Europe suffers cascade electricity breakdown

[Stonehead]

I've just been trying to work out the wiring on my central heating and have discovered a labyrinth of wires, some of which are no longer connected, some of which make no sense, and some of which may perform a useful function. I think I'm going to test everything very carefully, do a diagram, take it all apart and then put it all back together properly - removing all the wires that aren't in use.

The electrics in this place are a nightmare, even though it was rewired about eight years ago and then had a roof lift with new wiring two years ago. The most recent - "professionally" installed - wiring suffers flickering on the lighting circuits while the socket circuits needed a power conditioner before I could safely run computers and the like on them.

Both lots of wiring were signed off by building inspectors - I guess they never thought to turn anything on!

[nathanbriggs]

I love it when I'm right.

See my commercial website here
http://www.aelgroup.co.uk/pdf/pr_powercuts.pdf
The official report I did says that rolling powercuts throughout the world would be commonplace in 2007 in USA and 2008 in Western Europe.

At the time people called me all sorts of names.

I hate to be a doom sayer but the same report says that the energy crisis in Europe is not 2020 as most people seem to accept ie so far away as to not worry about yet

My date is 2008

[Merry]

Thanks Martin for explaining ups - I`ve never heard of that before.
It seems like a really good idea. I`ll keep my eye on SolarWind.

[Stonehead]

the same report says that the energy crisis in Europe is not 2020 as most people seem to accept ie so far away as to not worry about yet

My date is 2008

It's already happening in the US. Have a look at guidance published by the Florida Red Cross, for example (and updated only a month ago).

[jondy]

Thanks Martin, I have not come accross an ups before. You say you plug it into the mains, I guess you mean the feed from the pump and heating bits only. If the ups has an inbuilt battery, it must be an inverter also to provide 240v? I guess its 12v so adding more 12v batteries in parallel would,nt affect it. Is it reasonably straigthforward to plug into the mains would you think? At £65 for an emergency standby looks like good sense to have one. I will have to study the wiring of my heating system.

John

[Martin]

includes the inverter! - all built-in!
In theory you can just keep on adding batteries to increase the time it will run for, and you would arrange it that the current to the pumps and meters goes through the ups, so it can take over when the line drops!
It couldn't be more straightforward - it looks like a desktop computer box, you plug it in to any socket, then plug whatever you want to protect into it - that simple!