Eurgh.
Are these plug-in energy monitoring things much or a muchness, or is there any particular one or system that's better than others? e.g. for analysis of usage etc.
Hot Tub?
So I was correct that the only way you could be using so much electricity was because you were using it for "heating".
Only because we're at £100pcm for a electricity - we both work from home plus pay no real attention to power usage, but my Mum who has electricity-based heating (in our non-connected annex) and can easy use £100pw.
clip in line’ readout of energy use - can you recommend one?
I'd be interested in how much power our various units are using.
Or washing machine is old and only costs about 38p per wash
Are these plug-in energy monitoring things much or a muchness, or is there any particular one or system that’s better than others? e.g. for analysis of usage etc.
Mine is black and white, records hourly use and just keeps a 24hr memory. It then gives me average daily, weekly and monthly use. It is not clever in any way or fancy pants. £5 second hand.
But, after a couple of hours of turning devices on and off and noting their energy use, I have an idea of what is 'bad' in our house. For example: the boiler uses a *lot* of electricity, tumble drier (obvs), oven and the slow, insidious and all day use of gaming PC or PlayStations. I also replaced our (very old) fridge and halved the annual bill.
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
No because I can't be arsed to go through the boot up and reconnection each morning. That said out of interest I will put the energy monitor on it and see how much it uses. I am guessing, in the scheme of things, not much at all...
My BT Smarthub 2 has a rating of 0.04 W when not in use. I certainly don't switch it off. Nest Hubs use about 3 W (set up as photoframes) and I've two of those.
This is the new version of mine:
https://efergy.com/elite-classic/
Mine looks much older:
It was from local FB group second hand - TBF, once you have used it once it is all you need.
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
Nope, i went through this whole energy consumption testing thing a few years ago, the total consumption of the entire mesh network set up (3 routers, wired backhaul) would be about a 2 quid a month now.
I've also got smart WiFi switches on some of the really heavy users (TV, Amp, Playstation, Stereo and most of the house holdlights (indoors and out) so leaving the WiFi on means i can switch everything else on and off. Especially important with kids in the house.
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
That can be a bad thing for your router speed. Some ADSL feeds work on the basis that they speed up until the router can't handle the speed without too many errors, then slow to a bit below that. If you unplug it, the ISP thinks it can't cope, and slows the transmission rate down.
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
No, the disruption would be significant in our house. The router and modem use about 20W which is not trivial but it's not a lot.
Hot tub, sauna and Tesla while moaning about energy bills. Is this another bot threat designed to rule the forum 😂😂😂
Next we have Rishi S sign up to ask how to cut costs on heating his outdoor pool during winter.
Thanks folks for answering my q.
even for an earth rapist with first world issues like me.
Is not something that should even be said in jest at the moment really, but everyone to their own. We all (including me) have good reasons for our particular excesses
Does anyone unplug their router at night?
I know people who do because they feel more comfortable without the radiation. I'm not a believer but it makes them sleep better so why not. Just put the thing on a timer so it has time to reboot before you get up and all is good. You might even find it works better as a lot of these things do a sort of optimisation sequence at startup such as work out how to compensate for your telephone line and the quietest frequency bands to use.
Another data point here. With a 2 adult household in a 3 bed semi our Octopus electricity for January was 366Kwh costing £65. Probably more like £100 post the April rise.
To get £500 a month is big usage. I would tend to take the maker's low usage claims for the hot tub/sauna with a large pinch of salt. Even if you want to avoid having to warm them up powering off overnight and having them on a timer to warm up at some point during the day would save money.
I agree about the advert possible overstating the efficiency but when it was unplugged for a weekend it only lost a couple of degrees of heat. Unfortunately it is hardwired into a high capacity circuit with just an on/off twist switch so cannot fit a timer to it. It does have an 'eco' mode which lets the temperature drop for certain periods and re-heats for the time you know you want it. I only found this out today so will see what I can do with that but a 10 minute hot tub in the morning before work is really nice and then a longer soak in the evening before the sauna makes it hard to decide when to drop the temp. I guess we don't do as much midnight skinny dipping now so I could drop the temp between 9pm and 6am and se if that helps.
Amazing how much stuff I never noticed was plugged in and just sat there. Todays wander around the estate has been an eye opener.
Not sure if you are aware
I wasn’t WCA, hence I humbly apologise for my comments.
Blimey, We are dirty people reading this! Bedding gets washed once a week and towels every 2 or 3 weeks as they dry properly and only ever get used on clean bodies!
[i]I wasn’t WCA, hence I humbly apologise for my comments.[/i]
No worries Kryton 🙂
I spend so much time on here bragging about how wonderful my life is and asking how to make and do things I forget to mention the shit bits. No reason for you to know of them.
<em class="bbcode-em">Doing any welding? It may not be a big single thing (but those are easy to check), it could be accumulation of other activities.
Just moved most of the tool feeds to remote control sockets so nothing is left on standby.
A welder can use a metric shit ton of electric in a few minutes. If you've got a surprise spike in you costs (and its not down to some anomaly with meter readings) then that might well be your culprit My workshop is at a friends place on its own meter but its on their account and they bill the costs on to me as required. Typically - doing generally woodworking for a quarter the usage is so low its not even worth her billing me - but any time I've been using the welder or the plasma cutter, even if it seems like I've not used them a lot, its about £400 - £500.
Hot tub, sauna and Tesla while moaning about energy bills. Is this another bot threat designed to rule the forum 😂😂😂
Next we have Rishi S sign up to ask how to cut costs on heating his outdoor pool during winter.
I would suggest you read WCAs explanation as to the reasons for the hot tub etc and another forumite's subsequent apology for a similar comment to yours before posting bollocks like this.
FWIW, the place my ex moved into had a hot tub, and just chugging along keeping it at 10-15 degrees so everything worked properly, like the pumps, filters and various potions that had to be added (she's not a hot tub person) was costing her about 40 quid a month (and our leccy is a shit load cheaper than yours, even now).
The mate who she sold it to spends about £180-200 a month keeping it warm enough to use with ninety minutes notice. Gets used (almost) every day, as his inlaws live at the bottom of the hill, and his wife's uncle lives in the next farm...
Blimey, We are dirty people reading this! Bedding gets washed once a week and towels every 2 or 3 weeks as they dry properly and only ever get used on clean bodies!
Same here. Bedding and towels get done every couple of weeks-ish, and all at the same time as the white towels and white bottom sheet from the bed go in together on a 60deg wash. Every other wash we do is 30deg (and we do about two loads a week, depending on how much dirty sport kit has been generated)
For those that work at home and have a dryer - ours broke in January and while I was looking for a new one we put the washing on an airer next to the rad which is always on when the heating is on. I thought I’d give it a try as we had to have the heating on anyway while at home.
It’s been 3 months now and we haven’t had any need for the dryer again. As soon as the weather was good enough we put it out on the washing line which is nicer for the towels. We have found that the washing can get washed and dried during the working hours - every time I take a screen break I will fold up the dry stuff and rotate stuff around and generally by 5pm it’s all dry and done - I put the washing machine on to finish at 8am.
Might not work as well with a big family but there once was a time when no one had dryers so surely there’s a big saving to be made there for some people.
No idea how much it’s saving but I’m trying ti reduce usage before our fixed price utilities deal ends in January 23.
FWIW we wash our bed sheets between once a week and once a fortnight depending on if they still feel fresh or not. Towels probably the same but I tend to throw one or two in at a time with the other washing rather than do all at the same time.
Top tip that - in summer hang washing on a washing line! Love it 😀
I know people who do because they feel more comfortable without the radiation. I’m not a believer but it makes them sleep better so why not. Just put the thing on a timer so it has time to reboot before you get up and all is good. You might even find it works better as a lot of these things do a sort of optimisation sequence at startup such as work out how to compensate for your telephone line and the quietest frequency bands to use.
Probably no use giving advice to people who are "uncomfortable with radiation", but as stated above turning your router off daily will likely have a deleterious effect on performance. If your ISPs automatic monitoring sees your connection dropping daily it will keep reducing speed to try and find a point at which the line is stable.
we put the washing on an airer next to the rad which is always on when the heating is on. I thought I’d give it a try as we had to have the heating on anyway while at home.
It’s been 3 months now and we haven’t had any need for the dryer again.
We do this, and for an extra drying boost I stick an old mattress protector over the whole lot, tucked down the back of the radiator. It really hot-boxes inside and dries stuff pretty quickly, in fact I can sometimes get a couple of loads done in a day if there's a decent amount of quick drying sports-type stuff. A big sheet would work just as well, I think the mattress protector holds a bit more heat in as it's slightly quilted.
Top tip that – in summer hang washing on a washing line! Love it 😀
I know you’re probably being sarcastic but I’ve noticed we used the dryer for a lot longer into the year as it’s just easier, whereas when you don’t have a dryer you’re looking for opportunities to get it drying outside rather than going for the easy option.
I’ve just worked out our dryer was probably using about 4-5kwh per load, and at 17p per KWH that’s about 85p a load. Three times a week is £2.56 and week or £10 a month, £120 a year. Not a gigantic amount if you’ve got a decent wage but I’m expecting electricity price to at least double for me in January so £20 a month saving is pretty decent.
Can you get an electricity monitor that will send a signal to an app to log usage?
We do this, and for an extra drying boost I stick an old mattress protector over the whole lot, tucked down the back of the radiator.
I did this when we washed the sheets and was very surprised how fast everything dried, as fast and maybe faster than the drier.
I'm hoping the heating bills remain 'low' - house only gets heated to 18c and although we have a smart meter, we don't tend to use it apart from being able to hit a button on our phone to switch heating on (and it then switches off once the temp is up to 18c).
Washing is done once a week for clothes and there will be an extra wash every second week for towels.
I think the household stuff we are ok with i.e. not massively wasteful (cooker/hob gets used daily, fridge/freezer and washing machine. However, our household 'toys' probably are more wasteful than they could be - TV is off at the wall and only turned on when it is being used, but we have work computers switched on and plugged in all day; Smart speakers and smart display thing showing a photo album, they will all be drawing power. I also have wifi lights so these are on 24/7 and will also be drawing power.
Have to say though, house is feeling freezing but I'm wearing a t-shirt and I'm refusing to put the heating on (smart temperature thing suggests house is 15c) - I'll stick a jumper on and move about a bit.
The sheet over the airer trick is great but I do wonder where all the moisture actually goes - definitely a good idea to use a breathable sheet but I've often wondered if the sheet traps the moisture rather than letting it escape 'properly'. Now I'm typing this out, it sounds stupid!
I’ve often wondered if the sheet traps the moisture rather than letting it escape ‘properly’
It doesn't, it's fine (assuming it's not a plastic sheet 🙂 )
It does escape to the room though, obvs, so you should keep a window open
Yeah, as soon as I typed it out I realised it was me being thick!
Jumper now on as temp is now 12c apparently...I'll put the heating on boost just before lunch! Might also try and find my slippers that I got for a christmas present one year - the ones I vowed never to wear as I wasn't old enough for slippers!!!
Putting the plug in the bathroom sink and filling with hot water will heat your bathroom. Not alot but enough to be noticeable.
Wca needs to build some solar panels. 250mm C section perlins.
100mtr 10mm copper pipe
2mm polycarbonate sheeting
Matt deamon black spray paint
Solder
12mm celotex boards
Tiny pump
Crazy foam
Bag of push fit 90s
Spray perlins, solder pipes every 50mm apart. Crazy foam celotx onto back and sides, silicone polycarbonate onto front. Aim at sun.
We also swapped to an indoor dryer, and saved masses of tumble drier use/cost.
If only I could get my wife to unplug the toothbrush charger after its finished with...
And what do I plug that lot into?