Does anyone else have this problem or is it just me? I've got so many things plugged in that I'm gonna have to start installing new sockets!

I've got:
3 filters (one more on the way)
2 air pumps
2 lights

and because it's all in my room I've got this lot as well:
TV
Sky box
PS2
PC base unit
PC monitor
Stereo
Alarm clock

That's 14 plugs so far. 15 when the new filter arrives, and I'm running it all from 2 double sockets. I've had to use a 4 gang extension, 2 extension leads, 3 double plugs and a triple plug. There's absolutely no room for any more, so I don't know what I'm gonna do when the other filter arrives...
The circuit for my room must be on the absolute limit...

Has anyone got any tips for me? I've got cables and plugs all over the room and not only does it look a mess, it can't be safe.

Have you got any power strips/surge protectors? They tend to have 6 plugs on each. This is all I use because fish need so many electrical things.

I agree with midnight. You should be able to plug all that stuff into a couple power strips. BE SURE NOT TO PLUG A POWER STRIP INTO A POWER STRIP!! You don't want something to catch on fire.

Thanks guys.
2 10 way extensions with surge protection are on my list. I found them on ebay tonight for £13.99 each so that's where the next lot of money is going. I can't believe I didn't think of them before. I had an 8 way with surge protection but it mysteriously disappeared when I went away for a week...

I hear you. I have the same endless plug space problem. Anything else needs a plug and we get a power outage here. We even have to unplug the tank lights to have the heater on in the living room. It would cost a fortune to have the whole house rewired to enable us to use more electricity. Hope you get it worked out

So its not just me. I wanted to set up a 3rd tank with a couple of Bettas in it, but I guess that's not gonna happen I've probably got too much on the circuit already, but this is what fuses & circuit breakers are for, and nothing's blown or tripped yet so it must be ok.

This is what I'm getting:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Surge-Protected-10-w...1QQcmdZViewItem

i'm the same, i have 5 filters, 2 air pumps, 1 heater, 1 set of lights,as well as normal room stuff like lamps, alarm clock, tv, laptop, hair dryer, hair straighteners, dvd player, sega (old school!!) ....the list goes on!!

i have got double socket plugs in everything and 3 4 gang plug extentsions. I have to unplug the airstones to have my lamp on at night, and unplug my computer if i want to do my hair!

..How dangerous is that? because I have one plugged into another one to make it longer.. and add an extra socket hole thing..

I'm not sure, but it's always been in the fire-safety videos I've had to watch in school. I think it has something to do with the circuits and the current, but I'd suggest you try to avoid it as much as possible.

If you're just using extention cords, I think it might be okay. :shrug:

Yeah, its been like that for ages. Its a double one with a 5 socket one attached. ..I'll let you know if the house burns down..

As long as they're surge protected, the fuses in the main plugs are the right rating and you have circuit breakers in your home instead of the old type fuses, you should be ok Lucy. If you've got loads of things plugged in, be sure not to run everything at the same time because it might overload the circuit. If you do need to run it all at once, when you turn it all on, do it one thing at a time because everything coming on at once could do some damage. This is why the electric companies advise you to turn things off when you have a power cut, so they don't all come back on at once and blow the power grid or one of the transformers. Imagine half a city's power coming back on all at once...that's one big surge!

The advice they give you in fire safety videos is just a rough guideline for what you should do. If they didn't do this, people would go too far and cause a fire by plugging in a dozen things to one socket or something stupid like that (I've seen it first hand and you wouldn't believe how stupid some people can be). You can usually bend the rules just a little bit if you know what you're doing and you're careful with it. I've done a lot of electrical work in the past 5 or 6 years and went to college to study electrics and that's where you find out the real truth and what you can get away with. It's bloody hard stuff though

I have one strip of 5 which has filters etc. running all the time, then one double extension with another strip of 5 on, that has the tv and a couple of filters, heater and lights on. The other socket on the double thing has a whole tank plugged in (its all wired to one plug). Doesn't sound too bad?

Sounds like quite a lot. Most of it will be running at the same time but I suppose if nothing's tripped or blown up to now, it'll probably be ok. Does your house have an old fashioned fuse box or circuit breakers?

The plug problem is wrecking christmas around here. I can't have any lights! too many aquariums plugged in.
I live in an old Victorian duplex that was converted into apartments. The electrical service needs to be up-dated to accomodate modern usage. I have a squid in every outlet just to get enough juice for all my stuff.

That was from two wall sockets btw.

Errrm.. I haven't a clue.. I think we have a big fuse box thingy in the garage which turns everything off if something happens.

If the 2 sockets are in the same room it's still all on the same circuit.

Sounds like it might be circuit breakers. It would be in your best interests to check though. The old fuse boxes aren't as safe as circuit breakers and have more chance of failing and causing a fire. If you haven't got circuit breakers, you might want to think about getting an extra extension lead and running it from another room so you can split the load. I don't wanna read on here that your house has burned down or something. That would be a really crappy Christmas present for you...
If you live in an older house, you might have an old type fuse box. I'm not sure what year they started using circuit breakers, and since you live in Portsmouth, for all I know you could be living in an old cottage which may have old circuits. It's better to be safe than sorry, so it's worth checking out..

Our house is about ten years old I think.. maybe 12.
Where would I get an extention lead long enough to come from another room!?

Dad said something about the box thing cutting out if I ever got the plugs wet. If that makes it any clearer to you what I have..

..sorry for hyjacking your thread.. lol

Sounds like you've got circuit breakers then. As for the extension lead, I've got one that's long enough to run from one end of my house to the other. It's just a case of finding a shop that sells them.
Don't worry about hijacking the thread Lucy. Out of all my threads, this is the only one that's active so you're keeping me from dying of boredom! It sucks being unemployed and you'd think that with Christmas coming up that people would be hiring, but they just keep messing me about. I'm over qualified for most of the jobs that I've applied for so they won't hire me. They all want some spotty little teenager who's fresh out of school and inexperienced so they can get away with paying minimum wage (no offence to anyone reading this). I've got a lot of experience under my belt, and experience costs money, so I'm stuffed!
There's so many things that I can do, but nobody wants to give me a chance, so I'm stuck sponging off the government, and I'm gonna have yet another crappy Christmas! No wonder so many people commit suicide this time of year..it's really depressing...

good thing your goldies are COLD water fish! Geeze, heaters too!

BTW, nice A1 Golf. I'm pricing a new GTI right now!

Yeah, I couldn't imagine keeping tropicals instead of goldies. There's absolutley no room for anything else in my room.

Thanks. I sold the Golf ages ago and it was one of the most painful things I've ever had to do. I got ripped off when I bought it because, among other things, the piston rings were shot and they just used loads of Piston Seal to botch it up for the sale. I ended up buying a new engine, distributor, distributor cap, rotor arm, fuel pump, fuel filter, metering head, injectors, hoses, pipes, oil filter and loads of other stuff, not to mention paying for numerous electricians to try and fix the screwed up electrics. The previous owners had ripped out the Mk1 fuse box and replaced it with a Mk2 box, but obviously didn't know what they were doing. I had the car for about 2 years and it was on the road for a total of a couple of months at the most.

I paid £2250 for the car, £2800 for the first year's insurance, and around £3000 on parts & labour. Because it was my first car, I was driving every spare moment so the fuel cost for the 2 months that it was working easily came to £1200. I had no problem filling the tank up 3 times in a day at the weekends and at £30 a tank, for 4 weekends, that comes to £720 and that's not even counting driving to and from work and all the hours of driving in the evenings & nights.

I miss that car and it killed me to let it go for £200. That's not even the worst part. A few months later it was spotted driving around the local area by someone other than the man who bought it, which means he fixed it and sold it on for a big profit. He could have easily made £1000 on it after repairs...

Be very careful when you go to buy the car because it's very easy to make these old Golfs seem perfect when they aren't...

Sorry you are finding it hard to find a job I didnt think it was possible to be overqualified!
Could try selling christmas trees!?

I'll have to have a search for a longer lead where did you get yours?

Thanks. It's pretty depressing to be broke this time of year. I never thought in a million years that I'd be overqualified for a job. I didn't think it was possible either, but here I am..living proof. Either that or I'm underqualified! I really hope not because what does that say about me? lol
I seriously doubt I'm underqualified for Tesco, Sainsbury and all the others. I've applied to every supermarket within range of my house, as well as warehouses and other manual labour jobs, but nobody wants to know, which is weird because my first job was a year at the local Sainsbury and I finished up running 2 departments all by myself. I even had to attend the management meetings every day and do all the paperwork as well as stack the shelves and sort the warehouse. Of course, I didn't get paid any extra but I thought it might be a good thing to put on my CV. How wrong can you be?

I wanted to get back into building maintenance but that means starting from scratch...3 years of college down the drain and I'm just too fed up to find the motivation to do it all again. I busted my butt for nearly 5 years and it's all amounted to nothing. Most people don't understand why I get so depressed but that sort of thing hits you pretty hard.
Imagine going from earning £1200 a month, having a great car (the one in my sig), loads of great friends, my family and a roof over my head, to losing all that and living on some junkie's sofa..not to mention the £11000 of debt, and knowing that it was my own fault that everything got screwed up. Plus there's more, but it can't be mentioned in the forum.

Anyway...I'm seriously getting off topic here so I'll shut up


Selling Christmas trees? I didn't think of that! I love selling stuff and I'm pretty good at it. It's just a case of finding a product that people will buy and selling it at the right time. Of course you have to think of it and plan it before that time is right on top of you lol.

I didn't buy my extension lead from a shop, but I know you can get long ones. How about getting one that's on a reel? If you do get one of those, be sure to get one that's just a little bit longer than you need. Don't get one that's massive because it's just extra hassle. You have to unravel the whole thing to use it, otherwise the cable gets too hot as there's nowhere for the heat to go, and you end up burning your house down. Electricity can generate a lot of heat and it needs somewhere to go, so if the cable is just surrounded by more cable, the heat adds up and the cable melts.
This is why I don't like to use the extension reels, and why I made my own lead. I'm clever like that
You should be able to get what you need at any hardware shop, or Argos or somewhere like that. Take a look on ebay first though because they have loads of stuff. While you're on there, take a look at this:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/10-Gang-Tower-Extension-2M-Lead-13amp-SURGE-PROTECTOR_W0QQitemZ160058058147QQihZ006QQcategoryZ42321QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I'm getting a couple of these to make things less messy and a lot safer. It's better than plugging two 5 way extensions together. Obviously you'll still need that extension reel, but the 10 way towers are much better than the rest. Plus, you can still use your double and triple plugs, but not too many lol. You don't wanna end up with 20 different things plugged into the tower.

I think this is my longest post ever...Just goes to show how bored I get lol

Thanks for the link, lol. Cant say I've ever seen those before

You should try fish shops and things for a job..

No problem. They're very handy and a fair bit safer if you get the surge protected ones.

I asked about a job at my local pet shop because my friend is part owner, but there was a waiting list because everyone wanted a job there. I'd love to work there. They've got some HUGE fish in a big corner tank that must hold a couple of tons of water. I swear to god, when they open their mouths they're bigger than mine! Very slow and graceful, but still very cute. The oldest one must be at least 30 years old or something stupid like that because all of his colours have faded and he's just so massive. I reckon he's about 2 feet long and he could be the big daddy of the tank. He's probably fathered half the fish in the tank..Lucky git! lol