Key Post: Electric storage heater repairs/spares.

Hi JetBlue,

I got the number of a spark from a friend yesterday evening. However things took a turn for the worst last night when, at about 3am, the power went completely from the apartment (I was woken by the burglar alarm signalling 'Mains Fault').

I disabled the alarm (thankfully the back-up battery prevented the bell box going off) and flicked-off the main supply trip switch. A sleepless night ensued. I contacted the spark first thing this morning. He found that the main supply wires on the fuse board (into the screw-in fuse) had been overloaded and generated enough heat to melt the plastic from the wire and just about any plastic nearby.

He said it could have been due to loose connections but when I told him about the storage heaters charging during the day he suggested that there may have been excessive loads on the wire at weekends. Considering that the heaters were charging whilst several loads of washing, oven, kettle and occasionally the tumble drier were potentially all on the go at once over the course of the last few weekends, it sounds plausible to me. Needless to say I've arranged for the ESB to fix the timer :)

So if the daytime charging, combined with hectic weekend household activity, contributed to the overload then that's certainly something I hadn't considered when weighing up the pros & cons of the timer problem.

What do you reckon about the diagnosis?
 
Yes, that sounds plausible! but!
The supply cable is normally sized for an 80amp load, the main fuse is usually 63amp.
Certainly the cable shouldn't have been supplying to a fuse with a greater rating than it's current carrying capacity.
If your installation is overloaded then the main incoming fuse should blow at the fuseboard.
Insulation melting off a cable at a termination such as a fuseholder would indicate a loose connection to me. The heat is generated by the resistance of the connection and transmitted along the cable. There would usually be discoloration and damage at the connection too.
All fuseholders, mcb's and distribution boards are not created equal! There are quality and price differences between manufacturers.
Termination points and clamps do come slightly loose with age also, this effect is more noticable with terminations that are subject to high currents(compared to rating) and especially if the current varies a great deal, ie: heating and cooling effect.

Does all this make sense?

If I were you I would be reassured if the spark has replaced the main fuse holder and checked/tightened the rest of the terminations in the board.
 
OH, and remember you're in an apt block aren't you so when the esb change the timeclock it will affect all your storage heating using neighbours too, won't it?
and have any of them suffered similar probs to yourself?
 
The end of the saga:
It appears that the ESB came and changed/fixed the clock during the week as the heaters are charging during the night now. To be honest I don't know if my neighbours had the same problems, I rarely see them, but I'm curious and will ask next time I bump into one in the corridor. Thanks for sharing your knowledge JetBlue.
 
Hi all. I have read through alot of the posts and most things make sense. I have a few other questions though. i have three storage heaters in my apt, one of which is a combi, i.e. it has a manual fan. By manual though, i mean i can turn it on once the ESB night rates kick in, about 23.00 each night. i would have thought that the whole idea behind a manual option, is that i could turn it on when i wanted to. Does anyone have one of these Creda combi storage heaters?

I have tried to put the input at 6 and output at 1 over night tonight and will then increase output tomorrow evening and see if that makes a difference on the other two heaters. As a general rule of thumb, should i leave input at 6 all the time and output at 1 overnight, increasing it in the evening to release the heat? Also, can i leave the main switch on, all the time? It only costs once 23.00 comes along and the red light comes on, right?

Finally, i have two electric mounted heaters with timers. Again, is it ok to leave the main power switch on, all the time but since i have it on timer, it will only cost me when the heater flicks on per the timing i have it set to?

Thanks for your help
 
Hello,

I recently moved into my new rented flat and it has Creda storage heaters - TSR18acw and TSR12mwv.
I set the input to full overnight and left the output closed but when i got up this morning I opened the output and no heat is coming out. I have tried closing the input but still no heat comes out. Have I done something wrong, do I need to heat for more than one night or does it sound like my heaters are broken. Is there anyway to carry out maintenance on the heater myself if not where can I call to get someone to have a look at it,

Thank you

Any help would be greatly appreciated

David

Dublin
 
Is the flex outlet on the wall beside the heater switched on?
Are all the Mcb's in the distribution board "ON"?

Call your landlord, surely the apt had heat during the recent prolonged cold period.
 
Adventures in storage heating electriciblastifundibulums

The missus and I just moved into a new place in Nov with 3 storage heaters. The oddness abounds...

At first we were getting no electricity to the heaters, day or night. We got the contactor replaced and voila! heat was being stored galore, BUT...

  1. We discovered that the day/night timer (at the meter) was set to have "night" start ~12.30 and end at ~21.30.
  2. Regardless of "night" or "day", the storage heaters were constantly ON, in that they always getting juice and weren't getting switched off from "night" to "day". It's easy to test this if you have a phase tester and access to the electrical panel, but even if you don't (like we didn't), you can *easily* tell by the rate at which the meter is running if you have access to that.
So, at least we have heat (and good thing too, 'cause it's COLD!), but if we want to not pay a fortune for it, we have to go around and switch the storage on/off at the wall at the appropriate times... not an ideal situation if we're not home at 12.30 and 21.30.

So I had a look at the panel. Indeed, the electrician who replaced the contactor had set the "day" knob on the controller to "CONST" which I discovered, after reading this epic thread, means "CONSTANT", is used for testing, etc., etc.

So, I turned the "day" knob to 0 (vertical) and immediately the contactor clicked over (i.e. it turned off, which was good as it was ~20.00 last night when I did this - which, according to our meter timer, is "night"). Problem solved, thought I! I was quite wrong.

About 20 mins later and about every 20 mins after that, the contactor clicks over again. I say "about every 20 mins" because the controller has become, for all intents and purposes, a petulant teenager, wantonly flipping the switch at random - perhaps whenever it gets bored - and blatantly ignoring any instruction from the meter timer as to what it should or shouldn't be doing. It has a setting for "night" as well but there is no knob, just some graduations around a vacuous hole from which it issues silent yet insidious taunts.

Anyone have any idea where to go from here?

I have an illustrative image of the panel, but I don't have enough posts to link to it, so... *shrug*

tl;dr

Storage heaters are switching on and off at the panel every 20 mins or so.
 
Tariffs

sueellen said:
Ocras
Frequent poster
Optimum use of Storage Heating.

{snip}

4. On the subject of combination heaters; In my personal opinion they are terrible. They have nothing to do with the storage heater. They are a separate convector heater, stuck on to the front of the storage heater, and run only on the high ESB tariff, day or night.

{snip}
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what the "high ESB tariff" Ocras is referring to if it's something other than the "day" tariff. Perhaps tariffs have changed since 2002?

From what I've gathered, the day and night tariffs are regulated by a timer switch that feeds the dual day/night meter (in the older, non-digital systems) according to the timer's setting (and the on/off tabs on the dial face) at the entry point to each residence. Whatever the timer is currently at, that's the tariff you're getting throughout.

I.e. If it's "night", all electricity you use inside your residence is on the "night" tariff, including all convection (boost) heating; likewise for "day".

If anyone knows otherwise, please advise!

Since the controller in my electrical panel is set to "CONSTANT", the storage heaters are constantly getting electricity to store heat, regardless of what time it is.
 
hi,

I have a storage heater problem myself which is particularly strange given that the heaters all worked fine until yesterday and that the problem has affected 3 heater simultaneously.

Up until yesterday, the 3 heaters were storing heat from 11pm until 7am. The red light lit up to indicate this.

Then yesterday they lit up (started charging) at 8am and had I not switched them off, they would have still been charging after 8pm.

I turned them on again just before 11pm to see if they would charge as normal, but they didn't charge overnight. They lit up at 8am.

They are still working fine, releasing heat well, but only charging during the day. So it will cost me twice as much for the same amount of heat if I don't do something about it.

I have had them for around a year and they have worked perfectly up til now. The fact that it is affecting all 3 at once implies a problem with the esb box, which hasn't been changed lately. The fuse box looks fine too.

if anybody has any nuggets on this one I'd bow to your superior knowledge.
 
I need help. Am on committee of local community building which is 13 years old with combination of storage/convection heating. Never had a problem with the heating until about two years ago and now we have complaints about the place being cold. Do these heaters lose their efficiency? Always found the controls iffy, do the newer heaters have better controls? What are the alternatives to storage heaters? Can't have gas or oil, no place to put a tank, has to be electric. Would appreciate help asap.
 
Storage heater works one night a year!

Hi,
Can someone please enlighten me here! My storage heater in my apartment works one night a year...the same night for the last three years! There is another storage heater in the apartment that seems to work ok. I rang the ESB and they say that because my meter is switching between day and night units, it's not their issue. I've asked an electrician (not a very good one) and he didn't have a clue. Any ideas?
 
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