I appreciate the subject has been discussed to death but perhaps every case has to be examined on its own merit. So before spending for a failure project, it may help discuss a few facts first.
My place has no space for a tumble dryer and drying clothes in the house has become a bit of an issue for obvious reasons. We want to place a dryer in the garage, the only possible location. The garage is not attached to the house.
I am looking at buying a condensing tumble dryer, I will use one I've seen online as our test case, which says that on full load for cottons it consumes 4.2KW
At the moment the garage is supplied by a radial 2.5mm T&E with the following configuration. The CU has dual RCD and because the tails were extended to move the entire CU from under the stairs to the hallway, there is a connection block under the stairs where the old CU used to be.
The circuit has 20A MCB, the cable runs up to the block (about 4m length) and from there it goes through to the outside wall, through a conduit of about 10 meters long to a dual gang IP65 socket in the garage. There is a fused spur under the stairs and another fused spur just before the socket (these are 13A I believe).
The questions,
1. I have heard of people putting dryers in the garage, how does that work with freezing temperatures during the winter? i) can the dryer get damage from frost ii) is it possible it will seriously underperform in low ambient temperature i.e 1oC
2. Assuming (1) above is not a major issue, if the dryer wattage is around 4~4.2kW on full load*, can it be supported by the 2.5mm cable with a 20A MCB at this length/voltage drop?
*Considering that the dryer may need to run for 2 hours continuously for a cycle based on one of the programmes.
If not, what would be the best cable to run to the garage for that purpose.
Thanks
My place has no space for a tumble dryer and drying clothes in the house has become a bit of an issue for obvious reasons. We want to place a dryer in the garage, the only possible location. The garage is not attached to the house.
I am looking at buying a condensing tumble dryer, I will use one I've seen online as our test case, which says that on full load for cottons it consumes 4.2KW
At the moment the garage is supplied by a radial 2.5mm T&E with the following configuration. The CU has dual RCD and because the tails were extended to move the entire CU from under the stairs to the hallway, there is a connection block under the stairs where the old CU used to be.
The circuit has 20A MCB, the cable runs up to the block (about 4m length) and from there it goes through to the outside wall, through a conduit of about 10 meters long to a dual gang IP65 socket in the garage. There is a fused spur under the stairs and another fused spur just before the socket (these are 13A I believe).
The questions,
1. I have heard of people putting dryers in the garage, how does that work with freezing temperatures during the winter? i) can the dryer get damage from frost ii) is it possible it will seriously underperform in low ambient temperature i.e 1oC
2. Assuming (1) above is not a major issue, if the dryer wattage is around 4~4.2kW on full load*, can it be supported by the 2.5mm cable with a 20A MCB at this length/voltage drop?
*Considering that the dryer may need to run for 2 hours continuously for a cycle based on one of the programmes.
If not, what would be the best cable to run to the garage for that purpose.
Thanks