Moving to OVO Economy 10 (with or without storage heaters)

@Crag Thank you - that’s very helpful.

The two switches to the water heater are most probably as I suggested one for the constant supply and the other for the switched supply. Normally, the switched one would be always on, in which case it would only be live during what are supposed to be offpeak hours, when that’s eventually sorted out. The other switch will probably be for a second heating element near the top of the tank, to be used as a booster if you run out of hot water in a peak period. It’s surprising that the electrician who installed the tank didn’t label the switches a bit more clearly. 

Have you looked to see whether the left-hand switch lights up overnight? If your meter is turning the switched circuit on during Economy 7 hours, it should be working between 01:00 and 08:00. Have a look tomorrow morning (I noticed you were up and about before 8 this morning!). If it is live then, you could turn the other switch off. You’ll still be paying too much for water heating overnight, but that should come right when the meter’s timings have been sorted out.

The solar side looks ok to me - especially if it performed previously. The additional contraption looks at solar production, compares to home usage and diverts extra power to heat water. 
The main connection point is simply an additional power feed. The arrows simply show the vector information (direction) of the flow, positive or negative

… which could explain why there’s no (or very little) consumption recorded on the offpeak register. If the heating is turned on, of course, I’d expect at least a few kWh to show up there reflecting overnight usage. I think we’ll have to wait until everything’s fallen into place to sort that out.

I just noticed that @Keast’s quadrant arrows were the exact reverse of mine, and that’s one element of the Aclara’s displayed information that I’ve not bothered to dig into. 
 

Many years ago, my brother’s solar panels were wired up to do the same - heat up the water tank instead of pushing all of the excess generated energy out to the grid. I got the impression that this arrangement was not entirely kosher, when compared with his reward for helping out the grid. I never understood that, either. I suppose if he was getting FIT payments for 50% of generation, there were probably constraints on how much he was allowed to consume himself.

The ‘Harvi’ in the photo is a clever little device and monitors to decide where any excess might be more useful. It is fully acceptable and doesn’t affect any FIT payments as those are purely based on generation (with either a 50% deemed export or a measured alternative)

BPLighting you are right about the Harvi. It talks to an a myenergi eddi (by blue tooth I think) which diverts the solar output to the house, the water heater and out into the grid, in that order of preference.

I have had the solar panels for nearly 2 years but have not received full financial from benefit from an FIT  because I have been waiting for a smart meter for nearly 3 years.

By installing the panels and replacing old storage heaters with Dimplex Quantum I have reduced our energy consumption by about 40%. It was a big capital outlay, and I am too scared to do the financial benefit calculations, but I am happy to help make the world a tiny bit greener. 

I am right now waiting for a quote for a battery so I don’t need to sign up for a miserable FIT. Resilience for power cuts will be an added benefit because we have a completely electric household.

As an update, I am still on an Economy 7 supply, my meter readings have been sent to my account but it is only showing figures under the ‘anytime’ column. Those figures are less than my IHD meter reading shows so maybe the off peak usage is being held back until Economy 10 kicks in.

You will be on a SEG export tariff rather than FIT of course

I’m sure the outlay is worthwhile eventually and obviously offers some green credentials as well

Batteries are a key component of any solar system to my mind. Although you have some generation diversion, the battery storage adds substantially to your local capabilities. Just be careful on the power cut part. Many (if not most) systems actually switch off during a power cut as the external cables need to be isolated before engineers work on them. Generally there will be an option for a backup supply from the batteries but it will need its own power source (a secondary battery usually) and the sockets it feeds have to be cabled separately so are only used during power cuts 

I got switched from radio teleswitch (superdeal) to smart meter (economy 10) on Oct 1st.

All seemed to go well.  The IHD indicates when it’s going to switch (an hour before the rate changes it shows a little countdown graph and tells you if the price is about to go up or down) and the rate changes match what I was told for Economy 10 (but always only in GMT timing, apparently).

The heating circuit comes on and off with that timing but I have only 2 “rates”, 1 - peak and 2 off-peak (and strangely the meter has a rate 3 and rate 4 but they don’t use them at all so they are all zero).

So heating is basically just charged the same as off-peak usage, and the heating circuits only come on and off with the Economy 10 timings (I don’t have a 24-hour boost wiring such as some of these photos, but that’s just the way things were wired internally by the council years ago, I suspect, and has always been that way.

All seems to be working.

The only annoyance is that the OVO account still thinks I’m on a complex meter setup, so still offers me a smart meter, still won’t work on the app, still can’t see any stats, I can’t check or submit a meter reading (still reading my old MPAN and readings), I still can’t join those energy-saving initiatives that require a smart meter, and my bill is still just the standing charge for this month and nothing else.  I’m hoping that’ll change when it gets to the end of the month and they actually “realise” that I have a smart meter that they fitted.

Good to hear of another (mostly) successful swap out. 
The smart meters and background systems do take a while to get ‘in line’ so you should see those changes before too long. 
I’m interested in your IHD .. I’ve never heard of one doing the countdown etc. Which version do you have?

Mine does a countdown. Octopus Go starting at 00:30. I probably won’t get up to see it countdown from 04:30 when the standard rate returns at 05:30…!

Fascinating.. not seen this. Glad mine doesn’t do that every half-hour on Agile 😂