How much to change a 60A DNO fuse for a 100A?

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I currently have a 60A cut out fuse - an electrician has told me I may need to upgrade it to 100A to meet my needs. If he's right, how much would it cost?

Is it simply a case of SPEN coming along, removing the 60A fuse and replacing it with a 100A, or is there more to it?

In case it makes a difference, I live (literally) next door to a sub station (the brick shed type).

Cheers
 
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I currently have a 60A cut out fuse - an electrician has told me I may need to upgrade it to 100A to meet my needs.
What on earth are your needs?


If he's right, how much would it cost?
Probably more than you would ever dream of agreeing was justified.


Is it simply a case of SPEN coming along, removing the 60A fuse and replacing it with a 100A, or is there more to it?
Ask them - that won't cost you anything.
 
I currently have a 60A cut out fuse - an electrician has told me I may need to upgrade it to 100A to meet my needs. If he's right, how much would it cost?
Literally changing the fuse would probably cost little or nothing. However, that can only be done if the supply (cables etc.) is up to that higher current. If it's not, you could need a mortgage.

However, as BAS has asked, why is this need? Few ordinary houses need a 100A supply. The average current drawn by an ordinary house is something like 9A.

Kind Regards, John
 
Many older cutouts use ME type fuses that only go up to 80A. Newer ones tend to use MF type fuses which go to 100A, so you might need a cutout change to facilitate this. Some DNOs have certain rules, some like to fit 100A everywhere, some like to fit 60A everywhere, some it depends whether you have an outside meter box or not. And don't forget your supplier would have to uprate the tails between the cutout and meter to 25mm as well (they may well be able to uprate the fuse size too).

If your supply cable is undersized then forget it.

Don't forget a cutout fuse will happily take 1.5x its rating for 4 hours without blowing, so unless you like long showers whilst using every ring of your induction hob with both ovens on, you should be OK.
 
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Thanks for all the replies everyone. I'm getting an extension built that will more than double the size of the house. But I'm also getting a workshop built at the same time which will house a lot of servers and storage arrays running 24/7. The workshop bit is to do with my job so work pay my elec bills but due to the size of some of the server racks, the electrician said a fuse upgrade may be needed.

If I don't need to get the fuse changed then OK, but I'd hoped being so close to the substation it would be straightforward and cheap (ideally) free.

Thanks all

P
 
.... I'm also getting a workshop built at the same time which will house a lot of servers and storage arrays running 24/7. The workshop bit is to do with my job so work pay my elec bills but due to the size of some of the server racks, the electrician said a fuse upgrade may be needed.
I don't think that you'll be able to get much more advice without some pertinent facts - in particular a ballpark idea of how much power this IT equipment is going to use. I obviously don't know exactly what you're talking about would not have thought they would represent enormous loads

However, if you are going to have high powered loads running 24/7, the DNO might wish to know about that, and may have something to say about it! I believe that they usually work on the basis that a house represents an average load of about 2kW (about 9A).

Kind Regards, John
 
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Post a photo of your cut out and I'll cast my eye over it

I wouldn't admit to running servers etc as they may insist on changing the metering class to non domestic.
 
Normally I would say, don't worry, if the fuse blows then and only then worry about it, as often if a fuse blows the DNO will replace it with a larger fuse if only 60A. However with servers likely you don't want to lose power, so this then becomes something which your employer will need to consider, there are many problems, including change of use, the house will become a combined domestic and commercial premises, you would need to apply for change of use, councils can get very funny about change of use, locally a political party got fined because they were using a shop as an office without applying.

There are some odd rules, where I live you can use the house to run a business of doctor, dentist or solicitor, but nothing else, sole traders with vans parked so it can be seen they are running the business from home have been caught out, it is not just the electric bit. I am sure there are 1000's who now work from home with the traditional cottage industry, but deeds are not all the same, and it may be permitted in one street and not in another, the main problem is first they have to catch people, which is in most cases near impossible. In the main it means some one complaining, I am not permitted to store a caravan at front of my house, I do and so do many others in the street, unless some one complains it is unlikely we will get stopped.

The problem is you can't untell people, once you have said something it's done. So you need to consider who you inform, and what you say, some times better to just do nothing, the question is, how important is it that server does not loose power?
 
I think whether it needs upgrading really depends on what other loads you have on your installation before you add all this extra load.

If you have gas cooking, heating and hot water then I really wouldn't worry all that much. As John has pointed out the average usage is somewhere around the 9A mark. That means without any other large loads, you've got on average around 50A to play with. Obviously if you run the dishwasher/washing machine etc that headroom will drop to around 37A for periods, but likely not long enough to take out a 60A fuse.

If you do have an electric shower, hob or whatever, then you need to get a total load worked out for your server/rack etc. It may be that it comes with a 32A 60309 plug on the PDU but you might only draw half of that under normal load.
 
Leave it as is. If it blows they will replace it.(n) at zero cost to you !

DS
 
Leave it as is. If it blows they will replace it.(n) at zero cost to you !
... True, but he could end up without a job, since his employer might not be impressed with the servers going down for as long as it takes for the DNO to turn up ... and, if he really does have a big enough load to blow a 60A fuse, then the DNO might have something to say about that, too.

Kind Regards, John
 
... True, but he could end up without a job, since his employer might not be impressed with the servers going down for as long as it takes for the DNO to turn up ... and, if he really does have a big enough load to blow a 60A fuse, then the DNO might have something to say about that, too.

Kind Regards, John
Just get a REALLY big UPS setup!
 
Just get a REALLY big UPS setup!
If it were drawing enough (even plus a normal domestic load) to blow a 60A fuse, a UPS man enough to be guaranteed to keep it going util the DNO turned up would, indeed, have to be REALLY big :)

Kind Regards, John
 
The workshop bit is to do with my job so work pay my elec bills but due to the size of some of the server racks, the electrician said a fuse upgrade may be needed.
Get a separate supply installed for the workshop, which will then have it's own metering and billing.
 

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