Help with getting hot water with my e7? None for 5 days...

edinhome

Hello,

I do hope you can help me. I have rummaged around on the boards and have managed to find answers to how to get my storage heating to work...and that the red convector buttons were not about how much stored heat I was using but rather I was using peak! Sorted now...

But I simply can't figure out how to get hot water. I'm 5 days in and getting anxious and possibly unhygienic although I am boiling water in a kettle to wash. I've attached a pic of the booster thing, the tank and the water heater switch in the kitchen. I've tried combinations of having the 'water heater' switch and off and timed; the water heater switch up and down; and the boost going with different combinations, but I am getting no hot water.I have the manual for the boost and it says when the neon is on the peak elec is being used but I'm not getting heat.

Can anyone help or ask me questions that I can try and answer so we can figure this out? 

This is the first time I have moved in 30 years, I'm not a spring chicken and I am a wee bitty distressed. Your help would be wonderful.

Thank you.

DullGreyGuy

Is this an all electric property?

If it is then you'd expect the water tank to have two heating elements, one will be connected to the E7 night supply and the other to the 24/7 supply.  Ordinarily the tank will heat overnight using the cheaper electricity but you'll have a booster to add extra heat at any time if you use too much of the hot water before the next night. 

Often these are just two switches that are off or on for the two supplies but looks like your day boost has a countdown timer of up to 2 hours. 

Have you checked there are no other switches for it? Near the tank itself? If the property was empty at all before you moving in you'd expect them to have turned it off. 

Without more photos, which may not tell us everything anyway, its going to be a little bit of trial and error... If you turn the switch on, set the boost to Timed and turn the knob does the red light come on? Assuming it does, does it stay on if you then turn the switch off?

Newbie_John

In a typical case the box at the bottom (of the 2) of your hot water tank should heat the water during off peak hours - there is a separate wiring that only charges at night. The boost is to be used if you run out of hot water - and heats during peak hours as it's attached to wiring providing electricity 24h.

If you have smart meter you should see on daily usage graph a high usage from around midnight for 2-3 hours. If you have old meter - it would be good to check how fast the electric meter runs (compared to some low usage like 22:00) at about 1am. If there is no much difference then (it should use about 3kWh per hour) then issue with the heating coil or E7 wiring.

Heating in a kettle and heating with Boost during peak time should cost the same, the only difference comes from the amount of water you heat - the boost won't heat the full tank, just the amount above the level where the top box is.

So the question is if the bottom heating element works?

Ectophile

Check for tripped circuit breakers (or blown fuses) at the main consumer unit (fuse box).

Or it's possible that the main element has failed.

You should be able to heat part of the tank with the boost.  Set that to timed, and turn the knob to an hour or so.

edinhome

DullGreyGuy said:

Is this an all electric property?

If it is then you'd expect the water tank to have two heating elements, one will be connected to the E7 night supply and the other to the 24/7 supply.  Ordinarily the tank will heat overnight using the cheaper electricity but you'll have a booster to add extra heat at any time if you use too much of the hot water before the next night. 

Often these are just two switches that are off or on for the two supplies but looks like your day boost has a countdown timer of up to 2 hours. 

Have you checked there are no other switches for it? Near the tank itself? If the property was empty at all before you moving in you'd expect them to have turned it off. 

Without more photos, which may not tell us everything anyway, its going to be a little bit of trial and error... If you turn the switch on, set the boost to Timed and turn the knob does the red light come on? Assuming it does, does it stay on if you then turn the switch off?

Hello
Thank you.
Yes it is all electric. I turned the booster timer on again with the heater switch up and down and watched the wee light on the main meter and it didn't speed up. I then put the kettle on, and it did. So something not right there?
The property has been empty three months but the two times I viewed it, there was heat coming off the hot water tank and when I moved in on Monday, there was water bubbling out the hot water taps but then once that ran out, there was none. I turned the water heater button off as I thought maybe that was what had done it. But since then I have had it on overnight and no hot water.

edinhome

Found a new switch!! I've just pulled some boxes out of the airing cupboard where the tank is, where the removal people placed some boxes, and there was switch that was switched off. I've switched it back on and the red peak elec light is flashing faster now!  This may have sorted it. I'll let you know. I have one other problem to do with my electric shower not working right but I'll leave that until later on.
Thank you, you very kind people

DullGreyGuy

edinhome said:

Found a new switch!! 

House moving is always a journey of discovery... 6 years in and still haven't worked out how the cooker hood is wired in nor where the transformer that should be powering the thermostat was but managed to work out all the others eventually including the weird one that turns off the doorbell. 

edinhome

DullGreyGuy said:

edinhome said:

Found a new switch!! 

House moving is always a journey of discovery... 6 years in and still haven't worked out how the cooker hood is wired in nor where the transformer that should be powering the thermostat was but managed to work out all the others eventually including the weird one that turns off the doorbell. 

That's cheered me up. After 30 years in one big room size two bedroom flat into a very small one bedroom flat I'm finding it quite upsetting - it helps when I read other people are still discovering things. I'm quite a resilient and persistent so and so, but this is all being a bit taxing.

I suppose one just gets used to things e.g. my old cooker quite quickly dropped in temp from 6 to 1; this one here takes about 5 minutes. Oh well, 'first world problems' I keep telling myself. I'll adjust :

edinhome

It seems the most major part is solved. I now have hot water. It was that little switch that had toggled off I think when the removal people shifted a box around. I need to have both the timer ticking and the 'water heater' switch on at the same time. That seems excessive but maybe it also is a good failsafe - I had only electric (not storage) in my previous place and so many times I left the immersion on for an age.

I just now need to see if the overnight water heating works. 

Thank you again. I hope one day someone stumbles across this thread and it helps them.

QrizB

Glad that we could help you figure it all out