thanks Martijn…
i’ve done my research regarding pots and pans, but thanks for the tips!
i’ve ordered my cooker/hob and i’m really looking forward to getting it in a few days
induction hob and electric oven… and i use gas at work (traiteur at local markets) so my pots are pretty heavy duty and should work with everything
the joy of a new oven !!!
Nothing much to add except a brief comment (since you mentioned you sought to be educated.)
You referred a couple of times to the existing ‘ring’. A ring main is a British institution that is actually falling out of favour in the UK now. A cable leaves the consumer unit, goes round in a loop with the sockets on it and returns to the same circuit breaker. Cookers would not be on a ring. They would have their own spur in chunky 6mm or 10mm cable and 32a or even 45a breaker.
The French approach is to use only spurs. Which is what the professionals have been discussing above. A single run of cable from the disjoncteur (a double pole micro circuit breaker) that does not loop back to the consumer unit. This single run may have several sockets (different numbers allowed depending on cable rating) or lights or, as in the case of cookers, dishwashers, etc. have a single socket dedicated to that appliance.
Unlike the UK it’s not uncommon to plug the cooker in, but not using a standard 16a plug and socket. There are bigger plugs rated for cookers. Can be simpler than hard wiring it in. Specially if you like to get behind it to clean occasionally.
As a qualified electrician in the UK, but not in France, there is a great deal about the French systems and rules that I approve of. So I applaud your intention to do it by the book.
The only thing I regret is that we bought our house after the interior was dry lined. We really need several more spurs and should upgrade some of the cables that were installed in order to bring the installation up to the standard I’d like (previous owner ‘saved money.’) Would have been so much easier to do before the plasterboard went up!
I think it’s worth paying a bit more and putting in plenty of circuits and using the higher rated cable where there’s a choice while at that stage of the build/renovation. So much more hassle and expense upgrading later.
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Nicely put Tim, but I would just enlarge slightly on something you said…[quote=“Tim_O_Connor_2, post:22, topic:14754”]
Unlike the UK it’s not uncommon to plug the cooker in, but not using a standard 16a plug and socket.[/quote]
Just to avoid confusion; when you or I use the word “cooker” we would mean a complete appliance that includes an oven or two, a hob, maybe a separate grill. This kind of device requires a large electrical supply, hence the need for a 32A (or larger) circuit with either a properly rated socket & consequent plug, or a simple cable outlet (smaller, cheaper). It is not uncommon for people to erroneously refer to a separate electric oven as a cooker - believe me, I’ve been misled many a time by clients.
Here in France a more precisely referred to “four indépendant” usually draws 2.5/3kW at the most & is therefore able to run from it’s own dedicated standard 16A socket. Many are sold with a cable & moulded 16A plug already in place.
I recently had to deal with a client’s new pride & joy, a UK bought single phase range with a potential load of 15.4kW! Although the property is a small chateau the 36kVA three phase could not support that on one of it’s 60A phases. Luckily a bit of investigation revealed that it was relatively simple to rewire to three phase use & it’s now happily cooking banquets with it’s 6 ceramic plates, warming plate, fan oven, grill oven, & large ordinary oven.
The ones that work have a magnetic base.
I was amazed to discover that all my pans bar one work on my induction hob including the cheap stainless steel ones that I had presumed would not.
Thanks Jonathan.
Good point re my vision being of a single appliance comprising oven, grill and hob. That was indeed the picture I had in mind. Separating them is very likely to bring them into the range of a 16a socket. Plenty of ovens in the UK running off 13a plugs.
Like your comment re big electric range. Actually remarkably hard to get appliance manufacturers to make a clear statement about potential total load their appliances may draw. So consumers don’t get a lot of help from them.
We got round it by having gas hobs with electric ovens for my wife’s medium sized range.
Sorry, arriving a bit late to this conversation. We have an induction hob, as with many French properties, we have no mains gas and did not want to be faffing with cylinders. It works well - the only thing we failed to cook was crêpes as the pan did not get hot enough. Probably it was not suitable for induction which, basically, means cookware made from ferrous metals so cast iron or steel generally OK, copper and aluminium not unless they incorporate a steel plate for compatibility. Glass is totally useless. Pretty much any new cookware will show the induction symbol on the box or on the item itself so it should be easy to get compatible pots and pans.
Other points - pans need to be flat bottomed and straight sided and you can’t get away with a small pan on a larger hob - it will not trigger the pan detector and you will get no heating.
A couple of qualified electricians have posted so I will not wade in too deeply here as I’m merely an amateur sparky but the hobs are anything from 7kW up so need a dedicated 32A circuit on 6mm2 cable as previously mentioned. Usually the hob will have a flexible cable with just bare wire ends intended to be connected via a"sortie de cable". Many if not all will be adaptable to three phase by removing a link - on ours there are two “live” wires crimped together which can be split to connect to two phases. I would expect the same of modern ovens BTW -usually links inside the oven which can be removed to connect to multiple phases. In the UK a permanently wired hob has to be connected via a double pole switch but in France I don’t think you need a separate one as the disjoncteur will do (one think I like about French electrical installation is the requirement for double pole breakers at the tableau).
I would not try an induction hob on a 3kW supply. Ours has a feature where you can limit the maximum power draw but I have never managed the right multi-button pressing gymnastics to enable it. We have 60A/15kW (the most we can have without replacing the overhead cable) and we could easily trip that if we tried to use hob, oven, dishwasher and washing machine at the same time. In fact I purposefully fitted a 40A RCD to feed the group of high current stuff rather then the recommended 63A to give me a bit of leeway.
Talking of which I agree with Jonathan Badger - I too am slightly uncomfortable with a system which allows 16A rated sockets protected by a 20A breaker so when I updated the tableau from “fusibles” (the previous owner was tight :), he also had the house on 30A/7.5kW) to disjoncteurs I used 16A on the power circuits. I’m also not madly keen on the provision for 1.5mm2 circuits out to the sockets but, thankfully, all the existing wiring was 2.5mm2. The sole exception being the kitchen circuits which do have 20A disjoncteurs simply because it’s more likely that a couple of high current appliances will be working at the same time.
[quote=“ptf, post:27, topic:14754”]In fact I purposefully fitted a 40A RCD to feed the group of high current stuff rather then the recommended 63A to give me a bit of leeway.[/quote]In which case I hope you were aware of the difference between an “interrupteur différentiel” (ID) & a “disjoncteur différentiel”(DD)…?
An ID only trips in response to a residual current fault & will NOT trip through overload - the rating (25A, 40A, 63A, whatever) is only the maximum handling capacity i.e. if you overload it it will get hot & eventually catch fire/fail.
A DD includes both overload & residual current functions & are used to supply individual circuits that you don’t want to lose through the tripping of a more generalised ID. For this reason you would tend to find them in lower vlaues in a domestic situation (10/16/20A). This would be refered to as an RCBO in the UK - Residual Currrent Breaker with Overload protection.
To prevent the possible overloading of IDs the latest amemdement (A5) to NF C 15-100 now limits the number of circuits connectied via any one ID to 8 but also imposes a calculation to stipulate the minimum rating of each ID. If you don’t want to bother with the claulation then a 63A is required (as no one phase in a “tarif bleu” domestic situation is higher than that in France). If you want to fit a lower amperage value (as they are cheaper) then the rating of the ID must exceed the sum of 50% of all the values of any general ciruits connected (standard power & light) plus 100% of the value of any heating circuits (inc. water heaters) & electric vehicle charging points.
If an ID has 2 x 10A lighting circuits, 2 x 16A socket circuits, 1 x 16A tumble dryer circuit & one by 20A water heater then you do this:
2 x 10A / 50% = 10A
2 x 16A / 50% = 16A
1 x 16A / 50% = 8A
1 x 20A @ 100% = 20A
Total = 54A therefore you require a 63A ID.
This is a long winded way of saying that if you fitted an ID to “give me a bit of leeway” you have not achieved anything, apart from a potential falure, or worse.
Incidentally it is not the overhead cable that is limiting your power but the restriction of “tarif bleu” which now only allows you up to 12kVA/60A per phase. Historically you used to be able to have up to 18kVA(90A) but that is no longer the case if requested, though you will still find old supplies of that rating. If you want more than 12kVA then you need triphasé.
Thanks for the explanation much appreciated. It’s a DD feeding the group of high current circuits specifically as I wanted the over-current trip as well. I should have said RCBO when using the English term - slip of the fingers/laziness I’m afraid. There’s a 63A ID feeding the rest of the tableau. I wasn’t aware of the 8 circuits max per ID though so that is useful info (when did it come in?). Do existing installations need to be upgraded? Awkward if so as I think I would struggle to put another ID in the current setup - if I remember I do have a couple of blank slots and I have a spare 63A ID (which I originally had feeding the high current stuff) so it might be do-able, except I think that the spare slots are in entirely the wrong place for a logical layout.
Also interesting info about 12kVA being the most on tarif bleu - I knew it was the max but did not realise there had been a higher limit. In any case I would not want to go for more, the loop resistance is about 0.45ohms so any more than 60A and it is going to drop the voltage down below spec. That resistance is consistent with about 100m of 25mm2 cable (x 2 for phase+neutral) between me and the transformer which is entirely plausible so I don’t thnk it’s down to a single dodgy joint or anything.
In fact, from what you say in practice you need to have three-phase to have more than 12kVA. I would not want to make that step as it would need a complete rewire.
[quote=“ptf, post:29, topic:14754”]I wasn’t aware of the 8 circuits max per ID though so that is useful info (when did it come in?). Do existing installations need to be upgraded?[/quote]A5 came into effect in November 2015 but it is not retrospective - no electrical regulations are. CONSUEL still inspect to the the old regs if requested but I guess that will disappear, certainly for all new installations.
To be pedantic…12kVA is the maximum single phase supply on tarif bleu (i.e. 1 x 60A), with 36kVA (3 x 60A) being the maximum via three phase. If you were merely running a large amout of single phase use on a triphasé supply you wouldn’t need a complete rewire, just a properly thought out tableau.
Well done for having used a DD (RCBO) by the way. I was being a doubter 