My owl is inaccurate

devon_guy

My owl says I used 5kwh in the last 24hrs yet I read the meter and checked it 24hrs later and that equates to 3kw. Anyone any ideas on the discrepancy?

Magentasue

We have a Currentcost - similar to Owl - if it says we've used 83kwh in a week, we find the meter says 80kwh so there's less than 5% error. That's an acceptable margin to me - yours sounds faulty or not set up correctly.

Robert2009

I have an energy monitor and it sits on my computer desk next to my monitor. When I switch my computer on all the things connected to my computer also turn on. The laser printer comes on for 2 seconds while it is recognised by the computer and the reading jumps 675 watts. However the sender connected to the meter only sends a signal every 6 seconds so sometimes it does not register.

My fridge, when it comes on, also causes a peak of 973 watts for 2 seconds. Again sometimes it does not register but the reading jumps by 125 watts when the fridge is on. So therefore if an appliance has a spike when it switches on like fridges and freezers this is sometimes not registered on the monitor but it is certainly recorded on your electric meter.

As I said in a previous post it is helpfull when you first get it and you know how much each appliance is using when it is on continuously but it is nowhere as accurate as your electric meter in recording the exact amount of electricity you use on a daily basis.

I also connected my monitor to my computer and could see on a graph how much electricity I was using in real time and the graph was never a straight line but that is how I found out what every single item in my house used in electricity.

Don't worry the novelty wore off and now I don't bother how much electricity I use as I could not make significant savings.

Rob, nothing better to do with my life since I retired.

Premier_2

What voltage have you set it to?

devon_guy

Erm wasn't aware I could! I just plugged it in and put the p per kwh.

Premier_2

The owl monitor doesn't measure the supply voltage; it relies on the value set by the user to calculate the energy used.

If the voltage is set too high, this will be why the energy displayed as consumed is too high.

Read the instructions for full details on how to set the voltage. The difficulty you will have is that the supply voltage varies so knowing what to set the monitor to is difficult. You can only set an average, which is best done by trying to synchronise what energy the monitor records as consumed with what your electricity meter records as consumed.

If you are still unable to resolve the issue using their Troubleshooting Guide, then you can e-mail their Customer Service Team [EMAIL="customer.services@theowl.com"]customer.services@theowl.com[/EMAIL] or alternatively can call their helpline on 01256 383439 where you can leave your name, contact details and brief description of of your problem, so that someone can call you back and help resolve your problem.

Fire_Fox

How do you know it's the Owl not the meter that is inaccurate?

creased-leach

Erm- whilst we're talking OWLS, does anyone know where I can get the instructions to reset the values on our CM113A?

The only ones I can find on the website are for the newer model- can't find our booklet anywhere (no twit jokes please!! ) and the battery died while we were away.

Many thanks.

Premier_2

The user guide to the CM113, CMR113 & CMS113 is available here:

http://www.theowl.com/uploads/downloads/cm113_userguide.pdf

Does that help?

Or perhaps these instructions for setting up the above models?

http://www.theowl.com/index.php?page=setting-up-3

creased-leach

Thank you thank you thank you! I'll have a peruse later- I must have pressed every combination of buttons on the damn thing! :rolleyes: