Smart meter installed - IHD useless.

The_Hawk

I have a Chameleon type 1 (2018) IHD. As I also have an Octopus Home Mini, the only reason I have retained the IHD is because I find the Red-Amber-Green lights useful for a quick glance. For me:

• Green = Background or low usage
• Amber = Moderate to High usage
• Red = My EV charger is switched on
  

So, just a quick visual aid to alert me that a moderate or high power appliance is on; I may also press the 'now' button to see my exact power draw. For everything else I use my Octopus mini.

Somebody

The_Hawk said:

I have a Chameleon type 1 (2018) IHD. As I also have an Octopus Home Mini, the only reason I have retained the IHD is because I find the Red-Amber-Green lights useful for a quick glance. For me:

• Green = Background or low usage
• Amber = Moderate to High usage
• Red = My EV charger is switched on
  

So, just a quick visual aid to alert me that a moderate or high power appliance is on; I may also press the 'now' button to see my exact power draw. For everything else I use my Octopus mini.

Interesting that you mention Red = Ev charging as I have never seen Red on my IHD.  My PHEV only pulls 3.7kW charger so that  will be why.

Phones4Chris

Two observations -

One, on several days this last week I've noticed that the IHD has displayed "waiting for current data" (or words to that effect). This doesn't seem to be due to lack of connection to the Smart Meter, Wireless signal still showing and HAN light on and flashing correctly with the SW & WAN lights. I've no idea whether it's something Octopus are doing with sending/retrieving things to/from the meter, or something going on at the DCC.

Two - Coloured lights
Green = 500W or lower load.
Amber = above 500W
Red = not seen it on recently, briefly tried a load of 6.6kW, no red light. Will experiment more tomorrow when cooker rings and oven on! 
Budget setting doesn't seem to affect them.

dunstonh

I have the hildebrand/glow IHD.

The extra data is shows on screen is useful (24 hour bars or red/amber/green split by 30 minute intervals).   Unfortunately, mostly red but there you go.

It has saved me more than it cost.    Several times, we have spotted high use during peak hours, and it was the podpoint allowing the EV to charge outside of schedule (podpoints maintain your schedule on their server, and if you lose internet connection, they will go into charging mode).    Without it we wouldn't have known it was charging and it would have cost a lot of money (current is 5p offpeak and 35p peak to indicate the difference).

Over the winter months, we can use over 100 kwh a day on some days.   So, as a high user, IHDs are very useful.

Interesting that you mention Red = Ev charging as I have never seen Red on my IHD.  My PHEV only pulls 3.7kW charger so that  will be why.

Red cuts in at around 600w or thereabouts on our IHD.  i think its around 300w to move to amber

Somebody

Phones4Chris said:

I've noticed that the IHD has displayed "waiting for current data" (or words to that effect).

I frequently get this, as well as the IHD not showing usage but dashes.  I think it's the signal between the actual meters and the IHD.  I've put the IHD on a smart plug so just tell Alexa to turn it off and back on to get the display back.