Short term fix needed. Any suggestions?

[SteamyTea]

2 hours ago, TheMitchells said:

Octopus fitter said night period started at 1am.

Was that 01:00 GMT or BST?

Metering times are usually GMT.

[Susie]

You can phone the electric supplier to get the times. They are not always 7 continuous hours I previously had a one hour and a six hour night time on eco 7.

I have a smart meter and times have changed to now on 1.24 to 8.24 I was told 1 to 8 BST but we have an old system and you hear the contactor switching and the smart meter confirms this just wish it would send the reading to supplier. 
 

[TheMitchells]

it was a light pen. Similar to one of these. https://www.screwfix.com/p/fluke-non-contact-voltage-detector-pen-1000v-ac/85949?kpid=85949&cm_mmc=Google-_-Datafeed-_-Tools?kpid=KINASEKPID&cm_mmc=Google-_-TOKEN1-_-TOKEN2&gad_source=1&gclsrc=ds

 

However, we think the problem may be solved.  An electrician finally came today after booking him Wednesday last week.  Once he had removed the front of the Off Peak circuit board, this is what he found.

 

Not good!  He has replaced the Main switch and cleaned up the cables going into it and is happy that it should all work now.  Particularly as we know the power is coming on during the night.  So it wasnt Octopus's meter after all.  And, if the electrician who I asked to come at the very beginning (10th July) had come and taken a look, we could have saved ourselves 3 weeks of aggravation.  But instead he told me to contact Octopus and the rest is history as they say! 

 

So fingers crossed it all works okay overnight.  The RCBO next to the main switch is slightly damaged too, but that is for the central heating system which we are replacing next month, hopefully, so that will remain turned off till then.  He did say he could replace it but for now it is turned off. 

 

[ProDave]

So glad you got it sorted, and a shame the first electrician turned out to be no good.  At least you can carry on with the heating you have for the short term and have longer to plan a longer term replacement.

 

Keep the details of today's electrician, now you have found one that knows what he is doing.

[MikeSharp01]

Great it is sorted but you dodged a fire there, wonder what caused the 100A isolator to burn out, is it switched on/off under load regularly? 

[ProDave]

Usually loose terminals.  There will be a lot of current through that for 7 hours a night for half the year.  One of the reasons a regular EICR is a good idea, that would likely have been spotted before it actually failed like that.

 

When I did a CU replacement for a house with that sort of big central storage heater, I specified an over size board, so the 50A rcbo for the big heater, could have a vacant space either side of it to aid cooling.