Hi all,
I've come across a bit of a problem in a house that i've never seen before, it has all electric heating, 10 storage heaters and 2 imersion heaters in the hot water tank. My problem is one of the existing 30A fuse holders that feeds 2 of the storage rads has overheated and melted part of the comsumer unit, i can't find any faults on the storage heaters so i come to the conclusion that as the consumer units are getting on for 35 years old the contacts have worn and lead to a poor connection which caused the overheating.
The set up is a little unusual as there are 3 meters On peak (Day), Economy 7 (Night) & Economy 10 (the old Off Peak tarrif)
The normal house wiring, sockets, cooker, lighting ect are all fed from the main consumer unit with RCD's and in turn feed from the day and night tarrif meter. The storage heaters are fed from 4x 2 way consumer units which are feed from the Off Peak meter, but some of them share fuses, ie. 2 or even 3 heaters on a single 30A fuse and a single radial curcuit in 2.5 or 4.0 twin and earth cable, which i assume was ok all those years ago.
I only need to change one of the 2 way offpeak consumer units, however i'd feel better changing them all as one has failed the others will proberbly go soon as well. I was just going to do a direct swap for a 2way garage style consumer unit 63A main switch, and 2 32A RCD's to replace the 2 30A fuses. However to tidy the instalation up i could fit one large 13Way consumer unit feed from the offpeak meter, however the total load on the main switch wold be 208A ! I have found a dual tarrif Wylex unit with 2x 100A main switches which would be better.
Also i have traced the feed cables from the offpeak meter to the 4x 2way consumer units and they all pass through a 75A 3 phase Heating Contactor, which has the 200A offpeak load diversified across the 3 phases.
Any ideas on where i stand, i know the latest edition of wiring regs say that all the storage heates should be feed on a single radial curcuit protected by 16A RCD, this would require me to completly rewiring a 5 bedroom house to get the cabling correct, or can i just swap like for like replaceing 30A fuses with 32A breakers?
Any suggestion much appriciated.
I've come across a bit of a problem in a house that i've never seen before, it has all electric heating, 10 storage heaters and 2 imersion heaters in the hot water tank. My problem is one of the existing 30A fuse holders that feeds 2 of the storage rads has overheated and melted part of the comsumer unit, i can't find any faults on the storage heaters so i come to the conclusion that as the consumer units are getting on for 35 years old the contacts have worn and lead to a poor connection which caused the overheating.
The set up is a little unusual as there are 3 meters On peak (Day), Economy 7 (Night) & Economy 10 (the old Off Peak tarrif)
The normal house wiring, sockets, cooker, lighting ect are all fed from the main consumer unit with RCD's and in turn feed from the day and night tarrif meter. The storage heaters are fed from 4x 2 way consumer units which are feed from the Off Peak meter, but some of them share fuses, ie. 2 or even 3 heaters on a single 30A fuse and a single radial curcuit in 2.5 or 4.0 twin and earth cable, which i assume was ok all those years ago.
I only need to change one of the 2 way offpeak consumer units, however i'd feel better changing them all as one has failed the others will proberbly go soon as well. I was just going to do a direct swap for a 2way garage style consumer unit 63A main switch, and 2 32A RCD's to replace the 2 30A fuses. However to tidy the instalation up i could fit one large 13Way consumer unit feed from the offpeak meter, however the total load on the main switch wold be 208A ! I have found a dual tarrif Wylex unit with 2x 100A main switches which would be better.
Also i have traced the feed cables from the offpeak meter to the 4x 2way consumer units and they all pass through a 75A 3 phase Heating Contactor, which has the 200A offpeak load diversified across the 3 phases.
Any ideas on where i stand, i know the latest edition of wiring regs say that all the storage heates should be feed on a single radial curcuit protected by 16A RCD, this would require me to completly rewiring a 5 bedroom house to get the cabling correct, or can i just swap like for like replaceing 30A fuses with 32A breakers?
Any suggestion much appriciated.