that they will say its fine.

Perhaps some new batts for the UPS.....

--
Tony Sayer

Jason Arthurs wrote:
I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

These can always be replaced.
Sometimes even by old car batteries from the scrapyard, otherwise with
similar cells, almost always in any case cheaper than the manufacturer wants.

On Sun, 29 May 2005 10:11:41 +0100, Jason Arthurs wrote:

snip

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Are you essentially in a quite rural location? Large village, hamlet, many
neighbours? You said you'd lived there for a couple of years, did you move
from an essentially urban location?

Your brownouts are short-duration interuptions, caused by transient faults,
usually something that causes the overhead wires to clash, tripping
automatic protection, but then clearing, so that the automatic switchgear
can reclose sucessfully onto the circuit. Like it or not, these are one of
the downsides of living in a rural location fed by an essentially overhead
network.

It would pay you to do some research yourself, if you can. Are there any
major rivers or lakes not too far away? Possible locations used by swans or
geese. These can frequently cause o/h circuits to clash, but once clear of
the wires, the circuits remain intact.

If you identify any such locations, sensibly not more than 2 or 3 miles
from where you live, take a quick look for o/h circuits in the vicinity. If
there are any there, just take a quick look to see if there is anything at
all fitted to the conductors. Bird flight diverters (BFDs) have been in use
for quite a few years now. They are often small helical coils that are
wrapped periodically onto the wires, the idea being that they make the
wires more visible to birds.

Another oddity I came across a few years ago, and we tracked it down more
by luck than judgement, was a whole series of auto-recloses that started
suddenly, went on for a few weeks, then stopped just as suddenly. Turned
out in the end to be a farmer who had turned a bull into a paddock and the
bull used to work himself underneath a staywire and use it to scratch his
back, causing the o/h's to clash.

What you should do is try to compile a list of how many outages occur over
a period of time. If you merely complain 'we seem to be getting lots of
outages' you won't really get very far. If you can say 'In the last four
weeks we've had 10 outages that occured at these times on these days'
you'll stand a much better chance of getting somewhere.

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's ±10%. Soemone who is more up to
date than me with the latest regulations will pop up before long to
confirm.

--
the dot wanderer at tesco dot net

On 29 May 2005 10:04:22 GMT, Andrew Gabriel wrote:


and one quite spectacular one
when a digger outside went through an 11kV underground cable
just after the driver had been told exactly where it was.

Never mind about health and safety requirements, The worst thing anyone can
do is tell a digger driver where services actually are, a sure-fire
guarantee they'll be damaged. :-)



--
the dot wanderer at tesco dot net

The Wanderer wrote:

Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's ±10%.

No it's still +10 / -6. The change to -10% was supposed to happen on
1st Jan 2003 but was postponed by 5 years.

BTW isn't the distribution network operation part of the old MEB now
called Aquila Networks, or some such?

--
Andy

On Sun, 29 May 2005 10:11:41 +0100, Jason Arthurs wrote:

Our domestic voltage varies between 240-250v, but usually hovers
around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on my UPS often complains).

Thats getting close, start logging the voltage as recorded by your
UPS, say at 5min intervals. Collect a week or so, hopefully with the
brownouts and cuts as well, remember as well as a max there is min
(230 -6% or 216v)... Plot them out as a graph with suitable scales to
show the problems.

Then make a complaint, when the board come round to measure or perhaps
to fit one of their logging meters show them the UPS log plots. It's a
bit odd that the failures are in the wee small hours.

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

Andy Wade wrote:
The Wanderer wrote:

Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's =B110%.

No it's still +10 / -6. The change to -10% was supposed to happen on
1st Jan 2003 but was postponed by 5 years.

I thought we were now 240 +6% -10%, and France 220 +10% -6%, giving a
common range politically described as 230, but in reality still 220 and
240.

240+6% =3D 254.4
240+10% =3D 264
240-6% =3D 225.6
240-10% =3D 216

All adds up


NT

"Huge" wrote in message
...

The all-time record being 5 cuts in one
day. I called the 'leccy people and actually managed to speak to a real
engineer, who said he would "walk the line" for us. (We're on the end
of *miles* of 11kV, with a transformer up a pole, like the OP). He
never called us back, but the cuts stopped shortly thereafter.

Just by walking down the lines? Amazing. You could have walked by the line
yourself and stopped the cuts too.



_________________________________________
Usenet Zone Free Binaries Usenet Server
More than 120,000 groups
Unlimited download
http://www.usenetzone.com to open account

Never mind about health and safety requirements, The worst thing anyone can
do is tell a digger driver where services actually are, a sure-fire
guarantee they'll be damaged. :-)

Oh I don't know... around here they seem to manage quite well without
knowing.

Dave

In article .com,
writes:
I thought we were now 240 +6% -10%,

No, we never were. That's kind of mixed up pre- and post-harmonisation.
Pre-harmonisation (prior to 1 Jan 1995 IIRC), we were 240V +- 6%.

and France 220 +10% -6%, giving a
common range politically described as 230, but in reality still 220 and
240.

No, all CENELEC countries (all the EU countries, prospective
EU countries, and others nearby which wanted to join in common
voltage regulations) are now 230V nominal. During the interim
period (i.e. now), former 240V countries are 230V +10% -6%,
and former 220V countries are 230V +6% -10%.

--
Andrew Gabriel

(Andrew Gabriel) wrote in news:429993a6$0
:

the other thing he could have hit
was a high pressure sewage pipe from the sewage pumping
station which pumped several villages' sewage up hill to the
sewage works 5 miles away;-).


That would've been heck of a brown-out :-)

dave stanton wrote:


Never mind about health and safety requirements, The worst thing anyone
can do is tell a digger driver where services actually are, a sure-fire
guarantee they'll be damaged. :-)

Oh I don't know... around here they seem to manage quite well without
knowing.

Dave

A JCB is to services as pigs are to truffles!

Seen this with boring regularity, the 12 inch high pressure gas main was a
good one, the digger was ingesting so much gas that turning the key off did
NOT stop the engine!

Regards, Dan.

Andy Wade wrote:

The Wanderer wrote:

Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's ±10%.

No it's still +10 / -6. The change to -10% was supposed to happen on
1st Jan 2003 but was postponed by 5 years.

Seeing as the powers that be can make more money by supplying 253v to
the consumer than 216v/207v I'd expect everyone in the UK to be sat
at around 250v for ever and a day - well until the lights go out for
good that is.

With incandesent lamps being "Euro rated" at 230v there is no wonder
they last such a short time.




--

Martin Evans wrote:

Andy Wade wrote:


The Wanderer wrote:


Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's ±10%.

No it's still +10 / -6. The change to -10% was supposed to happen on
1st Jan 2003 but was postponed by 5 years.


Seeing as the powers that be can make more money by supplying 253v to
the consumer than 216v/207v I'd expect everyone in the UK to be sat
at around 250v for ever and a day - well until the lights go out for
good that is.

With incandesent lamps being "Euro rated" at 230v there is no wonder
they last such a short time.

All my lamps are rated 60w/240v and my supply today is 243v.
I've never seen a nominal 250v mains supply in the UK.

--
Eiron.

In article ,
Eiron writes:
Martin Evans wrote:
With incandesent lamps being "Euro rated" at 230v there is no wonder
they last such a short time.

I hardly ever buy any incandescent lamps, but the ones I have are
marked 240V. I happen to have some bought in France, and they are
marked 220-230V.

All my lamps are rated 60w/240v and my supply today is 243v.
I've never seen a nominal 250v mains supply in the UK.

Prior to standardisation on 240V in 1960, a number of towns in
the UK were officially 250V (and some were only 200V, Reading
for one).

--
Andrew Gabriel

Eiron wrote:

All my lamps are rated 60w/240v and my supply today is 243v.
I've never seen a nominal 250v mains supply in the UK.

All your lamps will be *marked* 240v which bears no relationship to
what they (and I use the term very loosely) are engineered for.

In the good old days before Brussels stuck their nose in you had 240v
lamps that, on a 240v +/- 6% supply would last their prescribed
hours. Now you get "240v" lamps that are anything but.


--

On Sun, 29 May 2005 12:05:29 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Sun, 29 May 2005 10:11:41 +0100, Jason Arthurs wrote:

Our domestic voltage varies between 240-250v, but usually hovers
around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on my UPS often complains).

Thats getting close, start logging the voltage as recorded by your
UPS, say at 5min intervals. Collect a week or so, hopefully with the
brownouts and cuts as well, remember as well as a max there is min
(230 -6% or 216v)... Plot them out as a graph with suitable scales to
show the problems.

Then make a complaint, when the board come round to measure or perhaps
to fit one of their logging meters show them the UPS log plots. It's a
bit odd that the failures are in the wee small hours.

Out of interest, what software is available that will log from a UPS?
I have an APC SU1400 which has a serial port on the rear, but since
the machines it runs are a mix of Linux and proprietary systems
PowerChute was never an option.

I've got an old laptop I can run for logging purposes if need be.

Regards,
Jason.
---
Replace nntp with my name to reply.
N0 5pAm H3r3: Include this tagline to pass my spam filter.

In article ,
Jason Arthurs writes:
Out of interest, what software is available that will log from a UPS?
I have an APC SU1400 which has a serial port on the rear, but since
the machines it runs are a mix of Linux and proprietary systems
PowerChute was never an option.

Well, they do produce Powerchute for a number of commercial unixs
(don't know about Linux), but you probably don't want to use it
anyway. It's riddled with security holes, and often responsible
for more downtime than the poor mains supply ever was.

Look for UPSD. Note there's more than one of them.

--
Andrew Gabriel

On Sun, 29 May 2005 16:14:52 +0100, Jason Arthurs wrote:

Out of interest, what software is available that will log from a
UPS? I have an APC SU1400 which has a serial port on the rear, but
since the machines it runs are a mix of Linux and proprietary
systems PowerChute was never an option.

Sorry, I run OS/2... likewise never got on with PowerChute/2.

UPSd or NUT have already been mentioned I've not played with either of
those.

I've got an old laptop I can run for logging purposes if need be.

I don't think the protocol is complicated. Send it a single character
get a value back sort of thing (maybe..). But surely you already have
the UPS hooked up to a box so that it can shut things down cleanly
when the power goes or before the batteries give out.

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

On Sun, 29 May 2005 20:53:15 UTC, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Sun, 29 May 2005 16:14:52 +0100, Jason Arthurs wrote:

Out of interest, what software is available that will log from a
UPS? I have an APC SU1400 which has a serial port on the rear, but
since the machines it runs are a mix of Linux and proprietary
systems PowerChute was never an option.

Sorry, I run OS/2... likewise never got on with PowerChute/2.

Never notice that! Mind, you use a different newsreader to me...

I use PowerChute/2, but keep thinking I'm going to change to the Lone
Star software - do you use that?

On 29 May 2005 21:45:32 GMT, Bob Eager wrote:

I use PowerChute/2, but keep thinking I'm going to change to the
Lone Star software - do you use that?

No I use something written by a friend. Hum he doesn't appear to have
released it, probably due to reverse engineering the protocol...

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

Martin Evans wrote:

With incandesent lamps being "Euro rated" at 230v there is no wonder
they last such a short time.

They arent. And they dont. Britain is still 240 despite the official
230 description, and France still 220. Britain uses 240v bulbs and
France 220, because incandescents do not span the range happily.

Neither country is changing its voltage significantly. The adoption of
a cmomon standard simply means new electricals will be rated for use in
either country - incandescent bulbs excepted.

1000hr Incandescents last the same time they always did, 1000hr
average. 2 things have however changed:
1. The tendency to use many bulbs per room, not 1.
2. The fact that we grew up and time now goes much faster.


NT

wrote:

They arent. And they dont. Britain is still 240 despite the official
230 description, and France still 220. Britain uses 240v bulbs and
France 220, because incandescents do not span the range happily.

And fluorescents with iron-cored ballasts too, it seems. You might find
the Lighting Industry Federation's statement on the subject interesting:

http://www.lif.co.uk/statements/15f.html

--
Andy

1000hr Incandescents last the same time they always did, 1000hr
average. 2 things have however changed:
1. The tendency to use many bulbs per room, not 1.



2. The fact that we grew up and time now goes much faster.

Which is the most prominent factor!!!!....

--
Tony Sayer

On Sun, 29 May 2005 13:30:28 +0100, Dan Mills
wrote:

dave stanton wrote:


Never mind about health and safety requirements, The worst thing anyone
can do is tell a digger driver where services actually are, a sure-fire
guarantee they'll be damaged. :-)

Oh I don't know... around here they seem to manage quite well without
knowing.

A JCB is to services as pigs are to truffles!

A telecoms engineer suggested that everyone should take a length of
cable with them when they set off fell-walking. This was so they could
bury it if they got lost or injured.

His experience suggested that about ten minutes later a JCB would
appear and dig through the newly buried cable.

John
--
John White
SCA Electrical, Manchester http://www.scaelectrical.co.uk/
Domestic and commercial electrical contractors

Jason Arthurs wrote:

I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

We have a supply which comes from a large pole mounted (two telegraph
poles in fact) transformer at the end of the road, the transformer
itself appears to be quite ancient and even the 'In event of
emergency' telephone number is only three digits indicating it is
indeed from a bygone era. We are supplied via overhead cables courtesy
of a 'telegraph' pole in the garden.

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?


My heart bleeds for you.

I had one of those too...and 11KV cables over the house too.

I paid nearly 20 grand to get a half mile undergrounded, and they threw
in a corner of the garden 250A capable transformer as well. ;-)

All problems - apart from the rest of the overhead that craps out EVERY
winter and un summer too...are gone.

BUT I was able to rebuild the house to two storeys...and in the context
of that build 20 grand was not excessive.

What you need is to show the leccy company that your pole mounted
transformer is inadequate, by e.g. switching on half a dozen 3KW heaters
and demonstreating the voltage is below spec. And with them off above spec..

The overheads are not the problem: It's usually the excessively poor
transformers attached to them.

If at all possible and you are prepared to underground the last 20
meters...get an underground feed into the house as well. Even if the
11KV stays up top, not having 250v cables round your guttering makes it
hugely easier to repair it.

The leccy company are generally strapped for cash but sympathetic. They
know that overheads cause more problems than undergrounds, and if the
area manager can find an excuse to replace ageing equipment at someone
else's (partial) expense, they will do it IME.





Regards,
Jason.

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Martin Evans wrote:
Andy Wade wrote:

The Wanderer wrote:

Nah, it was +10% - 6%, I think now it's ?10%.

No it's still +10 / -6. The change to -10% was supposed to happen on
1st Jan 2003 but was postponed by 5 years.

Seeing as the powers that be can make more money by supplying 253v to
the consumer than 216v/207v I'd expect everyone in the UK to be sat
at around 250v for ever and a day - well until the lights go out for
good that is.

Looking at my meter - 227V, more or less as normal.

Andy Wade wrote:

wrote:

They arent. And they dont. Britain is still 240 despite the official
230 description, and France still 220. Britain uses 240v bulbs and
France 220, because incandescents do not span the range happily.

And fluorescents with iron-cored ballasts too, it seems. You might find
the Lighting Industry Federation's statement on the subject interesting:

http://www.lif.co.uk/statements/15f.html

"A 230V lamp operated at 240V will only achieve 55% of its life"

Precisely. A large proportion of lamps now come from overseas, both
within Europe and the far east but simply marked "240v" - the
filament in a number of cases is absolutely identical to those
utilised on mainland Europe and the UK consumer is non the wiser -
except that is for a reduction in service life especially if they
happen to live in areas at the top end of the "+10%"

I'm sure that there must be a market for a cheap scr device, maybe
situated in the consumer unit to limit the volts on the lighting
circuits.

I know it wasn't your post Andy but "bulbs" are things that sometimes
sprout flowers and nothing to do with electrickery.


--

Ian Stirling wrote:

Looking at my meter - 227V, more or less as normal.

You lucky, lucky *******. I bet your lamps last for ages ;-)

249.7v here but mainly on compact fluorescent's so it matters somewhat
less.


--

On Sun, 29 May 2005 10:11:41 +0100, Jason Arthurs
wrote:

I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

We have a supply which comes from a large pole mounted (two telegraph
poles in fact) transformer at the end of the road, the transformer
itself appears to be quite ancient and even the 'In event of
emergency' telephone number is only three digits indicating it is
indeed from a bygone era. We are supplied via overhead cables courtesy
of a 'telegraph' pole in the garden.

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Regards,
Jason.

---
Replace nntp with my name to reply.
N0 5pAm H3r3: Include this tagline to pass my spam filter.

We had a transformer on a pole, serving 3 houses. When I ran my
electric shower, my neigbhour could not watch TV, so she complained.
She is a "busy body" sort, but after a year, 15 guys turned up one
day, with all sorts of equipment. They spent the day changing the
transfomer, running new power cables, messing with meteres and the
like. Neighbour has now found something different to complain about
.........

Rick

Martin Evans wrote:

"A 230V lamp operated at 240V will only achieve 55% of its life"

Precisely. A large proportion of lamps now come from overseas, both
within Europe and the far east but simply marked "240v" - the
filament in a number of cases is absolutely identical to those
utilised on mainland Europe and the UK consumer is non the wiser -

Do you have any evidence for this? I've never come across any. I've
never yet had any such problems, despite buying a range of brands, and
from dealing with complaints here of bulbs going often, I find usually
the problem is simply unrealistic expectations from consumers.

If you have 9x 1000hr bulbs running 3.7 hours a day, you'll get 1
failure per month average. Yet people expect more like one failure per
9 months!


NT

Martin Evans wrote:
Ian Stirling wrote:

Looking at my meter - 227V, more or less as normal.

You lucky, lucky *******. I bet your lamps last for ages ;-)

Don't actually have any conventional lamps - apart from the outside 60W
one that a CF won't fit in the globe of.

249.7v here but mainly on compact fluorescent's so it matters somewhat
less.

Oh, and PIR floodlights.

On Mon, 30 May 2005 13:17:09 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Jason Arthurs wrote:

I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.

We have a supply which comes from a large pole mounted (two telegraph
poles in fact) transformer at the end of the road, the transformer
itself appears to be quite ancient and even the 'In event of
emergency' telephone number is only three digits indicating it is
indeed from a bygone era. We are supplied via overhead cables courtesy
of a 'telegraph' pole in the garden.

When the weather gets warmer we experience occasions brownouts, short
power outages (usually in the early hours between 4am - 7am) and
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?


My heart bleeds for you.

I had one of those too...and 11KV cables over the house too.

I paid nearly 20 grand to get a half mile undergrounded, and they threw
in a corner of the garden 250A capable transformer as well. ;-)

All problems - apart from the rest of the overhead that craps out EVERY
winter and un summer too...are gone.

BUT I was able to rebuild the house to two storeys...and in the context
of that build 20 grand was not excessive.

What you need is to show the leccy company that your pole mounted
transformer is inadequate, by e.g. switching on half a dozen 3KW heaters
and demonstreating the voltage is below spec. And with them off above spec..

The overheads are not the problem: It's usually the excessively poor
transformers attached to them.

If at all possible and you are prepared to underground the last 20
meters...get an underground feed into the house as well. Even if the
11KV stays up top, not having 250v cables round your guttering makes it
hugely easier to repair it.

250v cables that have fallen off the house over time are, I found,
fixed as an emergency repair ....... :-)

I left mine "fallen off" for quite some time, assuming they would
attach them back to the rotten roof, that I wanted to repair, once the
roof was done they fixed them too the wall - silly me.

Poor old leccie company, we spend a few quid a month on the stuff, and
they have fixed just about the whole supply, in a rural localion -
they will never get their money back...........

Rick


The leccy company are generally strapped for cash but sympathetic. They
know that overheads cause more problems than undergrounds, and if the
area manager can find an excuse to replace ageing equipment at someone
else's (partial) expense, they will do it IME.





Regards,
Jason.

---
Replace nntp with my name to reply.
N0 5pAm H3r3: Include this tagline to pass my spam filter.

John White wrote:


A telecoms engineer suggested that everyone should take a length of
cable with them when they set off fell-walking. This was so they could
bury it if they got lost or injured.

His experience suggested that about ten minutes later a JCB would
appear and dig through the newly buried cable.

Wouldn't be someone called John would it?


--

On Mon, 30 May 2005 13:17:09 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:


What you need is to show the leccy company that your pole mounted
transformer is inadequate, by e.g. switching on half a dozen 3KW heaters
and demonstreating the voltage is below spec. And with them off above spec..

No he doesn't, if you had read the OP instead of spouting off a load of
irrelevant drivel, you would see that he is complaining about a number of
short duration interruptions, or severe dips in supply voltage, lasting for
a second or two. Those are not typically caused by an overloaded
transformer.

The overheads are not the problem: It's usually the excessively poor
transformers attached to them.

Bull****. Don't spout off about things that you obviously *know* little or
nothing about.

--
the dot wanderer at tesco dot net

Martin Evans wrote:
Ian Stirling wrote:

Looking at my meter - 227V, more or less as normal.

You lucky, lucky *******. I bet your lamps last for ages ;-)

249.7v here but mainly on compact fluorescent's so it matters somewhat
less.

Its actually cheaper to boost lamp v and get more efficiency fwiw.

People find bulb changing a pain, but it shouldnt be. Lights should be
selected with a small range of bulb variations, and be fitted so the
bulbs can be replaced with ease. End of stress. Well, works for me. I
cant see any sense in making life difficult.

But if you want that one special fitting with 2" Edison giant screw
base... I guess youll have to open an account with a glass blower, make
numerous bulb orders and pay numerous delivery charges for small
numbers of stupidly overpriced bulbs. PAR38 being the no 2 example of
the Stupid Bulb.


NT

Martin Evans wrote:

"A 230V lamp operated at 240V will only achieve 55% of its life"

Precisely. A large proportion of lamps now come from overseas, both
within Europe and the far east but simply marked "240v" - the
filament in a number of cases is absolutely identical to those
utilised on mainland Europe and the UK consumer is non the wiser

And your evidence for that statement is what, given that just about
every other country uses only ES bases...? I.e. a lamp marked 240 V
with a B22 base must be made for the UK market (and Eire, perhaps).

I'm sure that there must be a market for a cheap scr device, maybe
situated in the consumer unit to limit the volts on the lighting
circuits.

An auto-transformer, or a 12V halogen lighting transformer wired as an
auto-tranny is the obvious solution.

What is this obsession with lamp life anyway? GLS lamps are cheap; it's
the electricity that costs. View over-running as a benefit - more
lumens per watt :-)

I know it wasn't your post Andy but "bulbs" are things that sometimes
sprout flowers and nothing to do with electrickery.

Quite right too.

--
Andy

Huge wrote:
(Andrew Gabriel) writes:
In article ,
Jason Arthurs writes:
I've lived in this house for two years now and as soon as summer
arrives so do the periodic electrical dropouts, which is a shame
because the batteries in my UPS have just decided they're knackered.
generally very poor reliability. Our domestic voltage varies between
240-250v, but usually hovers around 248v (as the over voltage alarm on
my UPS often complains).

Our local provider is Midlands Electricity Board (npower?), is there
any point in complaining or will they simply tell me that everything
is within tolerance? Didn't EU harmonization mean our voltage was
supposed to be a maximum of 243.8v (i.e. 230v +6%)?

Max voltage is 230+10%=253V.

It might be worth complaining about the brownouts and cuts.

Agreed. We used to get lots of brief cuts, which prompted me into
buying a UPS (reminder: need a bigger one now, the original one will no
longer run all the computers). The all-time record being 5 cuts in one

Don't forget, you need a bigger UPS! Do we really need to know that or
are you just bragging?

day. I called the 'leccy people and actually managed to speak to a real
engineer, who said he would "walk the line" for us. (We're on the end
of *miles* of 11kV, with a transformer up a pole, like the OP). He
never called us back, but the cuts stopped shortly thereafter.

He's probably still there holding the bits of wire together.

MBQ