in today's news we meet the ruddling family from colchester and learn the secret solution to their condensation nightmares we discover the difference between square holes and round holes and we reveal the uk's worst hotspot for van theft welcome to electrical news weekly whether you're listening in the van on-site down at the wholesale counter or if you're an electrical designer and you've made it safely to your desk wherever you are i hope your week is off to a great start i'm joe robinson and i've been through the best of the electrical industry news to save you the trouble first this week's big ev news replenish has announced that it is teamed up with the smart charging specialist omi omi was founded by the scientist david watson and its clever tech allows consumers to charge their vehicles at off-peak times when energy is cheaper in some cases it can even pay them to charge the partnership allows replenish to stock the latest addition to the ome family the home pro charger it hunts out the best real-time pricing to avoid high energy demand on the national grid and it has lots of other cool features there's an intelligent app dynamic load management you can connect using your phone on 4g it has pen fault protection and a built-in type a rcd protection as well more info from our friends at replenish can be found in the show notes speaking of products with cool features ansel has introduced a range of down lights with an adjustable colour temperature that's something that simply wasn't possible before the arrival of the mighty led just by sliding a switch on the driver of the prism pro downlight you can go from a warm and cozy 2700 kelvin to either 3000 kelvin 4000 kelvin or even a chilly 6000 kelvin should you wish to do so now i've had a chance to play around with some samples fresh from the oven and you can check out my video report in the link in the show notes still on lighting we know that lots of control companies like to boast that their products are the rolls-royce of controls but what kit the rolls-royce themselves actually use we've got a chance to find out this week when the car maker to the rich and famous opened a luxurious new showroom in where else the highest ranking square on the monopoly board mayfair in london the electrical contractor hygienic and environmental engineering services or he's for short installed the rapid system from cp electronics cp is part of le grand so they'll be well chuffed with this high profile order and just as chef no doubt will be electrical wholesalers visiting mayfair for their new motor just kidding everyone knows wholesalers drive bentleys now spare a thought for the riddling family from essex their new build house in colchester suffers so badly with condensation that they have to use a window vacuum and piles of towels to mop up pools of water every day but mr ruddling a resourceful electrician thinks he's found a solution he has installed a bit of kit called a positive input ventilation unit this unit lives in the loft where it draws in air from outside this air is then heated and cleaned using high grade filters to remove nasty contaminants a diffuser then directs the airflow to the area just below the ceiling where the incoming air mixes with the existing warm air in the space mr ruddling reports that the kit the pure air home from vent axia has completely solved the home's condensation problem he says it has been a life changer and he's now got 50 used tails going spare if anyone wants them and if you're interested in all things ventilation then please do go and check out the free training package to help you with your cpd that we've created over on the know-how page of efix.co.uk that's going to really help you to get to grips with understanding ventilation and how to install it using the very best practices i'll leave a link in the show notes below another clever bit of kit hitting the market this month is a little device called the universal hinge mount it's designed to solve the problem of suspending among other things containment and light fittings from a sloping surface if you've ever tried this you'll know just what a faff it is but by using this clever bit of kit you can suspend threaded rods vertically from an angled roof or ceiling it accepts all m10 threaded products and that includes your threaded rods and it's adjustable through 135 degrees to suit any mounting application it's available from unistro in west bromwich or your favorite local wholesaler also coming to your local wholesaler is a choice you never knew you needed velludin has decided to make two different versions of its consumer unit one's got square knockouts and one's got round ones so make a choice are you a round head or a bit of a square i've put both of them on the wall recently and found a few more sneaky differences between them and you can learn more from my video review as ever you'll find a link to the video in the show notes and in the comments for that video some contractors are even demanding options with no cutouts at all it seems there's just no pleasing some people now here's an offer that might please some folks out there octopus energy has announced that it wants our help in finding places to put up its wind turbines it's invited anyone who owns land to get in touch if they're willing to host one you'll get a regular rent of course but the best bit is that if the local community supports the installation of this renewable energy source they'll get a discount on their electricity bills of 50 percent not bad considering the quite frankly bonkers price of energy just now so far over 5 000 groups of residents have got in touch to say me please i'm not sure how mrs r's going to feel want to install one in the back garden if you don't have any spare land lying around for a turbine and you'd like help with your energy bills how does 55 000 pounds sound that's the value of the prizes in the spectacular win with vargo promotion the top prize is nothing less than a brand spanking new electric van worth over 45 000 pounds and loaded with kit and on-the-road expenses paid the runner-up prizes are pretty decent too there's an awesome 4k oled tv a top-of-the-range weber barbecue a cool tag howa watch and my personal favorite a top gear track day experience for two to enter buy a vargo box product from either the 221 or the 2773 ranges scan the qr code on the packaging to get your entry code pop it into the old interweb and hope that they pick your name out of the hat now while the demand for turbines is booming solar panels aren't doing too badly either city plumbing reports that orders for photovoltaic kits are soaring the company is massively increasing its stockholding in pv panels mounting systems inverters and battery storage solutions meaning the product can be on site the next day if required another booming sector is coloured switch plates and sockets we've had them for some time now but hamilton reports the trend to personalise colour is really increasing the company is moving its paintables department to a much larger site at its factory in bristol more than doubling its capacity the firm recommends specifying rowell or british standard colours rather than the pantone references preferred by architects and interior designers that's because pantone inks are formulated to work on paper while ral british standards or the natural color system can be accurately reproduced during powder coating there's over 1 600 rail colours so you won't be short of choice now onto the less colourful subject of van theft which is sadly an increasingly common event of professional contracting life new research has revealed the uk's biggest hotspots for van theft with some regions seeing the number of offences more than double year on year the worst hot spot with a stonking 103 increase in van theft over the last two years is cambridgeshire the number of trade vehicles stolen there rose from 68 in 2020 to 138 in 2021. cumbria isn't far behind with offences doubling over that time period from 15 to 30. in fact almost two in five police forces saw increases in van theft between 2020 and 2021 so a timely reminder if one were needed to remain ever vigilant when it comes to protecting your van and your tools and kit in happier news a big shout out to our friends at d-line who have won their third queens award in three years it has taken a gong for the export of its electrical installation products which is no easy matter when you consider that there's lots of different regs in different countries around the world the company makes pretty cool trunking and cable management kit at its factory in newcastle check out our videos on some of the latest innovations the links as ever are in the show notes coming up on our youtube channel this week it's our fortnightly efix tv live stream featuring all your favorite segments gary swap shop the electrician's challenge wall and the news at penn and this week we'll be joined by dragon's den entrepreneur and prolific inventor richard brooke off of sockets and also reg supremo and technical book merchant paul elcock off of docstore and also we'll be finding out how the team got on finding innovative products at the elect show and catching up with the fun and games they had at fully charged live plus for the rest of the week all of your usual q a videos product reviews and industry updates including a fascinating round table on connectors behaving badly that one is not to be missed thanks so much for listening to what's been described as my mellifluence cadences friend of the show ray maloney suggested i wouldn't be able to get that phrase into this episode and i believe now owes me a point although we didn't agree what of so mine's a lagerville ray in the bottle we'll be just fine that's all from us this week make sure you subscribe to receive the next update have a great week stay safe out there and remember there's no such thing as a torque calibrated arm