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Powerful Two-Hander posted:No argument there. In fact if you build something that isn't up to building control but nobody finds out for something like 6 years it gets some sort of assumed consent, if it hasn't fallen down that is.
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Feb 7, 2016 14:33
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PopeCrunch posted:The gently caress is a ring circuit? Isn't that how US electricity works?
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Feb 7, 2016 15:10
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spog posted:Isn't that how US electricity works? Nope, UK electricity. It was their solution to needing to rebuild after WW2 while having a copper shortage.
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Feb 7, 2016 17:09
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Ring circuits are basically UK only. Pretty much everyone else realized it's not actually a good idea in practice.
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Feb 7, 2016 17:58
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Zhentar posted:Ring circuits are basically UK only. Pretty much everyone else realized it's not actually a good idea in practice. This is a very educational thread.
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Feb 7, 2016 18:01
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couple pictures of a building that came down in Taiwan after the earthquake the other day. zoom.. enhance.  you can see these in the first picture on the left hand side. 
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Feb 7, 2016 18:44
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I'm not sure what I'm looking at? Did the builder cheap out by substituting hollow voids in what should have been solid concrete/rebar supports?
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Feb 7, 2016 18:53
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Are those... Bags of chips?
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Feb 7, 2016 18:55
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they're oil cans.
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Feb 7, 2016 19:09
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baram. posted:they're oil cans. Load-bearing oil cans?? 
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Feb 7, 2016 19:10
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British Electricity.avi  They have to rebalance their entire electrical grid by importing French electricity to compensate for everyone turning on their tea kettles after their soaps
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Feb 7, 2016 19:12
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Nitrox posted:Could you elaborate as to why they're a bad idea? Thanks The wire (25A) is rated for less than the breaker (32A) on the circuit as a whole because the fact that current can flow in from either side effectively makes a parallel circuit that theoretically has double the capacity. If one side is broken or has a higher than expected resistance for whatever reason you can end up flowing more than rated current over one side's cables without tripping the breaker. Also if a ring is inadvertently connected to two breakers, or if two rings are inadvertently connected, you now have 64A available to a problem without tripping anything.
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Feb 7, 2016 19:19
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The main problem with ring circuits is that they need relatively balanced current flow on both return paths. A break or high impedance connection in the ring unbalances the flow, potentially causing an overcurrent condition that can't be detected by the breaker, and without any visible fault to occupants. Testing to detect those failures requires disconnecting the circuit from the breaker panel and measuring the impedance between the two ends of the circuit (and even that can fail to detect faults if there's bridging) - and then assuming that the re-connection is performed correctly. Spurs don't have two return paths, so you either don't use them, or use extra copper. Two 20 amp radial circuits use the same amount of copper as one 32 amp ring circuit (or less, if you make use of spurs). You get more total capacity, and more safety. It costs you one extra circuit breaker, more than paid for by the labor savings.
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Feb 7, 2016 19:20
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Oh holy poo poo that looks terrible and I'm glad we don't do that here. Given our propensity for plugging in whatever horrible garbage we bought on ebay at 3 am while stoned, and the fact that Joe homeowner competes with Jack drywaller for utter and ridiculous destruction of electrical cabling, it'd be about a week until housebecues became commonplace. I have no idea why the UK isn't in flames on a constant basis.
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Feb 7, 2016 19:28
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PopeCrunch posted:I have no idea why the UK isn't in flames on a constant basis. Climate's too wet.
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Feb 7, 2016 19:52
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PopeCrunch posted:I have no idea why the UK isn't in flames on a constant basis. Probably because 20 amps at 240 volts is already a ton of power. Only a country that considers 3kW electric tea kettles a fundamental human right would think that might be inadequate and that 32 amps would be more appropriate. The tea kettles only run for 2-3 minutes at a time, so even when there is a wiring fault, it's quite rare to spend much time in the 20A-32A "danger" zone.
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Feb 7, 2016 20:29
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What kind of plug is this?
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Feb 7, 2016 20:30
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I just had a thought: my electric dryer runs at 240v at 30 amps. Does that mean in the UK you can plug in a dryer right into a normal socket?
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Feb 7, 2016 20:38
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Here in East Europe we only have a separate (3-phase) circuit for the stove. Everything else runs off the same type of circuit, nothing different about them. Though my bathroom circuit is only something like 16-20A, with a 10A dryer. 30A would be quite extreme here. Most houses and apartments here have three 20A circuits (one for each phase, I guess?). Breakers are often undersized for whatever reason in newer construction (some tiny cost savings??) - I did the math and was able to upgrade some that needed to be upgraded just by swapping out the breaker. EssOEss fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Feb 7, 2016 |
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Feb 7, 2016 21:02
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Geirskogul posted:I just had a thought: my electric dryer runs at 240v at 30 amps. Does that mean in the UK you can plug in a dryer right into a normal socket? Theoretically, if you snip off the plug, bundle the two hots together and jam them in the right hole, along with the neutral and the ground into their respective hole, I don't see why not 'Murican electrical shenaniganery meets UK 240v
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Feb 7, 2016 21:06
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Sorry, had a brain fart in regards to 3-phase power. Brain fart as in I completely forgot about it. E: VVVVV so that does mean that there are electric dryers that plug right into the mains, so you don't have special plugs and wiring for them like we do in the US, right? That's pretty baller. I hate where my dryer is located in our townhouse, and moving it would be simple except for the wiring job that would need to be done. Queen_Combat fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Feb 7, 2016 |
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Feb 7, 2016 21:13
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I have a 13A dryer plugged into the mains right here. E: oh right, gotcha.
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Feb 7, 2016 21:15
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Geirskogul posted:I just had a thought: my electric dryer runs at 240v at 30 amps. Does that mean in the UK you can plug in a dryer right into a normal socket? From the look of the plugs & outlets, you'd think so, but they only allow individual devices up to 13 amps. That's why they stopped at 3kW tea kettles, instead of 4.5kW or 7kW. edit: OSU_Matthew posted:Theoretically, if you snip off the plug, bundle the two hots together and jam them in the right hole, along with the neutral and the ground into their respective hole, I don't see why not If you bundle the two hots together on one side, with the neutral in the other connection, all of your drying power is going to come from the fried electronics. One hot goes in the UK hot, the other hot goes in the UK neutral, and the neutral dangles freely Zhentar fucked around with this message at 21:30 on Feb 7, 2016 |
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Feb 7, 2016 21:20
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Geirskogul posted:E: VVVVV so that does mean that there are electric dryers that plug right into the mains, so you don't have special plugs and wiring for them like we do in the US, right? That's pretty baller. I hate where my dryer is located in our townhouse, and moving it would be simple except for the wiring job that would need to be done. Also, the venting. Or drain, if you've got a ventless heat pump dryer.
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Feb 7, 2016 21:25
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Geirskogul posted:E: VVVVV so that does mean that there are electric dryers that plug right into the mains, so you don't have special plugs and wiring for them like we do in the US, right? That's pretty baller. I hate where my dryer is located in our townhouse, and moving it would be simple except for the wiring job that would need to be done. It's actually a pretty straightforward job, I helped my brother move his not too long ago. Just picked up the right size old work box and receptacle, cut a square hole in the drywall with my oscillating multi tool along with a corresponding hole in the sill underneath going into the basement (with an extended spade drill bit), fished a tape up and through to the hole, pulled new 10g wire down, and ran it out to the box and swapped the breaker connections from the old run, and connected up the new box/receptacle. Didn't take more than two hours, tops. E: Zhentar posted:If you bundle the two hots together on one side, with the neutral in the other connection, all of your drying power is going to come from the fried electronics. One hot goes in the UK hot, the other hot goes in the UK neutral, and the neutral dangles freely Catatron Prime fucked around with this message at 21:45 on Feb 7, 2016 |
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Feb 7, 2016 21:33
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Zhentar posted:Also, the venting. Or drain, if you've got a ventless heat pump dryer. The area I want to move it to has easy plumbing access if I wanted to move the washer/dryer, and a vent is pretty simple in the location I want. It's the firewall between the floors and current wiring access that pisses me off. I hate drywall work so I try to make as few holes as possible, but re-wiring to where i want would require removing either one long track of drywall, or multiple 8x8" squares. 
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Feb 7, 2016 21:37
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Zhentar posted:From the look of the plugs & outlets, you'd think so, but they only allow individual devices up to 13 amps. That's why they stopped at 3kW tea kettles, instead of 4.5kW or 7kW. God drat, 7kw kettle. My teapot quivers at the thought.
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Feb 7, 2016 21:39
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I don't think a 7kw kettle would be very effective, Liedenfrost effect and all that 
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Feb 7, 2016 21:46
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insta posted:I don't think a 7kw kettle would be very effective, Liedenfrost effect and all that  Wow, I'm learning all sorts of interesting stuff today!
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Feb 7, 2016 21:49
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Why don't British houses just have the scandinavian boiling water taps if they're so obsessed with tea?
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Feb 7, 2016 22:51
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OSU_Matthew posted:So is that because of the ring main thing? Still trying to wrap my head around it, the return wire of the circuit is hot because theoretically you're saving copper by not having a dedicated neutral and that the load is distributed by design to one portion of the circuit or another? Or is the ground considered the return wire? No, it's not. The heating elements in a North American 240 volt dryer run from one hot to the other. Split phase +120v/-120v is functionally equivalent to single phase +240v/neutral, except that the "neutral" has voltage relative to ground. If you bundle the two hots together, there will be zero volts across the heating elements and they won't do anything. The purpose of the neutral in NA 240 volt outlets is just so that control electronics can run off a 120v circuit instead of 240. insta posted:I don't think a 7kw kettle would be very effective, Liedenfrost effect and all that If I'm reading this paper right, a kettle with a 200 cm2 heating element could get up to about 20kw before Liedenfrost hits you.
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Feb 7, 2016 23:30
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Feb 7, 2016 23:40
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 I could make tea so loving fast
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Feb 7, 2016 23:40
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Sagebrush posted:Why don't British houses just have the scandinavian boiling water taps if they're so obsessed with tea? But why would you put boiling water into the kettle?!  The concept of 3kW kettles boggles my mind. We used to do 6.6kW (2x20A@208v) server racks at work. That is basically one PDU worth of power, just to make hot water quickly.
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Feb 7, 2016 23:47
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Cakefool posted:
My coffee maker always keeps one cup's worth of hot water waiting in it. I don't have to wait for water to heat up at all 
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Feb 7, 2016 23:48
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We have a hot/cold water dispenser in our laundry room (upstairs) for midnight cold drink / tea making. It's great! Saves trucking downstairs on squeaky stairs and waking the whole house with the kettle. Also good when grandma comes to town. She's a light sleeper and does not trust herself to use the stairs without help, so having tea making facilities on hand just across the hall is great.
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Feb 8, 2016 00:14
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H110Hawk posted:The concept of 3kW kettles boggles my mind. We used to do 6.6kW (2x20A@208v) server racks at work. That is basically one PDU worth of power, just to make hot water quickly. If you didn't watch the youtube posted earlier, the UK power grid uniquely experiences huge spikes in demand that they call "TV pickups", caused by hundreds of thousands of people switching on their tea kettles at the end of TV shows. On a daily basis, over the course of of five minutes, grid demands will spike up by hundreds of megawatts. Special events will cause spikes on the order of gigawatts. To deal with it, they had to develop the fastest responding power generation in the world, a pumped storage system that can go from zero to 1.3GW in 12 seconds (compared to typical "fast response" power plants that take 5+ minutes to start up)n
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Feb 8, 2016 00:19
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That's absurd and amazing.
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Feb 8, 2016 00:24
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Zhentar posted:the fastest responding power generation in the world, a pumped storage system that can go from zero to 1.3GW in 12 seconds That's Dinorwig, right?
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Feb 8, 2016 00:36
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Why does water need to boil in order to make tea?
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Feb 8, 2016 00:40
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