Remote switching for shed mains supply

[bigegg]

I'm fitting a FCU in my new shed to distribute the 32A supply which comes from the house FCU.

I'm toying with the idea of making a remote "off" switch to cutoff power via my "home assistant" system. The "on" switch _must_ be manual only.

I'm just wondering if a relay to connect live>earth (via a resistor) to activate the MCB would be enough, or if I could use a capacitor to feed a few mA into the Earth instead(via relay)

Other alternatives might be to use a solenoid to push an isolator switch "off"

Any other ideas?

 

[carbon]

Use a contactor or a dol starter with a Shelly or sonoff in series with the stop button if they do a version that has changeover contacts

 

[gaz1]

i wouldnt as tech can fail

to me off means off and if im doing it im doing it manualy and then i can lock it off if need be

 

[daleyd]

i wouldnt as tech can fail

to me off means off and if im doing it im doing it manualy and then i can lock it off if need be

You can still lock it off no one is saying you can’t…

 

[brightspark]

just curious why do you need to isolate it just knock the mcb off feeding it or are you in to gizmos

 

[BrokenBiker]

Seems like a lot of faff to replace flicking the rcd or mcb as yiu leave the shed

 

[MattF]

or are you in to gizmos

You need to ask?

 

[dobbslc]

I would not use a relay to short the live to earth!
Something will burn out very quickly. You'll also risk tripping other MCB's / RCD's further down the system.

 

[daleyd]

As above, use a contactor which is designed for this exact thing, rather than trying to trip an rcd.

 

[addjunkie]

Seems like a lot of faff to replace flicking the rcd or mcb as yiu leave the shed

Wire it though a breaker just inside the house door!

 

[MetalMonkey]

Assuming you mean consumer unit and not those little 13A Fused Connection Unit - as above the best option would be to wire it through a contactor as a no volt setup.
So that if the power trips off and comes back on everything stays dead - and then use a wifi relay to trigger it off remotely. Then have a momentary button to manually energise it.

You absolutely don't want to be triggering the RCD as a switching device, for one thing they have a finite lifespan of trips.

 

[George Erasmus]

For my set-up I have a 32A breaker in the house an then another one in the garage, occasionally I would forget to shut master breaker in garage then I just throw the breaker in the house
Most common item I leave on is the compressor sometimes I will realise here at 1am that I left the main breaker in garage on, so rather than wandering out in the cold I just walk over to my db and shut the garage breaker off. Sure you can fit all sorts of magnetic breakers with fancey remotes but nothing is guaranteed like a breaker being shut off. Now obviously I can understand that those living in more challenging area's might want to have alarms and CCTV running but Garage roof should be big enough to run PV an small offgrid psu connected to run security devices. Having a breaker in the house guarantees protection if a neighbour accidently cuts the cable etc. This has happened to me when they resurfaced the tarmac last year on the communal drive, first time I realised how shallow my electric supply was. I wanted to upgrade the cable for ages but I was broke at the time it happened and insurance would only pay a like for like replacement