Electricity - don't assume...

[Iceni]

You can have what you want. We have just got our certification and decided to go the whole hog and get Tempo. Err, NO, we cannot have more than 6KW in total, the cables will not allow any more than 6. We have 6 KW now and run everything carefully so as not to trip the switch(we have never done this and have a 3 KW oven apart from all the normal household appliances and 2 fridges etc).

It is lucky that we were not intending to have Gites or apartments to rent out as this would not be possible. We will be having two hot water tanks but most of the time only one will be used. Seems that our three electric kettles (don't ask but they have all been used) will stay in their boxes. One may be a low wattage one which I may use but the rest will be donated to anyone who wants one. The two hot water tanks are due to the design allowing for summer living in a huge space and winter or very cold weather living in a smaller self contained space. When not on they do not cost anything and are very cheap to install.

Total rethink coming up - this was one problem that never crossed our minds.

[BJSLIV]

You need to plan your wiring round a system of delestage. They fit another bit to the fuse board, which monitors usage, and instead of plunging you into darkness if you use too much juice, simply switches off non priority units hot water, heating circuits etc, until you are back within total permitted load. when for example the oven goes off the disconnected circuits automatically switch on again.

Or you could just carry a torch with you all the time!

 

 

[La Guerriere]

But which cables do you refer to ? If it is the cabling on the consumer side of the EDF disjoncteur de branchement this can be upgraded relatively easily. The cable size for a 45A (9kW)setting is 10mm2, for 60A (12 kW)setting 16mm2 and up to 90A (18kW), 25mm2. If it's on the EDF side, of course, it is a bigger problem.

Using a delesteur is an elegant solution, but is quite expensive to install, and some ingenious use of time switches might give a sensible alternative solution.

JIm

 

 

[Iceni]

The restriction is on the EDF side and we will be making liberal use of time switches. The electrical items we have at the moment are almost the total amount we will have when the total renovation is finished - so add in the extra electric lights and we should still be OK.

Luckily we are addicted to A rated appliances. Our real problem is the power drops that we get, not enough to give us a 'brownout' but enough for the two UPS boxes to click in and out keeping the PC's and ancillary items at full power. I must say it has been very good this year - only on one or two of the coldest days has there been a lot of clicking. It is things that run motors that really take a beating when this happens - fridge and freezer being at great risk.

Ah well, at least it will keep the leccy bills down.

Thanks for all your comments.

[La Guerriere]

I think you're doing amazingly well keeping everything going on a humble 6kW. We have 9kW and still get caught out now and then. Of course, it's heaters that are the big users and these are easily put on time switches. We're thinking about another small chauffe-eau for the other end of the house so that the shower water doesn't have to travel a kilometre: I'm going to put them both on time switches so they're not on together. And avoid electric kettles: if you get out of the bath and go and put a kettle on for a cuppa, the c-e and the kettle absorb most of your allowed kW and Bob's mon oncle, all the lights go out.

Jim

 

[Nick Trollope]

[quote]I think you're doing amazingly well keeping everything going on a humble 6kW. We have 9kW and still get caught out now and then. Of course, it's heaters that are the big users and these are easily put...[/quote]

9Kw is quite alot by French standards (and is about power used by a cheap English shower!). However a C-E (@2.2Kw) and a kettle (@2Kw) (=4.2Kw) should leave plenty of reserve on your supply.

I have a 12Kw supply (the largest I can get on my EDF cabling) and run 2 C-E, a 5.4Kw oven, dishwasher, washing machine, tumble dryer, spa (4.5Kw alone) and pool pump - and simultaneously, without problems. Have you considered putting your C-E's on "off peak" (heures creuse) - 2x C-E = 4.5Kw in the middle of the night, won't blow yer wotsit & should save you a tidy sum, too.

 

[Alcazar]

This topic never ceases to intrigue me. We in the UK just don't know how lucky we are as we take our 100A, 23kW supply for granted.

Alcazar

[Teamedup]

I know alcazar, until we upped ours it used to drive me mad. With small kids and the washer and oven seemingly constantly on, it felt like we were  tripping out all the time. Trouble is that it is very costly here to have a lot of current coming into a home.

[Iceni]

They come to fit Heures Cruses (?sp) in two weeks and I am off out to buy time switches. The dishwasher has a built in one but we do live in one huge room so will hear it during the night. The washing machine and tumbledryer will also be on switches. We don't use electric kettles and at the moment only have one uplighter on while John watches Sky and I play on the PC.

We have one electric radiator in the bathroom but it is only on for 2 hours a day regardless of the cold. This is to dry towels and take the 'edge' of the cold in the winter. We don't use any other form of electric heating.

We have never tripped the power with our consumption - same cannot be said of close electrical storms .

[Owens88]

The worst we ever had was in Andalucia where the power supplies were so constrained that at one stage we had my daughter sitting by the trip switch whilst we were cooking a meal (it ain't safe to have hot food on a cooker and no lights). Funnily enough that was our third property in a week having been increasingly upgraded due to leccy probs.

Our place in France does not have problems (touch wood) and has a 12kw rating. What is informative is the edf site

http://particuliers.edf.fr/article493.html

where one pays a higher standing charge per year according to how much current is available.

My own decision is to accept the 60 euro surcharge over the next lower level and avoid some problems, but each to their own.

Regards to all

John

 

[zeb]

We are managing well on 6Kw and most mornings have dishwasher, washing machine, TV, kettle, lights, krups thingy and PC on at the same time with no trips.

But, we have gas bottle range type cooker (which I love - can't understand why people have problems with them!) and oil fired water/central heating, so that obviously reduces consumption

 

[Alcazar]

When we first had our property, "green as grass" didn't even START to describe us.

As a result, one of our first visits saw us in February, with ONLY two electric fan heaters to heat the entire property, (the woodburner was awaiting the visit of a chimney sweep to sweep the chimney before fitting the liner...........he NEVER arrived), and we had a 3kW supply!!!

I then went to telephone EDF for an uprated supply, and had to endure a 5 minute lecture on WHY it was tripping out, despite me explaing to the guy that I understood, having a degree in physics, and then no-one could come for a WEEK as they were all on strike.

Happy days.

Alcazar

[richandkath]

Had a smile on my face as I read previous posts.

Been there, seen that :-)

Have to admit not a lot of fun in middle of December deciding what electric heaters to turn off so you can boil a kettle. :-)

As someone said it got to the stage I always carried a torch as evening came around.

Touch wood, we uprated our supply form lowest to 2 above that (60 amp fuse I think) in April.

The EDF guys had to do some extra work in our house but all went well and nothing has tripped the system since.

The only problem we had (as 2nd home owners) was that EDF wanted more than a weeks notice so suggested we rang 2 weeks before returning to France.

Seemed reasonable, until we rang from UK to be told contact them when in France (arghhh! catch 22!)

But when we explained (with the help of a French friend) our visiting schedule they were really helpful and I cannot fault the 2 guys who turned up at our house to make the change.

[Quillan]

I am verinterested in delestage, can anyone point me in the right direction to get information, equipment required and installers.

Thanks in advance.

PS. There is a rumour that you can now get a 100A single phase supply in France but I can't find anything on the EDF website.

[Euge]

I’ve just been reading this stuff about electricity cutting off when a kettle is turned on. Umm, is there a problem with electricity in France?

I’m readying myself to build in Charente area 16 and would be interested to know what the problems are and how to avoid them if possible. Should I cost up a generator, or like one poster, use oil to heat, gas to cook and electric for light and computers?

[Mikew]

There is no problem with electricity in France, provided one understands the system, and plays by the rules. Even in UK heating is cheaper by gas rather than elec. Same here, use gas , if available, or fioul as next best(ignoring alternative energy solutions). We use the same appliances here as in UK and have had no problems with a six KW supply!! The total annual cost of 3500 KW here, on a 6 KW supply is about the same as the total annual cost of the same amount from Seeboard. If you use too many appliances at once and have to upgrade your supply - there are your extra costs - watch what you switch on, and when.

[Owens88]

Mind you it must be different electricity than UK.(smile)

Have you seen the number of power sockets in bathrooms ? Never mind the extent of external power sockets.

I saw somebody (an electrician) changing a socket without switching off the power , ouch ouch ooh ooh , and then it was done !

Cheers all

[Gyn_Paul]

[quote]I am verinterested in delestage, can anyone point me in the right direction to get information, equipment required and installers. Thanks in advance. PS. There is a rumour that you can now get a 100...[/quote]

Quillan,

I bought my Deselesteur (- that doesn't look right, but you know what I mean) from Leroy Merlin back in the days when the mini circuit breakers were so expensive that they had to be kept in the vitrine under lock-and-key.

Mine came with a wiring diagram and was easy to fit. From memory, it takes up 2 x spaces in the boit de distribution and is wired after the 30mA dijoncteur where it 'monitors' the total current flow (its trip level is adjustable to match the EDF disjoncteur) and opens an internal relay when that level is reached; you wire the 'sacrificial' items via the deselesteur and they come back on automatically when the total consumption level falls again. Mine seems to have some sort of timer inside which makes it wait 5 minutes or so after it trips before 'testing' if it's safe to reconnect again.

Hope this helps a bit

paul

[Quillan]

Many thanks for that I will ask next time I am in Perpignan.