Do you leave your washing machine unsupervised?

GaleSF63

I had a an extension reel in the past which was clearly marked as one thing if wound, and another if fully unwound (I think it was 10A and 5A). The warning that it was restricted when wound was enough to make me always  unwind it  fully, in case! Who knows whether it was winding itself neatly inside or getting squashed. It also put me off reels in the future which was a shame as they are much tidier. 

Rosa_Damascena

Section62 said:

Rosa_Damascena said:

I have bought a lot of extension leads in my life (in response to my ever-growing collection of Christmas lights) and never once have I bothered to look. I think the one I am using for my kettle and microwave must be 13A as I can use them both concurrently without anything tripping. I am a simple creature but would be cross if my system tripped on account of my afternoon latte

13A fuses in plugs (the BS1362 type) can pass more than 13A.  They should be able to pass 20A continuously, and can pass much higher currents for shorter durations.

So, depending on the actual power consumption of the kettle and microwave, it is possible that both can be running and not blow the 13A fuse in the plug for (say) the 3 minutes it takes to boil the kettle, but if you had both running continuously for (say) 5 minutes then the fuse would blow.

What that overload might be doing to the cable (cord) when repeated over a longer period of time is something else - if heat makes the insulation brittle then there could eventually be some spectacular/frightening results.  This is why the advice so often is not to run appliances on extension leads - the appliance might work today, but there are also long-term implications.

No choice atm. My current "kitchenette" is what was once my dining room table

onomatopoeia99

Section62 said:

Rosa_Damascena said:

I have bought a lot of extension leads in my life (in response to my ever-growing collection of Christmas lights) and never once have I bothered to look. I think the one I am using for my kettle and microwave must be 13A as I can use them both concurrently without anything tripping. I am a simple creature but would be cross if my system tripped on account of my afternoon latte

13A fuses in plugs (the BS1362 type) can pass more than 13A.  They should be able to pass 20A continuously, and can pass much higher currents for shorter durations.

So, depending on the actual power consumption of the kettle and microwave, it is possible that both can be running and not blow the 13A fuse in the plug for (say) the 3 minutes it takes to boil the kettle, but if you had both running continuously for (say) 5 minutes then the fuse would blow.

What that overload might be doing to the cable (cord) when repeated over a longer period of time is something else - if heat makes the insulation brittle then there could eventually be some spectacular/frightening results.  This is why the advice so often is not to run appliances on extension leads - the appliance might work today, but there are also long-term implications.

Microwave will draw 3-4A typically, if it is just a microwave and not one of those microwave / oven / grill combi things, so the kettle and microwave will run forever on an extension lead with a 13A fuse, because as you observed earlier, a 13A fuse won't blow at 20A.  The plug itself on the extension and/or the cable may not survive hours a 20A though. 

pinkteapot

Is the 3-hour duration because you're using the 'Cottons' programme? I just wash everything at 40. If I choose 'Cottons' it takes three hours, if I choose 'Mixed Load' it's an hour (Bosch machine). So I always do mixed load! 3 hours seems ridiculous - what's the machine doing for all that time?

ripplyuk

@pinkteapot The cotton wash is 3hr 25mins but pressing the ‘quick’ button reduced it to 3hrs. The synthetics cycle is 2hrs 45mins. 

However, that was the old machine. I’ve just had my new machine delivered. Literally 2hrs ago. It might be the same one you have as it’s a Bosch and it has the ‘mixed load’ option so hopefully that will save me a lot of time 🙂. I haven’t read the manual yet so I don’t know about the other cycles. I wash towels, bedsheets and cleaning cloths at 60 or 90 so I expect those will take longer but there’s a ‘speed perfect’ button to use. 

chrisw

pinkteapot said:

Is the 3-hour duration because you're using the 'Cottons' programme? I just wash everything at 40. If I choose 'Cottons' it takes three hours, if I choose 'Mixed Load' it's an hour (Bosch machine). So I always do mixed load! 3 hours seems ridiculous - what's the machine doing for all that time?

Yep, I've recently bought a new Bosch and I stick everything in the 1hr Mixed Load. 

It looks like it's one of the most economical programmes in terms of water and electricity consumption as well.

ripplyuk

chrisw said:

pinkteapot said:

Is the 3-hour duration because you're using the 'Cottons' programme? I just wash everything at 40. If I choose 'Cottons' it takes three hours, if I choose 'Mixed Load' it's an hour (Bosch machine). So I always do mixed load! 3 hours seems ridiculous - what's the machine doing for all that time?

Yep, I've recently bought a new Bosch and I stick everything in the 1hr Mixed Load. 

It looks like it's one of the most economical programmes in terms of water and electricity consumption as well.

It can only take a half load though. 4kg instead of 8kg on my machine. I had a look at the settings last night and this seems to be the case for all the quick cycles. If I press the ‘speed perfect’ button, the load size reduces dramatically. It’s still quicker to do 2 x 1hr cycles than one full load which takes 3hrs 14 mins. 

chrisw

ripplyuk said:¡"

chrisw said:

pinkteapot said:

Is the 3-hour duration because you're using the 'Cottons' programme? I just wash everything at 40. If I choose 'Cottons' it takes three hours, if I choose 'Mixed Load' it's an hour (Bosch machine). So I always do mixed load! 3 hours seems ridiculous - what's the machine doing for all that time?

Yep, I've recently bought a new Bosch and I stick everything in the 1hr Mixed Load. 

It looks like it's one of the most economical programmes in terms of water and electricity consumption as well.

It can only take a half load though. 4kg instead of 8kg on my machine. I had a look at the settings last night and this seems to be the case for all the quick cycles. If I press the ‘speed perfect’ button, the load size reduces dramatically. It’s still quicker to do 2 x 1hr cycles than one full load which takes 3hrs 14 mins. 

I've never looked at the weight, I just shove everything in.

galaxy123

Section62 said:

travis-powers said:

SuzieSue said:

travis-powers said:

We had a small fire start at a socket (our fault) but since then we have never left them running unattended.
 God knows what would of happened if I didn’t smell the smoke!

Why was it your fault?

We had a washing machine and tumble dryer plugged into one socket with a short lead, this was drawing more power than the socket could cope with, ohms law apparently so the plug caught fire!

The 13A (or lower) fuse in the plug should have blown before anything got hot enough to melt or catch on fire.

This is why it is a MUST to have the proper protection with correctly rated fuses and/or trips. Surprisingly, not everyone agrees with what should be a fundamental and obvious safety requirement.

There's a particular problem with cheap extension leads only rated and fused at 10A.  Most people have some 13A fuses laying around, and few people have spare 10A ones.  So when the 10A fuse inevitably blows, the quick fix people do is to fit a 13A one instead. And then..... (this is a general comment, not saying it is what happened in your case)

IMV the 10A extension leads should be banned from sale, because there are so many appliances in the home (washing machines, tumble dryers, kettles etc) that can easily overload a 10A lead on their own.

Plugging a high current device into a shoddy extension lead and then leaving it unattended would be asking for trouble, and the average punter just doesn't understand the risks. Hence appliances get a reputation for causing fires which isn't always deserved (as per EssexExile's post).

Having been electrocuted through the use of a washing machine on an extension lead, I’ll never make that mistake again. Washing machine leaked I went to turn it off and when I touched it I was thrown across the room. Didn’t know a thing about it until I’d landed it was that quick! thankfully I didn’t land in water or could have been a very different outcome !!

unforeseen

So, it could also have been a fault in the washing machine lead itself.
Did you get the extension lead tested?