Electricity

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ELECTRICITY SUPPLY   by Miles Marshall   researched in 1987

CANDLES AND OIL LAMPS

Throughout the ‘Upper Hamlets’ as we used to be known, candles and paraffin lamps predominated for domestic lighting until the mid-nineteen thirties.   Gas, the prevailing nineteenth century source of light and heat in the towns had still not reached us so whilst large houses such as Grymsdyke Lodge would have their own 50 volt direct current generator and battery house with rows of large glass cells, for lesser mortals it was oil lamps with a friendly candle being lit for the journey to bed, for beyond the living room all was darkness.

1925 RURAL ELECTRICITY

In 1925 the Borough Council borrowed £44,000 to finance rural distribution which was really pioneered in this area by W. A. Turnbull, a remarkable engineer who had already brought electricity to Aylesbury.   One of his first customers being Mr. James Rothschild who wanted electricity for Waddesden Manor and the village.   This was followed shortly afterwards by supplies to Tring, Thame, Wendover and Princes Risborough and also Chinnor Cement Works and the Prime Minister’s country home at Chequers.   With all this demand for electricity, locally – generated power had to be augmented in 1930 by a temporary supply from Luton Power Station.

1934 CENTRAL ELECTRICITY BOARD

Aylesbury was one of the first undertakings to receive electricity from the Central Electricity Board’s Grid and in 1943 was to become wholly dependent on ‘the Grid’, that network of high, sweeping lines that cross and recross the countryside on great pylons carrying three-phase electricity at 4000,000 volts.   The Aylesbury generating plant was then sold, being crated up on the spot and exported to Malaysia.

11,000 VOLT LOCAL LINE

In the early 1930’s an 11,000 volt line was run from Monks Risborough along the Saunderton Valley directly to Bradenham, teeing off at Woodway to Loosley Row, Lacey Green and Speen.   On the route of this line, pole mounted sub-stations were established near Widmer Farm and Stocken Farm to supply the low voltage distribution throughout the village of Lacey Green.   This supply to the Rural Area was maintained by the Aylesbury Council until nationalisation in 1948 when Aylesbury was taken into the Eastern Electricity Area; one of twelve area boards set up at that time, with headquarters at Ipswich.

PROBLEM REPORT LINE

For much of what follows, I am indebted to Mr. R.H. Phillips, Tng, MIElec, IE, Depot Engineer for the Chilterns Area, based at Exchange Street, Aylesbury.   Luton 585555 is now the only telephone number we need to remember for our electrical problems, where they will be dealt with, but any complaints concerning faults or failure of the supply will be reported immediately to the Distribution Staff at Exchange Street, Aylesbury where local maintenance and repair teams are based and from whence they are directed by two-way radio.

THE STAFF

At all times there are on call an engineer, a foreman, a joiner and his mate for underground cable repairs, a linesman and mate for overhead wires in addition to a fitter and electricians.   On receipt of an emergency call (via Luton of course) the engineer will assess the problem and initiate the necessary action but before he can operate local circuit breakers he must first get authority from Central Control at Ipswich.   This is done by radio using transmitting and receiving equipment rented from Thames Water, on the Lacey Green Radio Mast.   In most breakdown cases it is likely that men will already be working within a few miles of the trouble spot so they may be readily diverted once a failure is reported.   Despite modern equipment which can identify and locate a fault quickly, they still rely on the customer, to report the fault by telephone in the first place.  One very bad winter I remember our supply in Slad Lane was cut off for four days and when I finally telephone Luton they told me I was the first to report it.   Mr. Phillips told me it was not unknown for quite a large area to be cut off for a considerable period whilst everyone is thinking that someone else must have rung up about it!

1987 NATIONAL GRID LOCAL AREA

The point where this district now contacts the National Grid is at Amersham.   There, huge transformers reduce the voltage from 4000,000 to a mere 132,000 and (for us) transmit it by twin supply lines to a sub-station at Ilmer, on the right of the Thame Road as you leave Longwick.   Here our supply is once more reduced, this time to 33,000 volts and fed overhead, once again by duplicated lines, to Saunderton.   The Saunderton sub-station built 1962-3 reduces the voltage again to 11,000 volts and sends it by a mostly underground ringmain to our local secondary sub-station near St. John’s School, returning to Saunderton via Bradenham.   This effectively gives us an alternative supply should there be trouble on either cable route between here and Saunderton.

1987 NATIONAL GRID HERE

At the ‘school’ sub-station, the pressure is finally reduced to our homely 240 volts (or 415 for larger consumers on 3-phase).   At Saunderton there are also automatic circuit breakers which will ‘cut out’ for a few seconds should a branch of a tree or an unfortunate squirrel short-circuit the bare overhead wires.   The supply then comes on again for a brief period to try and burn off the remaining twigs or the carcase of the dead rodent and, if successful, the supply will come on again and remain on.   More serious faults, however, such as poles cut down by the crazy midnight motorists who plague us in Main Road or severe storms damage, will cut the supply altogether until a repair team answers our call.

LOCAL RING MAIN

On its way from Saunderton and back, our 11,000 volt ring main feeds other small sub-stations and overhead transformers to supply other customers such as farms, industrial users, other areas of Lacey Green and Naphill, Bradenham etc.

CHEAPER AT NIGHT

The Electricity Council’s recent advertising campaign has been pushing ‘Economy 7’ cheap hot water and so on.   This is all part of an effort to balance the load on the whole generating and distribution system over the twenty-four hours of each day.  The aim being to avoid the need for additional daytime capacity which must remain idle all night.   The new tariffs have been deliberately chosen to make ‘Economy 7’ two-rate meter a very attractive money saver to the domestic consumer just because balancing the load is so important.

I PROVE THAT IT IS CHEAPER

I changed over to ‘Ecomomy 7’ in May last year after years of believing that ‘old people really do need that afternoon charge up’, that we got between lunch and tea on the old ‘Restricted hours rate’.  But we don’!   It is remarkable how much heat a modern storage heater can absorb in only seven hours and they don’t go cold at nine o’clock in the evening as I feared.    Besides which, everything you use during those seven hours, lasting until 8.30 am in the summer, costs just 1.9 pence a unit.