"Daisy-Chaining" switches/ supply for two immersion elements

[GeronimoCarmichael]

I was swapping out two immersion heater switches.

When I took the old switches off, I was surprised to see that one switch had 2 of each wires (E N L) connected at the load terminals. Eventually I figured out that the second set of cables was actually the supply going back into the wall & coming out at the other switch, to connect its supply.

So basically the top switch has e.g. two separate earth wires going into the earth terminal. The wires are otherwise loose, they are only held together at the terminals of the first switch.

Is it "okay" to recreate this, with the new switches? Or is there a "proper" way to do it?

Cheers!

 

[oldbuffer]

1. Almost certainly not OK.
2. From your description it would be possible to have both immersions running off one supply from the consumer unit.
3. This would give a load of around 26 amps, each normal immersion heater being 3 kW. This could lead to:
3.1 Overheating of the cable from the consumer unit, unless it is rated for 26+ amps.
3.2 Overloading of the terminals and switchgear in the switches, again unless they are rated for 26+ amps.
3.3 Overloading / overheating can easily lead to fire.
4. I'd suggest you need a qualified electrician to examine the setup ensure it is either safe or replaced.

 

[ericmark]

There are devices which do allow two immersion heaters to be used so one can select which one is active or even auto select which one is active.

Need to think about why two immersion heaters are needed.
1) Sink or Bath
2) Duel tariff
3) Using solar energy
How best to do depends on what you want. There are timers and solar detector like the iboost+ designed to use to immersion heaters clearly one at a time, but need to know why you want two to start with.

 

[GeronimoCarmichael]

Thanks for the replies.

I think I'm realising I'll actually only need one cabled switch. The new cylinder is still in the box & I hadn't read it -- but it looks like the "other" coil is for solar power, which I won't be using...

 

[ericmark]

I fitted an iboost+ but in hind sight don't think that was a good idea, as get more for solar electric during the day, to what I pay for electric at night.