No power going to Hot Water Cylinder

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#1996589 15-Apr-2018 19:38

It just controls a relay

From what I've seen in Auckland it's just a single rate metering for pilot control, whereas areas that have ripple control get their hot water heating at a much cheaper controlled rate.

sonyxperiageek

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#1996612 15-Apr-2018 20:51

So the ripple relay device is only connected to hot water cylinder and potentially any high load devices such as AC?

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#1996697 16-Apr-2018 05:55

sonyxperiageek: So the ripple relay device is only connected to hot water cylinder and potentially any high load devices such as AC?

and or pump control or night rate, streetlighting and much more

here is a link to orion's ripple control pdf, the last 2-3 pages has the load types and time and there is plenty more information in there and everything is explained

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#1997203 16-Apr-2018 17:28

Just talked to a few more people and seems like lots are still without hot water despite having power.

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RunningMan

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#1997205 16-Apr-2018 17:33

Seen the Vector Hot Water restoration schedule?

https://www.vector.co.nz/personal/outages/restoration-times#water

EDIT: Picking you're outside the areas listed as complete...

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#1997220 16-Apr-2018 18:14

Adding a "me too" onto this thread.

Don't know if it is ripple control or pilot line (how does one tell the difference?), but either way it seems it is being deliberately turned on/off.

Our house didn't actually lose power for more than a second or two - there were a couple of flickers of the lights, but that was it.

However hot water must have gone off because we ran out on Wednesday evening or so (weren't aware that it was off)

Got home Friday evening and found we had hot water from the tap again (yay!) but must have been only temporary, because the showers were luke-warm Sunday morning.

All in all, nowhere near as hard a time as some people have been having. And I can understand the reasoning. Power and hot water for some people vs Power for more people while they fix up the capacity.

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sonyxperiageek

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#1997224 16-Apr-2018 18:27

Just had a cold shower. I can say it was... refreshing!

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PANiCnz

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#1997226 16-Apr-2018 18:32

When we bought our house my servers started magically turning off in winter. Took me a week or two to figure out the circuit was run off hot water circuit.

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#1997233 16-Apr-2018 18:46

PANiCnz: When we bought our house my servers started magically turning off in winter. Took me a week or two to figure out the circuit was run off hot water circuit.

Probably happens a lot in areas where the hot water power usage is via a second meter that is billed at a cheaper rate.

GBenne

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#1998131 17-Apr-2018 21:40

We are in Whangarei, and had no power outage, but our hot water can be turned off by the power company. Checked the cylinder/thermostat today, because water is getting colder. Thermostat is a bit black, there are sparks and it smells like burned plastic. I've turned off the power manually now.
What I'd like to know, is this a coincidence, or what?
Can anyone shine a light on this please?

Actually, the power was out last Friday, because of a line extension. The water is getting colder since Friday......... Could this have been electrical damage due to a power spike after they turned back on the power?

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#1998135 17-Apr-2018 21:48

evnafets:

Adding a "me too" onto this thread.

Don't know if it is ripple control or pilot line (how does one tell the difference?), but either way it seems it is being deliberately turned on/off.

Our house didn't actually lose power for more than a second or two - there were a couple of flickers of the lights, but that was it.

However hot water must have gone off because we ran out on Wednesday evening or so (weren't aware that it was off)

Got home Friday evening and found we had hot water from the tap again (yay!) but must have been only temporary, because the showers were luke-warm Sunday morning.

All in all, nowhere near as hard a time as some people have been having. And I can understand the reasoning. Power and hot water for some people vs Power for more people while they fix up the capacity.

In Auckland we have both Ripple Control (South of the Bridge) and Pilot Line (North of the Bridge) - https://vimeo.com/264927370 < Vectors Video about the HWC Situation.

If you have power you still need to log an fault with Vector too as per the video should be back within 4-6 Hours of power restoration.

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#1998233 18-Apr-2018 01:00

GBenne:
We are in Whangarei, and had no power outage, but our hot water can be turned off by the power company. Checked the cylinder/thermostat today, because water is getting colder. Thermostat is a bit black, there are sparks and it smells like burned plastic. I've turned off the power manually now.
What I'd like to know, is this a coincidence, or what?
Can anyone shine a light on this please?

Actually, the power was out last Friday, because of a line extension. The water is getting colder since Friday......... Could this have been electrical damage due to a power spike after they turned back on the power?

Your thermostat is definitely faulty. Call an electrician to replace. Unlikely to be the fault of the storm. As the thermostat is a very simple device that doesn't have any electronics inside it.

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#1998238 18-Apr-2018 05:47

And our hot water is back on!

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#1999861 20-Apr-2018 14:48

richms:Its a nasty crappy old way of doing load shedding and they dont do on new installs now.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10387772

yes they do.

And yes it is, Hot water is one of the biggest power users....

If you chose to have it off, your power KW rate increases.

eph

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#1999867 20-Apr-2018 15:01

We've still got no hot water (at least as of yesterday evening) - 10 days and counting.

I've seen a lot of posts on FB from electricians who would charge 150$ or so to bypass the pilot. Sounds a bit like a ripoff for 20min job to me but people are desperate. They also claim it's legal (which it might be) but I wonder if they notify Vector that the ICP is not on controller rate any more. I doubt it.

How does it work then? Can they just simply bypass the pilot or remove the ripple switch?

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