Anyone who has ever used EHU even slightly ever please come and advise and reassure me.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Yes yes, I am getting ehu. As a previous staunch anti you can all tell me you told me so.



So, onto the electricity business. Going camping tomorrow to a site where all the pitches have hook up. Having just done a weekend where dh was moping about because his iPhone ran out of charge and I am going to be paying for electricity at the site tomorrow this is a seize the day opportunity.

I'm going to move to the dark side.

BUT, Jesus the dark side has a lot of choice. And not straight forward choice either. Multiple packets of sockets and cables and converters. Have just got back from camping shop bewildered and empty handed.

All I want is a single solitary plug socket from which we can recharge phones/nintendos/kindles/lantern. I do not need multiple sockets. I am not going to run a fridge or a telly or an oven or hair straighteners from it. I might use a fan heater occasionally.

The camping shop had those tower units. But with three plugs each with a little flappy covering and a circuit breaker jobby. It really is overkill for what I want. And they were MASSIVE and ugly and heavy.

Can I do this. ehu gubbins? 10m orange mains lead (second row down in the middle) plus domestic conversion cable (bottom row in the middle)? That is all I want. Just one plug.

Asked man in the shop and he said it would probably be fine and would probably not blow up. GREAT. Thanks Mr Reassuring.

Please help me camping mners. Tell me what I want will be fine.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Oh and is 10m long enough? How long on average does one have to stretch one's cable? I do not want to be under-cabled.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Mm have started reading epic ehu thread on ukcs. Seems I need an rcd tripper switch thing. So need to buy something like this.

[Hopeforever]

Assume you are camping in a tent. You have to be vary careful obviously with electricity and water and you can't be 100% certain your tent will remain dry which is why the circuit breakers and covered sockets are so important.

I am disappointed that the shop staff could not tell you what is necessary

If its just to charge a phone, could you not use an in car charger. We recharge iPad and phones on ours.

[Hopeforever]

Also, if you buy a longer cable, be careful to unroll it completely even if it's too long as if it is coiled together it can overheat

[CMOTDibbler]

Rather than the whole EHU thing, you could have a Power Pack. We have them so DH can camp without power as he has to have a breatheing machince overnight, but it also powers phone chargers etc etc

But with ehu you need the rcd and breakers

[Poledra]

Well, as I recall (DH fixed it up when we used it) we had about 10m of bright orange cable attached to a domestic converter like the one you indicated on your sheet. We took the RCD that we have in the house for running things like the lawnmower and drill. But, as you can tell, I'm no expert...

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Thanks Hopeforever. Yes having started reading up on it now I see how important the circut breakers are. Am quite annoyed that the camping shop chap didn't point this out immediately.

Yes we have an in car charger which is fine for the iPhone but we have to stay in or near the car when it is charging which is a bit of a pita. Quite fancied trying ehu as we are paying for it.

Think we might just go without.

[AngryFeet]

This one?

To be honest you might as well get the 3 plug one as it is nearly the same price. I got a 3 socket sunnflair one on amazon. Yes they are bulky and ugly but SOOOOO useful. Charging phones is quick and easy. We got an electric coolbox (£40 from Aldi) and it was great to have cold milk, butter etc. We had ours outside under the gazebo but would have been fine in the tent.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Angry feet if that is the sunnflair single one then yes that would work. But we go tomorrow morning and neither of my local camping shops sell them. Never mind. Will have to pack the UNO and talk to my family more

The other reason that I want something reasonably small and light(ish) is that I am dabbling with the idea of train/plane/backpacker camping next summer and the 3 plug units are just way waaaay to big and heavy to take. Same for that Halfords power pack CMOT.

Thanks for all the advice anyway mn as always is more helpful and knows more than people who are employed to advise their customers

[AngryFeet]

Well you never know the shop at the campsite might have one :) Have fun, hope the weather is good for you!

[IloveJudgeJudy]

Yes, you do really need to get the 3 or 4 socket one with the covers. You also need 25m of lead as quite often that's as far away as the EHU point might be from your pitch. Also, once you've gone over to the dark side you might be surprised how dependent you might become on it.

[Ineedaflippinmedal]

I would agree with buying one with a long lead, I have just come back from a site where the hookup point was down a mini cliff and across a load of blackberry bushes!!

I used all 25 metres of cable.

We have just gone over to the darkside and I have to say it is the lightside for me as our lighting is sooo much better. The Dd's and Dp love to be able to charge their gadgets too.

We got ours from towsure and it has covers and a circuit breaker.

BTW, I still go to some sites without hookup so we dont go soft

Good luck and enjoy

[gordyslovesheep]

what angryfeet said - I use my 3 plus one - for my kettle, toaster and mini coolbox/fridge - and then for recharging DS's and phones

[FannyBazaar]

Gosh, what a lot of stuff to think about, I never realised you had to bring stuff to make it all happen if you went for EHU, I thought it was all included and you just plugged in gadgets to whatever they supply. Then again, I can't talk of electrickery in a tent without sounding like Catweazle, it is completely beyond me, even though I do need a better method of charging my phone than the solar charger.

[Otherworld]

Slubber - am I right in thinking you're in Hants? If so, would you like to borrow mine? If not it's probably not worth the travel...

'tis a slippery slope you're perched on though!

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Otherworld that is terribly kind of you but I am nowhere near Hants, not even slightly

Caravan friends have lent me theirs to try it out, with instructions to roll it all out and not to plug the plug end in first.

It's going to be closely supervised. I trust it not, unnatural orange thing with the funny blue plugs.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

If I'm mooning over the 2014 Sprite caravan catalogue this time next year you know I fell down the slope and into the abyss.

[Otherworld]

'tis a slippery slope Slubber. No idea what made me think you were a Hants resident.

(I am a regular to the Camping threads under a name change - not a random t'Internet lurker )

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

I have the non electrical icey-tek to keep me on the straight and narrow.

[FourArms]

Are caravan ones not different? Or did they happen to have a normal EHU?

I love ours, but it does weigh a tonne. I carry it in a freezer bag of the type that you buy from supermarkets for 99p.

EHU made DH love camping so we might go for EHU a bit more frequently in the future.

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

I left it at home.

[Lucycat]

For your forrin camping you'll also need a continental adapter to go in the ehu & LOTS of extra cable to track down the electricity point several pitches away! We tend not to use it in the UK for short trips but 3 weeks a la continent it's v useful

[SlubberTarpWrangler]

Am currently still pondering on backpacker train/plane camping next year in which case ehu will be way too heavy, and would look slightly mad trailing into a two man tiny tent

[Otherworld]

Our EHU worked without an adaptor. It's from Towsure and it's an unnatural orange thing with the funny blue plugs

[pictish]

We broke our EHU cherries this year, having been staunch anti like yourself.

It was pretty damn good and we're convinced.

We bought this one from Go Outdoors. It did what it said on the tin, and we had music and a hairdryer on the go, as well as the laptop on the site's wifi.