Single phase power all thats avaiable for new workshop build

[robertl]

Hello Everyone, new to the forum and looking for some advice on a new workshop, i'll explain.
I am planning on building a metal / woodworking workshop (mainly aluminium and stainless steel) for boat work, refurbishment and boat building.
I am a marine engineer to trade and i am planning on starting my own business doing this in said shed.
Now to understand what i will need for this machinery wise, obviously welders, pillar drill, lathe, press brake, guillotine, grinders, table saw, band saw, and anything else you may think on from grinders to anything else with a maximum of 2 people working separate machines at any given time. mostly just be me on my own.
Now the problem is where the shed is going there is no 3 phase within a mile of it. I can get a single phase 100A supply easy enough but not sure how that will work. Basically just wondering if i will get away with a single phase 100A supply and if i end up with 415v 3 phase machines then i can get an RPC which you can get up to 30hp now, The only other issue there is the 30hp rotary converter is 100A so in theory if the RPC was working to capacity that would be all of the capacity on the network. but to be honest looking at the size of motors in the machines i am looking at 10hp seems to be the max. so even with 2 of them there would be still plenty of spare capacity. but im stilll not sure if it is the right way to go.
What are your thoughts on this? the 3 phase would be wildly costly 50k upwards to install so that's out, i could buy land and put the shed elsewhere if it cannot work going forward but i would like to know your thoughts on this.
The land the shed is planned to go on is ours so it will work out a lot cheaper to put it there, just the issue of supply.
Thanks in advance
Robert

 

[robertl]

And yes there are only 2 overhead 11kv lines, for me to get 3 phase I need to get them to install a 3rd overhead cable around a mile over a hill which just can't be justified financially.

 

[Bellendian]

I honestly think you could get a half decent 3 phase genset and years worth of diesel for less than the cost of getting the dno to upgrade. As far as I know these can be run on red diesel so less tax than road fuels. At the very least it gets the business up and running, bringing in revenue to possibly fund the network connection costs later down the line.

 

[robertl]

I honestly think you could get a half decent 3 phase genset and years worth of diesel for less than the cost of getting the dno to upgrade. As far as I know these can be run on red diesel so less tax than road fuels. At the very least it gets the business up and running, bringing in revenue to possibly fund the network connection costs later down the line.

I have thought about this, since the last message in this I have also specced all the machines I will be using, and I was quite surprised, the max motor size is 7.5kw as I said before but most of the motors for everything else are less than half of that, and even with a 23kv single phase supply I'm quite sure I will get nowhere near that. Maybe in the future if it expands dramatically then it is possible that I may need more and the geni / upgrade option will come in to play, but weel see what happens. Anyway that's my thoughts on it for now.

 

[dmxtothemax]

I think if your carefull about how you use your machines and when ! Then a single phase will work.
Perhaps consider swapping out the three phase motors for single phase motors.

 

[davesparks]

I honestly think you could get a half decent 3 phase genset and years worth of diesel for less than the cost of getting the dno to upgrade. As far as I know these can be run on red diesel so less tax than road fuels. At the very least it gets the business up and running, bringing in revenue to possibly fund the network connection costs later down the line.

The genset and years worth of diesel may be less than the cost of the DNO upgrade, but will it still be less with the next year's worth of diesel? And the next after that?

That option is cheaper now but in 20 years time will have cost a lot more in total,espexially with servicing and repairs to the generator, plus downtime due to breakdowns.

 

[robertl]

I think if your carefull about how you use your machines and when ! Then a single phase will work.
Perhaps consider swapping out the three phase motors for single phase motors.

Yes i have looked at this also, (new motors i mean) but to be honest seeing as im starting out i will hopefully just buy single phase machines where available and if not buy a 240 3 phase capable machine and fit a VFD, with the benefits of start up being reduced etc.

 

[robertl]

You can get pretty well most machines now that will either be single phase or will be capable of 240 3 phase.