I quite fancy having a play with one of these, but don't want to pay the £40 retail price for what might be a two week novelty. I get the impression you guys are being sent them for free by your energy providers?
Energy Monitor Clip on Sensor fitting
- Thread starter lpt100
- Start date
Owl sell via ebay for £25 ish.
I have one and check it on the way out (of an empty house)- It flags up enough cost to go round killing the 4 PC's and 5 TV's in the house.
It also used to check if son child person has left lights on in the loft bathroom which has 6 x GU10's
When 1st used it dropped the bill for juice to about £100 a quarter, rather than the £160 it was. That was done in conjunction with a broad sweep of ES lamps to light fittings with 8 x 40w golf balls and candles.
On the OP subject it sound like form the isolator to the CU you have 1 x cable, maybe an SWA which doesn't allow you to fix the clamp to.
Re check the entire route between the mains head and the CU, if you really have no uncontained oped access to the live cable (25mm normal) then your screwed.
A 25mm sq cable is about 8mm thick plus a bit more for double sheathing. So if the clamp fits round your finger, it's the normal size for connection to 98% of house main live.
Also remember that since it's wireless it can go anywhere on the route from the in head to the cu.
I have one and check it on the way out (of an empty house)- It flags up enough cost to go round killing the 4 PC's and 5 TV's in the house.
It also used to check if son child person has left lights on in the loft bathroom which has 6 x GU10's
When 1st used it dropped the bill for juice to about £100 a quarter, rather than the £160 it was. That was done in conjunction with a broad sweep of ES lamps to light fittings with 8 x 40w golf balls and candles.
On the OP subject it sound like form the isolator to the CU you have 1 x cable, maybe an SWA which doesn't allow you to fix the clamp to.
Re check the entire route between the mains head and the CU, if you really have no uncontained oped access to the live cable (25mm normal) then your screwed.
A 25mm sq cable is about 8mm thick plus a bit more for double sheathing. So if the clamp fits round your finger, it's the normal size for connection to 98% of house main live.
Also remember that since it's wireless it can go anywhere on the route from the in head to the cu.
thats some powerful PCs you got there...
(or lots of them)
my Bg monitor clipper round no problem, I do suspect my tails are 16mm though rather than 25, that said the clip is pretty loose.
the cost on them is nonsense, you can change it, but that only works if you are on a single rate tarrif, mine costs £X for the first so many KWh, and £X after that, so setting the cost dont work.
all my lamps are already CFLs, with a couple of 12V halogens thrown in here and there (mainly in the kitchen to illuminate work surfaces)
mines used mainly to regulate the time the wife spends in the shower...
Mine eat about the same. Two large desktops, a small one (used as a router), an Itanium server (that eats about 350-400W by itself, idle.. Yeah, I'm replacing it with something lighter), a rack mount switch, ADSL modem, wireless AP, and all the trimmings. It adds up pretty rapidly, especially older stuff. The PSUs in the router and switch are probably <75% efficiency..
I have one on order from E.on - they were giving them away to their customers. They cant post/give away free CFLs anymore since the govt put a stop to them posting hazardous waste to unsuspecting householders 
But they are still obliged to try to cut peoples' energy use. So you might find an owl dropping (ewww) on your doormat soon!
I am going to find it useful in my first house - its very good for seeing how much electric certain appliances use. My Grandad has one, we were going around the house turning things off to find out what exactly was using 1p an hour
My bills are 20p per kwh for first 800kwh/year. I'm going to try not to go over this Though this is a ripoff because it'd be 10p/kwh over this! 
But they are still obliged to try to cut peoples' energy use. So you might find an owl dropping (ewww) on your doormat soon!
I am going to find it useful in my first house - its very good for seeing how much electric certain appliances use. My Grandad has one, we were going around the house turning things off to find out what exactly was using 1p an hour
My bills are 20p per kwh for first 800kwh/year. I'm going to try not to go over this
Though this is a ripoff because it'd be 10p/kwh over this! Sorry got my math wrong. I think i'll take your advice and give up. The only tails i could get to are between the isolator and CU the rest is in that dam plastic box.
It would just be a novelty i guess. Apart from showing you that something is on when you though everything was off.
It would just be a novelty i guess. Apart from showing you that something is on when you though everything was off.
So why can't you put the sensor on one of those?
the cable is too thick for the sensor to be clipped round
FYI, 25mm² tails are approximately 11mm diameter.
I make 44/π = 14, not 8.3, but the clamp should still fit just fine.
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