Backup Options - Gennie Vs Ups

[OnOff]

Where I live is pretty rural. 4 wire, 3 phase coming along the road. Older properties (like mine) on TT with some of the newer builds on PME......until the pikeys thieve the earth tie downs on the poles as frequently happens! Me, I'm sticking with the rod!

Anyway, we USED to suffer from frequent power cuts - a week long one time. I even bought a 2300W petrol gennie from Macro when they were going cheap. Fired it up, ran a work light off it to try it and promptly NEVER used it since! Sod's Law that for the first time in YEARS we had a power cut last night. Only off for an hour and a half but it got me thinking about "next time". If nothing else to keep the central heating going and maybe the lights.

Obviously I will NOT be going with the double ended plug lead as is my neighbours favourite trick. Saying that he has been kind enough to run a lead over from next door before now just so we could save the frozen foods.

So I  have the gennie but I've just got a skipped, rack mount UPS, and a big one at that - YES, IT'S PERFECTLY LEGIT. The BMS was flooded and this was replaced as part of the insurance claim along with servers etc. Nothing wrong with a lot of stuff that gets skipped as usual (I'm hoping)!

It's this one:

http://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=sua2200rmi2u

Just gone to charge it up and realised I've NOT got the "bigger" IEC plug to do so.

Anyway, I've roughly tallied the central heating requirements:

Grundfoss pump: 90W

Riello oil boiler pump: 125W

x2 2-port & x1 3-port valves: 15W

These plus a couple of Tower QE2 controllers, so all up less than 250W. Am I reading the runtime graph right that I should get probably doing 3 ish days out of it? Obviously more as the boiler switches on and off.

Thinking it would be worth getting this UPS up and running and fitting a changeover switch for the heating supply.

Any hints, tips appreciated!

 

[steptoe]

mmm, for just running your boiler off it you could use a DPDT latched relay on the boiler supply, with a simple PTM switch to initially fire the relay on the mains.  

 

[OnOff]

mmm, for just running your boiler off it you could use a DPDT latched relay on the boiler supply, with a simple PTM switch to initially fire the relay on the mains.  

So..............you're suggesting a relay that's constantly energised whilst the mains is present.........fired by a PTM switch that brings in a hold on circuit...................mains fails and relay drops out? All easy enough to do but not sure I like the relay being energised for 99% of the time. If that's what you meant?

Couple of photos of the UPS, it's 'kin heavy, maybe 40 - 50kg (Fluke stick for scale):

 

[steptoe]

its the only way I could see for the boiler to have instant UPS seperately from the rest of the install,

but, then again, I'm fairly far down the garden sometimes.  :|

 

[steptoe]

So..............you're suggesting a relay that's constantly energisedwhilst the mains is present.........fired by a PTM switch that brings in

a hold on circuit...................mains fails and relay drops out?

All easy enough to do but not sure I like the relay being energised for

99% of the time. If that's what you meant?

yes.

but I do understand your concerns of having the relay on permanently [so to speak] .

 

[ProDave]

Am I missing something here?

Surely the UPS outputs 230V ALL THE TIME

It has it's own changeover circuitry.

So just connect the UPS to the mains, and power all the heating controls direct from the UPS ALL THE TIME

Nothing more needed surely?

If these will keep your servers running without interruption when the mains fails, they will do the same for the boiler.

Since it's such a big one, why not feed some of the lights from it as well?  Perhaps a dedicated low energy flourescent lighting circuit?

 

[kme]

Concur with Dave~O.

That`s the whole idea of UPS - hence the "Uninterruptible" bit of the name?

 

[OnOff]

Am I missing something here?

Surely the UPS outputs 230V ALL THE TIME

It has it's own changeover circuitry.

So just connect the UPS to the mains, and power all the heating controls direct from the UPS ALL THE TIME

Nothing more needed surely?

If these will keep your servers running without interruption when the mains fails, they will do the same for the boiler.

Since it's such a big one, why not feed some of the lights from it as well?  Perhaps a dedicated low energy flourescent lighting circuit?

Nope, it's ME who's missing something! I have little experience of UPS's. Got one on a crane and that's about it. This UPS so big (in a domestic situation), as I say a bit of a lump..........got to think of where it can go..............in the loft near the cylinder, pump and controls I guess? Then a regular hoover etc. I'll see if it works first after a charge. I note the mains in socket is a 16A IEC C20 job. It WAS I'm sure just on a plug top where it was fitted. Cheers. (Scoobed).

I was still in the mode that any solution (gennie etc) would have to be manhandled out of the garage every time!

 

[alpha spark]

+1 pd that's wot I do on shop fits where counter sockets need to be on ups

 

[steptoe]

yep, Dave has it,

told you I was down the garden a lot,

you just need to decide where to break into the boiler feed at now,

I suppose its times like this that you wish you had wired the boiler seperate and not off the ring,,,,,,,

:|

 

[Badger]

unlike me where the i have ups on the cctv system but i wired the heating system seperately and so i wouldnt have a problem :coat :run

 

[OnOff]

B***ocks! Looks like the 48V battery pack on this UPS has seen better days. Got a C19 IEC lead and plugged in. Battery fault light came on straight away. NOT the freebie I was hoping for!

 

[M107]

I fitted 3 of them ups's with battery packs a few years ago.

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00192.jpg

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00190.jpg

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00191.jpg

into this

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/CONTROLUNIT004.jpg

Starting a refurb of the vehicle in the next few weeks.

We get batteries from

http://www.thebatteryshop.co.uk/

 

[OnOff]

I fitted 3 of them ups's with battery packs a few years ago.

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00192.jpg

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00190.jpg

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/DSC00191.jpg

into this

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j293/gazjothomas/icu/CONTROLUNIT004.jpg

Starting a refurb of the vehicle in the next few weeks.

We get batteries from

http://www.thebatteryshop.co.uk/

Cheers, I'll look at what the batteries are and maybe give the seller a try. I'll see if the individual batteries take a charge beforehand though. Scoobed.

 

[wozz]

My concern with a gennie in this situation is the output from them, i dont know a great deal about electronics but is a gennie with no AVR suitable for boilers or LED lighting and such like? 

Does a UPS consume much power?

 

[Steve3948]

Had a smallish UPS given to me in my office until it needed new batteries, when they told me the price I binned the UPS.