Domestic Electics

[JamesAsus]

Hi All,

Is there a good book out there that will help me understand:

Home lighting circuits
Amps/voltage/AC currents from a home electrical appliance point of view
How much current can be placed on one circuit in the house or how to find out etc etc?

Also random question, I have a electric heat pad and I'm wanting to make it warmer as the hottest setting is pretty pathetic really and I'm pretty sure it could be another 10 degrees warmer without setting alight, does shortening the power supply or would swapping out the temperature control module help do this or is it not something to be messed with?

Cheers

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Hi All,

Is there a good book out there that will help me understand:

Home lighting circuits
Amps/voltage/AC currents from a home electrical appliance point of view
How much current can be placed on one circuit in the house or how to find out etc etc?

That's a wide-ranging set of topics, particularly from a complexity POV.

• http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=electrical+circuits+101
  
  
• http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=uk+house+wiring+(basics+OR+101)
  
  
• http://kevinboone.net/electricity.html
  
  
• http://web.archive.org/web/20080213151445/http://www.kevinboone.com/domesticinstallations.html
  
  
• [wiki]Electrics%3Abooks[/wiki]
  
  
• [wiki]Electrics%3Aindex[/wiki]

Also random question, I have a electric heat pad

What sort of heat pad?

I'm pretty sure it could be another 10 degrees warmer without setting alight,

On what basis?

does shortening the power supply

Don't know what you mean.

or would swapping out the temperature control module help do this or is it not something to be messed with?

A very good basic principle is that if you remove whatever it is which monitors the temperature of a heating appliance it will either remain completely cold or get so hot it fails.

 

[ericmark]

There are of course 1000's of books, however it is hard to recommend a book until we know why you want to learn more.

Maths is an integral part of electrics and some of it becomes quite complex. I started my son off sending him to school to pass his RAE (City & Guilds radio amateur exam) however that no longer exists, today there is less theory and more hands on and it is split into three parts so no longer the introduction it was.

Collage courses have also rocketed in price. The problem with books every one leaves out something. The IET does publish books and these are the ones used by electricians and are likely the best. Many electricians consider the "On Site Guide" as an essential working guide it is written more in layman's language than the actual regulations.

As to heat pad you can get electronic temperature controllers many a home brew enthusiast has used the STC-1000 to control the temperature of his beer. However these units are designed to fit in a box so not just a case of buy and used you have to do some work to make them usable.

One of the big problems is USA is very different to UK with domestic electrics, even rest of Europe uses different methods. Likely this forum will teach you more than the books. Lighting for example has evolved through the ages. Back before 1960 we had no earths to lights. By the 1980's we saw the introduction of extra low voltage spot lights and there was a move away from using the ceiling rose as a junction box and we started to copy the USA idea of using the switch back box as a junction box. We started to split lights into two circuits to get the extra power needed for the spot lights. Then we went to CFL to save energy. Then we started using RCD protection on the lights. This in turn caused us to have to reverse the faulty splitting of lights into two circuits and combine back into one circuit. The extra low voltage power supplies caused problems with LED and we returned to using low voltage (230vac) for lights. As a result any book more than a few years old will give wrong information. It is pointless buying any book written before 2008.