Oct price cap increase likely to push energy bill to over £10k... for a family of 4...

Happy_Sloth

QrizB said:

Happy_Sloth said:

However i agree with TheGardener it took us along time to realize that our insanely high electric consumption was due to the PC's.... it really is a hidden issue.  We honestly sat there thinking a PC used similar amounts to a TV and for a long time didn't realize our electric bill was abnormal. 

I'm really glad you found this, I remember back in the spring (this thread) we really strucggled to understand why your electricity bills were so high!

Did you manage to get your gas use under control too?

Gas usage is still gonna be high in winter ... victorian, poorly (read none) insulated house! (Assuming we actually even try and heat the house this winter.. at £750 a month (OCT prices) we are still having that argument haha) 

However we found we had 2 issues with the gas .... 

1) a VERY long run from the Boiler to the Hot water Cylinder.. ment that the water was cooling mid route and therefore never "reaching" the cylinder where the temp sensor is at the desired temperature. There fore the boiler was constantly trying to pump hot water to the cylinder to bring it upto temp.  It was failing utterly but costing us a fortune trying REALLY hard! .  We couldn't lag the pipes they are behind all sorts of walls so we've managed to work out a temperature that the boiler can get the hot water too without bankrupting us! it means the water is never super hot but it's hot enough for a bath. 

2) we did finally figured out that the "smart heating"  isn't as smart as your think... 

So this is what we found .... we had naively thought that by setting all the thermostats in each room to 21 that the heating wouldn't come on till the thermostat detected the room dropped below 21.  This is sort of correct... but the boiler fires All the damn time even in the summer even when there is no demand! So the additional usage in summer was caused by the boiler simply firing up incase someone needed a radiator.  Anyway we turned off the heating OFF at the source rather relying on the thermostats and that seems to have solved it.  

Happy_Sloth

MariaAH said:

Wow @Happy_Sloth..,you don’t mention your sisters reaction when she found out…I bet it was priceless!

There where ... words... none of them i can repeat on this forum.... but it turns out they have quite high electric consumption as well.  

xeny

Happy_Sloth said:

He replied   "all the time, i can't be bothered booting it up in the morning, it takes too long"  The result of this conversation was that she discovered her son had NEVER switched off the PC since he got it last Christmas, he instead simply turned off the monitor so it "Looked" off.  in his mind the 60 seconds it took to boot up was too long to wait when he wanted to check facebook in the morning... same thing when he went to school "why bother switching it off if i'm home in 8 hours?!" 

  

Just in case anyone hasn't realised, PCs boot so much faster with solid state (SSD) storage than mechanical hard drives, that either sleeping them or turning them off is suddenly much less of a test of patience. SSDs are now cheap enough that it may actually work out cost neutral due to extra time with the machine off. Use a mechanical drive for bulk storage by all means, but put Windows and most commonly used programmes on the SSD.

michaels

Happy_Sloth said:

QrizB said:

Happy_Sloth said:

However i agree with TheGardener it took us along time to realize that our insanely high electric consumption was due to the PC's.... it really is a hidden issue.  We honestly sat there thinking a PC used similar amounts to a TV and for a long time didn't realize our electric bill was abnormal. 

I'm really glad you found this, I remember back in the spring (this thread) we really strucggled to understand why your electricity bills were so high!

Did you manage to get your gas use under control too?

Gas usage is still gonna be high in winter ... victorian, poorly (read none) insulated house! (Assuming we actually even try and heat the house this winter.. at £750 a month (OCT prices) we are still having that argument haha) 

However we found we had 2 issues with the gas .... 

1) a VERY long run from the Boiler to the Hot water Cylinder.. ment that the water was cooling mid route and therefore never "reaching" the cylinder where the temp sensor is at the desired temperature. There fore the boiler was constantly trying to pump hot water to the cylinder to bring it upto temp.  It was failing utterly but costing us a fortune trying REALLY hard! .  We couldn't lag the pipes they are behind all sorts of walls so we've managed to work out a temperature that the boiler can get the hot water too without bankrupting us! it means the water is never super hot but it's hot enough for a bath. 

2) we did finally figured out that the "smart heating"  isn't as smart as your think... 

So this is what we found .... we had naively thought that by setting all the thermostats in each room to 21 that the heating wouldn't come on till the thermostat detected the room dropped below 21.  This is sort of correct... but the boiler fires All the damn time even in the summer even when there is no demand! So the additional usage in summer was caused by the boiler simply firing up incase someone needed a radiator.  Anyway we turned off the heating OFF at the source rather relying on the thermostats and that seems to have solved it.  

You do know you need to get the tank to at least 55 once a week to prevent legionella bacteria forming?

Happy_Sloth

michaels said:

Happy_Sloth said:

QrizB said:

Happy_Sloth said:

However i agree with TheGardener it took us along time to realize that our insanely high electric consumption was due to the PC's.... it really is a hidden issue.  We honestly sat there thinking a PC used similar amounts to a TV and for a long time didn't realize our electric bill was abnormal. 

I'm really glad you found this, I remember back in the spring (this thread) we really strucggled to understand why your electricity bills were so high!

Did you manage to get your gas use under control too?

Gas usage is still gonna be high in winter ... victorian, poorly (read none) insulated house! (Assuming we actually even try and heat the house this winter.. at £750 a month (OCT prices) we are still having that argument haha) 

However we found we had 2 issues with the gas .... 

1) a VERY long run from the Boiler to the Hot water Cylinder.. ment that the water was cooling mid route and therefore never "reaching" the cylinder where the temp sensor is at the desired temperature. There fore the boiler was constantly trying to pump hot water to the cylinder to bring it upto temp.  It was failing utterly but costing us a fortune trying REALLY hard! .  We couldn't lag the pipes they are behind all sorts of walls so we've managed to work out a temperature that the boiler can get the hot water too without bankrupting us! it means the water is never super hot but it's hot enough for a bath. 

2) we did finally figured out that the "smart heating"  isn't as smart as your think... 

So this is what we found .... we had naively thought that by setting all the thermostats in each room to 21 that the heating wouldn't come on till the thermostat detected the room dropped below 21.  This is sort of correct... but the boiler fires All the damn time even in the summer even when there is no demand! So the additional usage in summer was caused by the boiler simply firing up incase someone needed a radiator.  Anyway we turned off the heating OFF at the source rather relying on the thermostats and that seems to have solved it.  

You do know you need to get the tank to at least 55 once a week to prevent legionella bacteria forming?

my problem is that my boiler is not capable of getting my tank to 55.... i mean not even slightly... it WAS trying... REALLY HARD and costing my a fortune but my tank and boiler are so far apart that 55 is a dream..

The tank/boiler situation is a thing on my "To-do" ... i need to move one of them... so they are closer to each other.  

QrizB

Happy_Sloth said:

The tank/boiler situation is a thing on my "To-do" ... i need to move one of them... so they are closer to each other.  

Even at current electricity prices, it will probably cost less to run your immersion heater once a week than it will to pay for the necessary plumbing work. (This supposes your concern is principally biosanitary, rather than anything else.)
Declare that to be "bath or shower night" for the family and make use of the hot water once you've sterilised the tank.

Magnitio

Happy_Sloth said:

my problem is that my boiler is not capable of getting my tank to 55.... i mean not even slightly... it WAS trying... REALLY HARD and costing my a fortune but my tank and boiler are so far apart that 55 is a dream..

The tank/boiler situation is a thing on my "To-do" ... i need to move one of them... so they are closer to each other.  

You mentioned in another thread that you have an immersion heater, but that it is turned off. It would definitely be more efficient to use it than your boiler, but whether it would be cheaper depends on the rates you are paying.

Happy_Sloth

Magnitio said:

Happy_Sloth said:

my problem is that my boiler is not capable of getting my tank to 55.... i mean not even slightly... it WAS trying... REALLY HARD and costing my a fortune but my tank and boiler are so far apart that 55 is a dream..

The tank/boiler situation is a thing on my "To-do" ... i need to move one of them... so they are closer to each other.  

You mentioned in another thread that you have an immersion heater, but that it is turned off. It would definitely be more efficient to use it than your boiler, but whether it would be cheaper depends on the rates you are paying.

Alas..... the immersion died we used it twice! and it blew. I haven't been able to find an electrician/plumber to fix it... 

Incidentally i don't really know which i need.. my electrician claimed i needed a Plummer and the Plummer claimed i needed an electrician... 

Go figure. 

Vincero

Happy_Sloth said:

michaels said:

Happy_Sloth said:

QrizB said:

Happy_Sloth said:

However i agree with TheGardener it took us along time to realize that our insanely high electric consumption was due to the PC's.... it really is a hidden issue.  We honestly sat there thinking a PC used similar amounts to a TV and for a long time didn't realize our electric bill was abnormal. 

I'm really glad you found this, I remember back in the spring (this thread) we really strucggled to understand why your electricity bills were so high!

Did you manage to get your gas use under control too?

Gas usage is still gonna be high in winter ... victorian, poorly (read none) insulated house! (Assuming we actually even try and heat the house this winter.. at £750 a month (OCT prices) we are still having that argument haha) 

However we found we had 2 issues with the gas .... 

1) a VERY long run from the Boiler to the Hot water Cylinder.. ment that the water was cooling mid route and therefore never "reaching" the cylinder where the temp sensor is at the desired temperature. There fore the boiler was constantly trying to pump hot water to the cylinder to bring it upto temp.  It was failing utterly but costing us a fortune trying REALLY hard! .  We couldn't lag the pipes they are behind all sorts of walls so we've managed to work out a temperature that the boiler can get the hot water too without bankrupting us! it means the water is never super hot but it's hot enough for a bath. 

2) we did finally figured out that the "smart heating"  isn't as smart as your think... 

So this is what we found .... we had naively thought that by setting all the thermostats in each room to 21 that the heating wouldn't come on till the thermostat detected the room dropped below 21.  This is sort of correct... but the boiler fires All the damn time even in the summer even when there is no demand! So the additional usage in summer was caused by the boiler simply firing up incase someone needed a radiator.  Anyway we turned off the heating OFF at the source rather relying on the thermostats and that seems to have solved it.  

You do know you need to get the tank to at least 55 once a week to prevent legionella bacteria forming?

my problem is that my boiler is not capable of getting my tank to 55.... i mean not even slightly... it WAS trying... REALLY HARD and costing my a fortune but my tank and boiler are so far apart that 55 is a dream..

The tank/boiler situation is a thing on my "To-do" ... i need to move one of them... so they are closer to each other.  

Have you considered maybe having a small output boiler positioned next to the hot water cylinder? Nothing fancy, just ~10kW maybe, something that would only need a 15mm gas pipe to function...

xeny

Happy_Sloth said:

Alas..... the immersion died we used it twice! and it blew. I haven't been able to find an electrician/plumber to fix it... 

Incidentally i don't really know which i need.. my electrician claimed i needed a Plummer and the Plummer claimed i needed an electrician... 

Go figure. 

I've done it several times as a DIY job and consider it one of the easier ones, there's no measuring, drilling or cutting. The wiring side is as complicated as wiring a plug, although you want to check the power is off first.

Immersion heater spanners are about £10 and there are howtos on youtube, which a gaming PC should easily be capable of displaying at a high level of detail.