Trying To Find A Suitable Electric Cooker

Hi all,
I'm getting a small retirement flat ready to move into. Kitchen has a tatty 50cm freestanding electric cooker. There is space for a 60cm so I chose and bought a new one with ceramic hob, small oven/grill and large oven. To me, it looks like a completely normal 60cm domestic cooker.

I've got an electrician from a large local company doing a variety of jobs - new storage heaters, lights, fans etc. Come time to connect the cooker and he can't - it's 'heavy duty' and the existing cable (6mm) won't take it. According to the retailers website it draws 9.8kw and is 32amp. He's suggested looking for something under 7kw. I'm struggling with understanding how the specs are presented on retailers websites and with finding anything remotely close to 7kw. Some of the specs give the kw rating, the cookers similar to the one I bought are 10-12kw. Some only give an amp rating usually 32 amp. Zanussi seem to give the kw rating as 1.1 - 1.2kw which seems strange compared to the rest. I need to find something quickly and I'm struggling. Any advice on how to negotiate this minefield will be very gratefully received.

PS - a new cable isn't an option. It would have to be surface mounted in trunking which is not acceptable to me - I'm having existing trunking removed - or fished through the ceilings via a circuitous route which is complicated by the presence of Artex ceilings which the company say will have to be tested for asbestos before they'll cut into it. The cost of installing a new cable would be considerably more than I paid for the cooker.

Virtually all cookers are suitable for a 32A circuit, which is typically wired in 6mm² cable.

ceres said:

I've got an electrician
....
He's suggested looking for something under 7kw.

Click to expand...

Find someone else. They haven't got a clue.

There are no freestanding cookers under 7kW total. The total is always more, but the essential thing your 'electrician' seems unaware of is that no cooker ever uses all of the elements on full power all of the time. It's called diversity.

Ratings are either given as the total (10-12kW typically), or in other useless cases it's actually kWh, which is the energy consumption based on some made up average for 'standard' cooking of certain things - ignore that, it's nonsense.

Thank you, that is so helpful! I'd just come across 'diversity' after I posted:

https://www.theiet.org/forums/forum...d=59510&STARTPAGE=1&FTVAR_FORUMVIEWTMP=Linear

Most of it is above my head but with what you've explained, I get the gist! And the Zanussi kWh are just a confusion too far!

So, the cooker which I like, which is suitable for my needs and which I already bought is fine. I don't need to return it and look for another. The sparky on the other hand...………. It's going to be an interesting conversation tomorrow morning!

Thank you so much, it's been a horrible day but it's looking a bit better now.