Remote Reading Water Meter (Sensus HomeRider (868MHz)

[Toby]

Hi,

Thames water have just installed a new water meter, which has a remote reading function over radio. The installer said they have been looking at fitting the readers to bin lorries to read the meters when they go past, but that hasn't happened yet.

The meter is marked as a Sensus/HomeRider V5.2 and has 868MHz on it.

I have had a good look around, but cant seem to see anything about an end user communicating with the meter and obtaining readings and usage data from it.

Has anyone managed to achieve this?

Thanks!

[Bob Minchin]

I'd be amazed if they can install a utility meter of any sort that the consumer can't read given these days of wanting householders to consume responsibly. Has it got any readout on it at all?

[Toby]

Other than the usual mechanical digits you would usually get on a meter, nope!

Here is what it looks like

[Andy Champ]

Bin lorry doesn't go past our door. They insist we take the bin to the end of the drive, and there are 8 other houses closer that our to the place where the lorry stops. What would they do for flats?

Andy

[Toby]

My meter is in the pavement, not in the house.

The installer said the range was sufficient to read meters in the top floor flat where the meter was up there from the road in the trials. The meter has a battery in it, and I believe is listening for a wakeup signal sent to its serial number, to then send the data, so the battery should last 10 years or so.

Some of the meters send a reading every 15 seconds or so, but I am not sure if this is the case with this one.

[Phil L]

I've had a water meter installed for about 5 years. No one has ever been to my house to take readings manually, but it gets read remotely on a regular basis and I recieve a letter informing me of this a few times per year, this is just for information as I pay monthly by DD. The readings are accurate

[Allan]

YW put a small device (about the size of a kit-kat) on top of my meter a year or so ago. Apparently, they now come round in a van (drive-by?), and read all the meters in the street at one go with some sort of radio device, instead of having to go and look in each inspection chamber. haven't tried reading it for myself.