Free Energy

Tomorrow's the 18th. Do you mean tomorrow or Monday?

Thanks for that. I hadn't signed up because of the full car at the last free slot, so didn't get any notification. I've signed up now, so hopefully I will get the notification.

The car is sitting at around 60% now waiting to be charged for the start of a road trip on Tuesday morning. I can swipe what I can get either Sunday or Monday. I just have to remember to set the house battery to charge at the same time (although it will be at 100%) to avoid the Zappi draining it while it charges, and get everything from the mains.
18th 18th yes Sun 18th. ?
 
I altered my Powerwall to charge through the 1 hour period (or it will charge the car) and scheduled the car to charge at the same time and plugged in. All went as planned, no discharge from Powerwall (already at 100% from solar), car charged at just under 7.2KW. The only "problem" was that the nice sunny day was giving 2.4KW from my solar (8 panel array) so only a bit over 5kW being taken from the grid.

Over the course of the hour I reckon I saved 40p :ROFLMAO:
 
Definitely not as obvious as it seems.
I tried Friday. Programmed domestic battery ( Sonnen) to charge for the hour but not enough. Chose 5kw but for some reason that just kept it at the same level. Will try 10kw tomorrow.
The ashp took the hot water from about 30 to 50 degrees in half an hour, then max'd out and stopped.
The car took some but was already at 80odd percent. Think it charged about 10% on an Octopus boost which I've never tried before and took a while to get going.
Must make a note of what everything is at just before the hour tomorrow and obviously after. Generally not using anything at that time with domestic battery covering background, so it's all good ( a couple of quid at primary rate ).
Can't wait for when the grid is 90% renewables and there's lots of spare electrons floating about out there and it's all free all day ??
 
Dang, still no email advising me of this opportunity, even though I have signed up now. Don't know whether to risk it.
Mine came through at 1230 on Friday, having signed up Thursday. Didn't even realise I was waiting for it ?
 
Even if I do the car charger (which I need) and the hot water (which I probably don't) and run the vacuum cleaner for a bit, I'm not going to use £1 worth of electricity, given that I'm only using the stuff at the off peak rate.

Not convinced it's worth the hassle.
 
Even if I do the car charger (which I need) and the hot water (which I probably don't) and run the vacuum cleaner for a bit, I'm not going to use £1 worth of electricity, given that I'm only using the stuff at the off peak rate.

Not convinced it's worth the hassle.
Then dont do it, simples :cool:

Last time I used about 15 kWh extra so about £3.30 ish for about 5 minutes configuring things on my system (EDDI Zappi, Heatpumps, Batteries, Granny Charger).
 
Red energy in Australia give u 2 hours free on Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 - 14:00; that’s good on a cloudy day. Solar today pumping 5.5 kW .weather warm but windy strong enough to blow a brown dog off its chain.
 
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Then dont do it, simples :cool:

Last time I used about 15 kWh extra so about £3.30 ish for about 5 minutes configuring things on my system (EDDI Zappi, Heatpumps, Batteries, Granny Charger).

You've obviously got the ability to use a significant amount of power the way your system is set up. If I could do the same then I would, but I'm struggling to see how I could get even close.

I can plug in the car, yes, and that's not difficult, and since I forgot to take the Eddi off stop mode last night (I can see this becoming a perennial problem) it makes sense to heat the water and have a shower in the free slot. But my house battery is full now and discharging it to the grid to recharge it during the free hour is getting a bit complicated for this novice. If even the Zappi, the thing that draws more power than anything, is only going to net me about 50p, it's hard to see how adding other lower power appliances is going to add up even to £1.

I think there a certain people this will be good for, but I suspect I'm not one of them. I'll have a free hour of car charging and some hot water though.
 
OK, thinking this through. I need to write it down. At one o'clock I...
  1. Turn off "eco" on the inverter so that the house will only use mains power.
  2. Turn on the Eddi.
  3. Maybe turn on the fan heater if the sun hasn't come out.
  4. Plug in the car and set the Zappi to maximum charge.
  5. Vacuum out the car boot (which I was going to do this afternoon anyway, having done the footwells and the mats yesterday).
  6. Go take the shower I didn't have this morning because I forgot to turn the Eddi back on last night and the water wasn't hot enough.
At two o'clock I stop the Eddi, stop the car charging, turn off the fan heater, and set the inverter back to "eco".

I thought about automating this, but I'm not that confident so I think I'll do it manually for now.

I'm not doing anything with the washing machine, dishwasher or tumble drier, because that was all done last week, and anyway all these things take more than an hour to run a cycle.

I'm not trying to discharge the house battery and charge it again, because I think that's a complication too far for me right now. Maybe next time.
 
It is so annoying that our smart immersion heater failed last week just at the point when it finally start to be financially beneficial! :rolleyes:

I'm not doing anything with the washing machine, dishwasher or tumble drier, because that was all done last week, and anyway all these things take more than an hour to run a cycle.
On the former, I had to decide whether to have the laundry/dishwasher starting or ending during the free period. Decided to try to get them ending during it because there will be heating/spin cycle.

It just so happens we need to do both today.

Also happen to need to make bread (in breadmaker) for lunch so postponed that slightly so that it would be partially cooking in the free period.

I'm not trying to discharge the house battery and charge it again, because I think that's a complication too far for me right now. Maybe next time.

For the battery Givenergy had a 'forced discharge' and a 'forced charge' option which I struggled with when I used to try to get it to do my bidding (before getting intelligent flux).

It used to be a button on the bottom of the home page on the app but it seems to have disappeared now, so I guess you have to set the timers.
 
OK, thinking this through. I need to write it down. At one o'clock I...
  1. Turn off "eco" on the inverter so that the house will only use mains power.
Can you not set the inverter to charge your house battery from 13~:00 to 14:00? that will then stop Zappi stealing battery power as well as charge your house battery.

  1. Turn on the Eddi.
Set a schedule on EDDI 13:00 for 1 hour, ditto Zappi.

  1. Maybe turn on the fan heater if the sun hasn't come out.
Yep

  1. Plug in the car and set the Zappi to maximum charge.
Plug the car in now and set a schedule as per the above, only switch mode from the app just before 13:00 from STOP to ECO+

  1. Vacuum out the car boot (which I was going to do this afternoon anyway, having done the footwells and the mats yesterday).
Aye, go for it

  1. Go take the shower I didn't have this morning because I forgot to turn the Eddi back on last night and the water wasn't hot enough.
Sounds like a plan

At two o'clock I stop the Eddi, stop the car charging, turn off the fan heater, and set the inverter back to "eco".
Delete the schedules on your inverter, EDDI and Zappi, job done

I thought about automating this, but I'm not that confident so I think I'll do it manually for now.
Nah come on, you can do better than this.

I'm not doing anything with the washing machine, dishwasher or tumble drier, because that was all done last week, and anyway all these things take more than an hour to run a cycle.
Yes but the one theyre running will be saving you £££ and after the hour has gone it will revert to being fed from your solar / battery.

I'm not trying to discharge the house battery and charge it again, because I think that's a complication too far for me right now. Maybe next time.
Chicken :unsure: what have you got to lose? why will next time be any different to this time?
 
Not so simple. The minute I turn on the Eddi or the Zappi they will start swiping excess solar. No, stoppit, leave the solar alone. It's as easy to start them at one o'clock as it is to change the settings at one o'clock. The house battery is currently full so there's no advantage in setting it to charge. If I turn off eco on the inverter not only will it stop the house battery supplying power, it will cause the entire house to run off the mains.

I just don't need any more clothes or dishes washed right now. Anyway, I'd be saving pp, not £££.

I think this will do for now. I'm not even 100% sure I'll get paid for it, although I did register. It's a learning curve. Better to do about 60% of what's possible and get it right than to mess it up by getting too complicated.

(Poor Octopus. They want to get rid of excess power. They may be inducing people to export a ton of power 12-1 then swipe it back 1-2, which doesn't sound like it's what they want!)
 
What I would say about this is 2 things.
Firstly, it's practising and familiarisation. I may not need it at the moment ( car's at 88% and domestic battery 92%) but it's useful to know how to take advantage of the offer for the future when it will be more financially beneficial and -
Secondly, I don't think they are doing this because they love us. I think it's designing a methodology for the way the grid works. It's designed for ramping up and down as generators power up and down. However renewables are on/off which the grid is not designed for and can therefore be damaging to it. Having a large user base using excess simulates the ramping effect the grid is designed for. It acts as a buffer.
In other words, we are testing a system to make renewables work with the existing infrastructure and for our troubles we get a bit of free electric . If they manage to offer this 5 days/week and we get £2 free per day, that's £10/week, £40-£50 per month, which'd certainly help towards the monthly bill.
My issue is that I've already load shifted to cheap rate and it's a pain trying to shift it back and forth, which is where the practice comes in useful.

Time to switch it all back ?
 
Whew, eight minutes to go. Worth it more for the learning experience than for possible pocket change.

First the Eddi didn't want to come out of Stop mode. This is regular, but usually it's not an issue. It was being particularly recalcitrant this time.

Then the Zappi, which I was controlling from its own interface, kept reverting to eco+ no matter how often I told it to go to Fast. I thought there was a boost setting in Octopus, but couldn't find that. A lot of random fiddling with the Zappi app, which kept saying things like "boost is not available when fast mode is selected", and somehow I must have done something right because it held. Poor Caliban must have been quite confused by what was going on, but he held up admirably, accepting power whenever it was offered.

Then I grabbed the Dyson and set to the boot vacuuming. The guy across the road was pressure-washing his car, so it's all the car care today. By this time it was 1.20, but that had given the Eddi time to heat some water, so I had that power shower, managing to finish by 1.35 to give the water time to heat up again. Dry, dressed and back here just in time to type this and then start switching things off.


OK, the switching off was OK. I hadn't put any heaters on because there was enough solar gain to warm the conservatory and the kitchen so it would have been pointless. The Eddi co-operated, then after thinking about it for a bit the Zappi went into Stop mode, and I got the inverter back on eco a few seconds after two. The GivEnergy app looks perfectly normal, with the battery at 100%, the house drawing 287 watts, solar generation at 1.87 kw and 1.59 kw being exported.

Now I need to go back out and tidy up the Dyson, its extension lead, and the boot itself. Caliban is all smart and ready to go for the next big road trip on Tuesday. (But actually I think I need a coffee first! Didn't think to boil the kettle during the free period!)
 
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Whew, eight minutes to go. Worth it more for the learning experience than for possible pocket change.

First the Eddi didn't want to come out of Stop mode. This is regular, but usually it's not an issue. It was being particularly recalcitrant this time.

Then the Zappi, which I was controlling from its own interface, kept reverting to eco+ no matter how often I told it to go to Fast. I thought there was a boost setting in Octopus, but couldn't find that. A lot of random fiddling with the Zappi app, which kept saying things like "boost is not available when fast mode is selected", and somehow I must have done something right because it held. Poor Caliban must have been quite confused by what was going on, but he held up admirably, accepting power whenever it was offered.

Then I grabbed the Dyson and set to the boot vacuuming. The guy across the road was pressure-washing his car, so it's all the car care today. By this time it was 1.20, but that had given the Eddi time to heat some water, so I had that power shower, managing to finish by 1.35 to give the water time to heat up again. Dry, dressed and back here just in time to type this and then start switching things off.


OK, the switching off was OK. I hadn't put any heaters on because there was enough solar gain to warm the conservatory and the kitchen so it would have been pointless. The Eddi co-operated, then after thinking about it for a bit the Zappi went into Stop mode, and I got the inverter back on eco a few seconds after two. The GivEnergy app looks perfectly normal, with the battery at 100%, the house drawing 287 watts, solar generation at 1.87 kw and 1.59 kw being exported.

Now I need to go back out and tidy up the Dyson, its extension lead, and the boot itself. Caliban is all smart and ready to go for the next big road trip on Tuesday. (But actually I think I need a coffee first! Didn't think to boil the kettle during the free period!)
A busy old hour, eh ? ?
What I've learned over the 2 sessions I've done it is to remember to delete the overnight schedule on the Wallbox for the car charge. Twice it caught me out, never again ! ?
Other than that ashp heated water from 36-50°, domestic battery finished charging from 96-100% and car charged from 88-96% and a washing machine wash done.... and a kettle boiled ?
Used 6.2kwh this time as opposed to 4.96 on Friday.
Not a huge financial gain but useful experience /knowledge as stated previously.
 
I didn't anticipate the Zappi refusing to engage Fast mode from its own controls, instead needing something done on the app. Maybe John's suggestion would have been better, I can try that next time. I got 5.79 kwh into the car anyway, a little less than I anticipated but worth having. The Eddi got 2.8 kwh and even though I took that shower in the middle of the free period (power shower also consumes electricity) the water is still pretty damn hot now.

So on top of the 8.6 kwh the MyEnergi appliances got, there was the power shower and the use of the vacuum cleaner. Worth it for the learning. I obviously don't know nearly enough about how the Zappi functions.

Car now at 74%, so I just need to get a schedule from Octopus to add 30% tonight.

While I was clearing up outside my neighbour's father (not the neighbours with the same solar installation as I have, the people on the other side) drove up in - a dual motor Tesla Model Y. He was talking about getting a Tesla the last time I spoke to him, and apparently he took the plunge in June. He says it takes a bit of getting used to but he's getting to love it. He said he'd heard about the free hour but since he wasn't at home he couldn't think what to do about it. So he must be on Octopus too.
 
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