No E7 - Help please

[vendikar]

Hi,

Sorry this is long.

I moved into a bungalow in July which uses an Immersion heater and storage heaters.

There is a dial on the wall marked 2 Hour boost for hot water and in the adjacent cupboard sits a hot water cylinder with two elements and two switches on the wall. There are also two Consumer units near the door and the meter at the time was a Liberty secure 100.

The lanlord said it was economy 7 but when we switched on the switches in the hot water cupboard the immersion worked, so I just switched on for a couple of hours when we needed hot water. The supplier (Bulb) said we were not on E7 and that they did not support it anyway so I left it at that.

At some point we switched over to Robin Hood Electric who recently closed down, so of course we are now with British Gas. All was well until last week when we noticed that there was no hot water. Tried the boost dial and that worked but we only got a small amount of hot water and it wasn't as hot as normal. 

I contacted our lanlord who sent an electrician out who said the meter was faulty, he said he had bypassed the meter to prove it. It then came to light that the storage heaters were not working  

 (been using a fan heater and oil filled radiators instead of the storage heaters so didn't notice).

British Gas attended and changed them meter to a Landis + Gyr E130, we switched one of the heaters on last night and neither that nor the immersion heater came on. On checking this morning the second rate on the meter still reads 00000.02.

BG are now saying its an internal problem and to get the lanlord to send another electrician out. One thing they did say is that the cable from the meter was wrong, he said it was "electricians cable".

Does anyone know what the problem could be? Many Thanks.

 

[Bruspark]

Whatever the problem it's the landlords to fix not yours . 

 

[ProDave]

For E7 to work you MUST be on an E7 tariff your your supplier and must have a correctly confugured dual rate meter.

Can you post a picture of your electricity meter and consumer units, you will probably have to upload it to an image hosting site and post a link.

 

[Murdoch]

Sounds like the supplier & meter are to blame ..............

 

[vendikar]

For E7 to work you MUST be on an E7 tariff your your supplier and must have a correctly confugured dual rate meter.

Can you post a picture of your electricity meter and consumer units, you will probably have to upload it to an image hosting site and post a link.

Here's the photos

https://ibb.co/Yb9RzBK
https://ibb.co/Xt4TWHx
https://ibb.co/j463dW5
https://ibb.co/XFGzfNp

 

[Murdoch]

Hum, if the E7 reading is zero, that suggests to me that the E7 isn’t changing in the meter. 
 

your home would use E7 for everything during the E7 hours so a zero reading isn’t realistic

 

[poni]

looks like the cable to the relay has been not been connected to the meter,  

 

[ProDave]

What do your electricity bills say?  Is there a Day and Night, or Peak and Off peak reading?

Agreed the thin grey wire should be in terminal 5 of the meter, which becomes live during the off peak time. This will energise the contactor in the off peak consumer unit.

If your bill is showing 2 rates then all that is needed is an electrician to connect that thin grey wire and test it.  But why was it disconnected in the first place.

The trouble with rental properties is tenants have a habit of doing strange things, like deciding they don't want off peak (even though they have storage heaters) and leaving their mess for the landlord or next tenant to sort out.  I had months of trouble because one tenant had been submitting the peak and off peak readings reversed. I only noticed when trying to sell the property. It took 2 meter readers visits and ages to sort out as they had to contact precious tenants to "correct" their bills.

 

[vendikar]

OK, Thanks for all the replies.

I haven't had a bill from BG yet to check Day & Night rates. Logging into the account on their website doesn't help.

BG have been out again this morning and changed the meter to another E130.

Readings not at 0 so meter was working before it got to me. 

Looks like E7 wires connected now so lets see if it works tonight.

 

[vendikar]

Update:

I am pleased to report the meter correctly switched over to Economy 7 just after 0030 this morning and, at last, we now have heating and hot water. Yay!

One question, on the immersion when the E7 element is running it sounds like a kettle. is this normal? I didn't noticed this before.

Thanks.

 

[poni]

One question, on the immersion when the E7 element is running it sounds like a kettle. is this normal? I didn't noticed this before.

yes a little noise like when a kettle starts, but not a boiling kettle if its like a boiling kettle then you need to get the stat looked at as this can be dangers if you have a plastic header tank , if you have a plastic header tanks than i would turn off the E7 immersion heater until you get it looked at