The Accidental Smallholder Forum

Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: bucketman on December 09, 2012, 10:45:38 am

Title: Electricity
Post by: bucketman on December 09, 2012, 10:45:38 am
Well we have just had our first power out since we moved up here. It went off some time in the night. We found out about 2am nothing we could do so just pull the covers over our head and back to sleep.When we got up it was still out so give them till 9 and rung "Yes we know of the problem and we have people on it". It came back on about 10am. will buy some camping lighs and be ready next time. It was windy last night so guess a line blew down. wonder how often we get them will have to ask round.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: lachlanandmarcus on December 09, 2012, 10:49:38 am
I was surprised that we dont get more than we do - we average one or two a year - it was worse than that in the home counties. Mind you the last one was 2 days, but to be fair that was cos of the hurricane that swept Scotland last year and in our case was 2 high power lines and one low power to sort out before they could reconnect us.
So you might be pleasantly surprised, we were going to get a generator for power cuts but havent felt the need to date. But we do have a wood stove that is also a range and that has a back boiler - so we can cook and keep a little bit warm and have a shower, - invaluable when our friends in the village with mains everything dont have anything.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: sabrina on December 09, 2012, 10:54:44 am
In the past we have had power cuts most winters. I keep lots of tea lights in a bag, a torch by the bed, we have a small calor gas stove that has 2 rings and I make sure there is tins of soup in the cupboard just in case its off for hours. Be prepared is the word in our house.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Bionic on December 09, 2012, 12:00:47 pm
Be prepared is the word in our house.
Here too Sabrina. We have had several power cuts since we moved here, mostly from our own supply problems though  ;D . There are torches dotted all over the place, candels, tealights and matches at the ready. The camping equipment and BBQ can all be got at if necessary for making drinks and meals.
Sally
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: doganjo on December 09, 2012, 01:03:09 pm
I have had one power cut here since I moved here almost 5 years ago.  I still have candles, matches, torches, log burner, a big stock of logs - it's just called being prepared.  ;D
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: bucketman on December 09, 2012, 02:58:54 pm
was told if they could not fix it by 11am they would switch a big generator on. But may look a small one our selves we have 3 freezers and 2 fridges to keep cold and a lot of stock (money) in them. Dont know if we could claim
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: doganjo on December 09, 2012, 03:01:51 pm
No reason not to if freezers are covered in your house contents insurance.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Sylvia on December 09, 2012, 03:37:13 pm
 :relief: :relief:  No electricity here= no power cuts. Can't say i miss it much either.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Small Farmer on December 09, 2012, 05:30:15 pm
I was surprised that we dont get more than we do - we average one or two a year - it was worse than that in the home counties.
You're dead right - we have frequent cuts of a few minutes and occasional longer ones usually with advance notice.   Three years ago we lost power at midnight and phoned it in "yes we know about that", still no power at 0600 "yes we know about that", still no power at 1000 "what do you mean, we've fixed your fault".   Two transformers had tripped out, and ours had blown up.


So we got a little Honda generator in case.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: cleopatra on December 09, 2012, 09:23:05 pm
was told if they could not fix it by 11am they would switch a big generator on. But may look a small one our selves we have 3 freezers and 2 fridges to keep cold and a lot of stock (money) in them. Dont know if we could claim

our business insurance covered frozen food lost by power cut but only if the freezers were less than 3 yrs old, which they werent.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Sudanpan on December 11, 2012, 07:23:43 pm
We get occasional power 'outtages' - don't generally last more than about 10 mins or so, but irritatingly we have to go round the house and reset all the room thermostat timers (part of the underfloor heating setup) which is a major pain  :rant:


One time we did have a situation where the voltage had dropped quite significantly which therefore resulted in higher currents being supplied to all our electrical equip - somewhat worrying cos that's what does the damage!
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: in the hills on December 11, 2012, 08:31:06 pm
We have been here nearly 4 years and had several but only lasting a few hours.  We have been told that we have been lucky and it can be several days so we have same things on standby as Sabrina.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Victorian Farmer on December 11, 2012, 09:11:40 pm
i hatch through the winter i have lost all young stock before naw i hatch be for Christmas the time the power goes here  is late November and January . In 2010 it was 2 weeks new year out side Barbe no pawer and all freezer stuff in the snow .It would be a disaster if it went naw  i have 7 sheds full off young stock 6 weeks old power dependant the gas only lasts 2 weeks . So the  wether has to be watched by the way i did say a green Christmas in November ,so no snow on the big day thank god.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: lachlanandmarcus on December 11, 2012, 09:27:36 pm
after a previous power outage we had a surge when it came back on and it blew up some of the house equipment that didnt have RCDs on it - so now we have it on the whole house supply and special ones for all the computer cabling.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: tizaala on December 12, 2012, 09:14:00 am
On two occasions recently we were notified of power disruption for repair work to be carried out, on both Occasions we were supplied with huge generators because I told them we had eggs hatching in an incubator, I just didn't tell them it was only 6 .
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Lesley Silvester on December 12, 2012, 09:25:00 pm
Well done, Tiz.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: SteveHants on December 13, 2012, 12:01:40 am
Used to get them fairly often when I was out in the cotswolds.


Generator would kick in, alarms would go off and it was out of bed to check the jenny was working properly and all the stock was alive.


Bareley notice them now.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: Lesley Silvester on December 13, 2012, 06:33:00 pm
Used to get them on Arran fairly often. The worst was for 24 hours in our first winter and we ran out of oil for the rayburn our only other form of heating except for a wood burner.  If the power went off at night we always knew as my youngest used to wake up screaming because it was dark.
Title: Re: Electricity
Post by: smiley bucket on December 13, 2012, 10:01:49 pm
On two occasions recently we were notified of power disruption for repair work to be carried out, on both Occasions we were supplied with huge generators because I told them we had eggs hatching in an incubator, I just didn't tell them it was only 6 .

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