Replacement teleswitcher

[hownottodoit]

No.

Really, so you know how many Kwh we draw a night? And how many in a day? You know the tariff we are on and the rates we are getting? What our renewable setup is and what storage we have in place.

So given that you can blindly claim that E7 is "not" the better option for us, please let me know the better tariff than what I currently have. Hell i'll do you one better, tell me a better tariff and the money saved in the first year i'll give you in pound notes.

Yes, that all makes perfect sense.
I often get customers saying "Come round and do whatever you want; I'll clear up after you".

Because clearly I'm going to have a guy back who ripped out a unit who in his own words "had no idea what it was for". Instead I'm going to get the issue fixed myself and send him the invoice. With the helpful replies of other members in this thread I have now found what I need to get that done.

In view of the above, how do you know it's a mess?

How is a contractor ripping out something they don't know what it is for and disposing of it "not a mess"?

Seriously, if you want to come into a thread, fail to read all the points and then try and make some veiled accusation, don't then embarrass yourself by making absurd claims which you have ZERO ability to know.

 

[ericmark]

Tele = Latin for at a distance, so speech at a distance = telephone. So the teleswitch has to be operated by some one at a distance from the house. That person is the supplier, not sure if really the DNO as it's all part of the billing so could be the billing agent.

But the DNO has a board which all it's property is mounted on, it would seem the missing item was not mounted on the DNO's board, so could be something which the DNO has nothing to do with, I have simple clocks at home which use a time signal from Germany to correct them, suppose you would call them a teleclock? So it may be something which uses the radio 4 signal but is not belonging to the DNO?

However I thought ENA has overall responsibility for the operation, maintenance of the system in accordance with the requirements of the Companies (15 licence holders) using the Radio Teleswitch Service.

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

Tele = Latin for at a distance, so speech at a distance = telephone.

Well... Greek anyway.

 

[JohnD]

The signals are sent out on behalf of the supplier, not the DNO.

There are various tariffs for various periods, some have an afternoon top-up for example.

There are also several batches of signals sent out so that there isn't a big surge as you would get if they all switched at the same time, and the teleswitches are preset to respond to a particular batch. So even if you and your neighbour are both on, say, 11pm-6am tariff, you will probably switch some minutes apart. The signals carry a code that will only operate switches set to respond to that particular code.

If the teleswitch loses radio contact, it has a fallback clock.

It is rumoured that the transmitters are obsolete and spares are no longer made, but that might not be true.

 

[JohnW2]

The signals are sent out on behalf of the supplier, not the DNO.

Indeed, but since it appears that the OP never had a teleswitch, that's probably a bit moot!

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnD]

'mmm, but they might give him one to fill his gap.

When Smart Meters are installed, electricity suppliers and Chinese hackers will be able to control the timeswitch and meter according to their whim.

 

[bernardgreen]

It is rumoured that the transmitters are obsolete and spares are no longer made, but that might not be true

The signals are carried on the BBC Radio 4 Long Wave service. Definately not obsolete

 

[JohnD]

see if you can find out how many spare valves they have.

And how many exist in the world.

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

And they have stated that when the valves are gone, Droitwich closes.

 

[bernardgreen]

And how many exist in the world.

The Grauniad published a news item that said the BBC had bought up all the glass valves of the type used in the Droitwich Long wave transmitters.

First error is that the BBC do not own or operate the transmitters. Form memory the operating company is Arquiva ( or very similar )

True the glass valves are in short supply but can still be made if necessary. Again from memory but I am sure the transmitters are now equiped with ceramic valves.

 

[JohnW2]

True the glass valves are in short supply but can still be made if necessary. Again from memory but I am sure the transmitters are now equiped with ceramic valves.

As you say, they could, in theory, always be made (we cannot unlearn how to make them!), but whether or not it would be cost-effective for a relatively small number is perhaps a different matter.

However, apart from that, it would presumably not beyond the capabilities of human endeavour to 'upgrade' the transmitters using technology other than thermionic valves. I have to say that last time I played with 'RF power transistors/FETs', 40+ years ago, unless one was a millionaire, one had to be content with not much over 'single figure' numbers of watts (although, I admit, I was largely 'playing' with VHF at the time, which made the task even more challenging/expensive!). However, I can but presume that, in the ensuing decades, we have evolved devices that are even man enough for the power amps of Droitwich!

Kind Regards, John

 

[ericmark]

I have not transmitted with anything over 30 Watt for some time, however in the 1990's large amplifiers of just 1 kW often had valves, cheap ones were air cooled, more expensive were water cooled and if the standing wave ratio was not good enough the water would boil, hence the phrase steam radio.

I would assume today still the large transmitters use valves, not the little glass things we had in our radios of yesteryear but massive liquid cooled devices, since very few people can transmit with really high power these valves were made as one off items, not bought off the shelve and made by the 1000's.

The last valve in my house is my old TV which still has a cathode ray tube which is in essence a valve. This single valve was however controlled by solid state devices.

With the smart meter I expect the radio 4 transmitter will not be required, also with wind and solar power the idea of there being excess power at night may be a thing of the past, and we will likely be given power as and when it is available. Since I don't want a smart meter and I don't use off peak power I am not really worried how they do it.