Hello all
I hope this post is in the right section - it might belong better under "electrics".
We've just bought a flat as a second home which is heated by electrical storage heaters. There is no gas supply to the block. I don't know a great deal about storage heaters yet, but I do know that they are charged overnight and then discharge heat next day.
We will be using the flat often but not really on a predictable basis. Consequently it definitely wouldn't make sense to have the heaters charging every night as they lose their charge over the following day and there would be no one there quite often to benefit.
Also, because the flat might be used in the week or at weekends (although usually the latter), a timer wouldn't be ideal either. And since these things don't work unless they've been charged the night before, we're going to have a cold welcome if I don't find some way of turning them on to charge the night before they are required. Hope that makes sense!
The obvious answer is to control them via wifi somehow (or replace them with some form of direct heating, but I'm not keen on the cost implications). I've seen some plug in devices which can be controlled via the internet to turn appliances/lighting/etc off and on. However, they only seem suitable for fairly light loads. I don't actually know what load these are, but I assume it is pretty heavy and anyway these are wired directly into fused switches.
From what I understand of systems like Hive, they are great for controlling thermostats but wouldn't do what I need them to do? I may be wrong there.
If anyone has been able to understand what my problem is, I'd be grateful for some advice. If it would need an electrician to be involved that would be fine. It doesn't matter too much if it's a single control for all heaters or a set of controls for each one.
Thanks in advance.
Martyn
I hope this post is in the right section - it might belong better under "electrics".
We've just bought a flat as a second home which is heated by electrical storage heaters. There is no gas supply to the block. I don't know a great deal about storage heaters yet, but I do know that they are charged overnight and then discharge heat next day.
We will be using the flat often but not really on a predictable basis. Consequently it definitely wouldn't make sense to have the heaters charging every night as they lose their charge over the following day and there would be no one there quite often to benefit.
Also, because the flat might be used in the week or at weekends (although usually the latter), a timer wouldn't be ideal either. And since these things don't work unless they've been charged the night before, we're going to have a cold welcome if I don't find some way of turning them on to charge the night before they are required. Hope that makes sense!
The obvious answer is to control them via wifi somehow (or replace them with some form of direct heating, but I'm not keen on the cost implications). I've seen some plug in devices which can be controlled via the internet to turn appliances/lighting/etc off and on. However, they only seem suitable for fairly light loads. I don't actually know what load these are, but I assume it is pretty heavy and anyway these are wired directly into fused switches.
From what I understand of systems like Hive, they are great for controlling thermostats but wouldn't do what I need them to do? I may be wrong there.
If anyone has been able to understand what my problem is, I'd be grateful for some advice. If it would need an electrician to be involved that would be fine. It doesn't matter too much if it's a single control for all heaters or a set of controls for each one.
Thanks in advance.
Martyn