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IOwnCalculus posted:Home Depot lists at least one Whirlpool heat pump dryer, but based on the reviews it seems to mostly be a thing for people with lovely / impossible dryer vent situations. It apparently doesn't require any outside venting. That's correct; it just needs a drain hookup. That's where the efficiency comes from; it takes a lot of latent heat to evaporate the water, and you get it all back when you condense it. The lack of venting is also why they're popular in Europe. The Whirlpool model (and its LG competitor) has only been sold in the US for about a year, and at this point they cost enough that they'll never pay off in energy savings. ulmont posted:They do take forever. I have an LG combo washer / dryer that takes 3.5 hours per load and even then can't handle a large or towel-filled load. It's probably a non-heat pump condensing dryer, which is much less efficient and much slower.
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Feb 29, 2016 00:15
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ulmont posted:They do take forever. I have an LG combo washer / dryer that takes 3.5 hours per load and even then can't handle a large or towel-filled load. None of that locking door malarkey, just a polite reminder "please do not reach into the drum when it is spinning" on the inside of the lid. 3k rpm of laundry drying goodness, powered by a 1.2kW synchronous motor. After a couple of minutes no more water comes out and stuff will mostly be damp at that point. After that towels take maybe 20 minutes in the dryer.
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Mar 2, 2016 01:23
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So I had sparks shooting out of a kitchen outlet when I turned the toaster oven on. Pulled it apart and found this:  Circuit in question did trip a couple times a few weeks back when we we had two applicances running off of it. Each time I unplugged one and reset the breaker. I guess it still got way too hot? There was black electrical tape melted over the top of the two terminals. I have heard not to use the stab ins is this why? 20 amp outlet so I don't know wtf. Replaced it with a new one. I think I almost burned my house down.
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Mar 5, 2016 19:22
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That's not a stab-in, but yeah......that's why you don't use them. They get loose (like that screw did) and then you end up with high resistance/heat and let the smoke out.
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Mar 6, 2016 00:16
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Got another pic of the wiring in that box? To have GFCI protection on that second receptacle, the wiring should look something like this:
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Mar 6, 2016 11:36
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The line from the pole to my house is a bit low, and can hit the gutter on a windy day. From the ground, I originally thought that the insulated support mount might be loose (it’s a bit tilted), but it seems that it’s very solid, and the white/bare cable just needs to be pulled a bit through the sliding clamp to lift the cable. As the cable is bare/white, I’m assuming it is either ground or neutral, but I really have no experience with electrical on this side of the breaker box. My question is if I’m ok pulling the cable myself, or if I should get an electrician. I don’t want to die, but I also don’t want to have to call someone for an easy 2 minute job. Any advice?   
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Mar 8, 2016 20:16
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The Gardenator posted:Got another pic of the wiring in that box? To have GFCI protection on that second receptacle, the wiring should look something like this: I'll have to pull it apart again. I tested the new one with an outlet tester with GFCI and it will trip. I have no idea why melting everything and throwing sparks did not trip it. I guess because no juice was leaving via ground but rather just having a hell of a time getting to the appliance?
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Mar 8, 2016 22:04
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Nostalgic Cashew posted:The line from the pole to my house is a bit low, and can hit the gutter on a windy day. From the ground, I originally thought that the insulated support mount might be loose (it’s a bit tilted), but it seems that it’s very solid, and the white/bare cable just needs to be pulled a bit through the sliding clamp to lift the cable. Call your utility. They will likely send out a linesman for free. Tell them it's scraping the gutter.
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Mar 8, 2016 23:23
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ManDingo posted:I'll have to pull it apart again. I tested the new one with an outlet tester with GFCI and it will trip. I have no idea why melting everything and throwing sparks did not trip it. I guess because no juice was leaving via ground but rather just having a hell of a time getting to the appliance?
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Mar 8, 2016 23:45
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H110Hawk posted:Call your utility. They will likely send out a linesman for free. Tell them it's scraping the gutter. This. You won't die if you pull the bare wire yourself, but that wire has clearances that it obviously isn't meeting. I think the minimum distance is 12" from a residential roof, but I'd have to double-check the chart.
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Mar 9, 2016 01:48
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babyeatingpsychopath posted:This. You won't die if you pull the bare wire yourself, but that wire has clearances that it obviously isn't meeting. I think the minimum distance is 12" from a residential roof, but I'd have to double-check the chart. H110Hawk posted:Call your utility. They will likely send out a linesman for free. Tell them it's scraping the gutter. Thanks, called them and they said it is their responsibility.
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Mar 9, 2016 03:24
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My house has a new 20A breaker and wiring for the master bedroom, but a vacuum or a 500w space heater trips the breaker. Lamps and cellphone charges work fine. The circuit shouldn't be overloaded - it only has 4 outlets and a light with 5 LED bulbs. Could it be miswired in a way that's lowering the capacity of the breaker?
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Mar 9, 2016 15:05
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Hashtag Banterzone posted:My house has a new 20A breaker and wiring for the master bedroom, but a vacuum or a 500w space heater trips the breaker. Lamps and cellphone charges work fine. The circuit shouldn't be overloaded - it only has 4 outlets and a light with 5 LED bulbs. Could it be miswired in a way that's lowering the capacity of the breaker? Who installed it? What brand of breaker?
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Mar 9, 2016 19:36
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Anybody else familiar with this kind of rooftop utility attachment? It's a new one on me, and frankly looks like a roof leak about to happen.
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Mar 9, 2016 20:20
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i've never seen that particular style of strike plate before but use similar ones...usually attached to the side of the house, though. and i agree...although it kind of looks like tar or silicone or something was slathered around the outside edges of it to keep the water out. the mast/weatherhead look old as gently caress but that wedge clamp looks quite a bit newer...would have made more sense to strike it to the mast, imo, if it was replaced sometime more recently. but who knows...different places do different things *shrug* also striking to the mast would have given the required drip loop instead of the wires being pulled straight out/taut like that.
crocodile fucked around with this message at 02:11 on Mar 10, 2016 |
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Mar 10, 2016 02:09
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angryrobots posted:Anybody else familiar with this kind of rooftop utility attachment? It's a new one on me, and frankly looks like a roof leak about to happen. Yeah, I installed a bunch of them. The lag bolts go down into the sheathing; ideally you're gonna try to hit a joist with it but nobody tries that hard. Under that metal plate goes a piece of tar paper. It's about the thickness of an oreo cookie, with the white being (probably 100% asbestos) paper, and the black being ultra-sticky tar. You're supposed to tighten the lag bolts until there's 1/4" of squeezeout of tar. Undertighten: roof leaks. Overtighten: roof leaks. Miss the joist by a bunch: roof leaks. They are REALLY CHEAP though.
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Mar 10, 2016 02:22
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Huh. We only attach to the mast, or to the eave/house structure. We also provide our own attachment if the homeowner/electrician hasn't, though.
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Mar 10, 2016 06:40
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I swung by the scrap metal shop today to pick up some armored cable for my workshop project ($2 per pound!). I noticed that they had some 12-4 cable along with the 12-2 stuff I got, and I was curious: is it actually allowed to use an over-specced cable and just leave some of the wires in it unattached? Or are you only allowed to use that kind of cable in situations where you are required to use that many conductors?
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Mar 12, 2016 00:39
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I swung by the scrap metal shop today to pick up some armored cable for my workshop project ($2 per pound!). I noticed that they had some 12-4 cable along with the 12-2 stuff I got, and I was curious: is it actually allowed to use an over-specced cable and just leave some of the wires in it unattached? Or are you only allowed to use that kind of cable in situations where you are required to use that many conductors? You can run 12-4 AC/MC if you want, and just mark both ends of the unused stuff as "for future use." No problems there. It beats having to run more stuff in the walls later. There may be hidden gotchas later if you try to just use the extra circuits (breaker ties for everything sharing a neutral, etc) but if you wanna pay for the copper to just hang out in your wall, that's on you.
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Mar 12, 2016 01:26
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babyeatingpsychopath posted:You can run 12-4 AC/MC if you want, and just mark both ends of the unused stuff as "for future use." No problems there. It beats having to run more stuff in the walls later. There may be hidden gotchas later if you try to just use the extra circuits (breaker ties for everything sharing a neutral, etc) but if you wanna pay for the copper to just hang out in your wall, that's on you. Okay, cool. I wouldn't know what to do with the extra wires honestly, but sometimes it's just easier to find a coil of 12-3 in their "random pile of electrical cables" section than it is to find 12-2.
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Mar 12, 2016 01:32
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Okay, cool. I wouldn't know what to do with the extra wires honestly, but sometimes it's just easier to find a coil of 12-3 in their "random pile of electrical cables" section than it is to find 12-2. I have a few situations where I've done that and I like to ground the "future use ones" on the far end. That was if some idiot were to power them at the panel they will trip the breaker they get put on rather than be hanging out in the box powered and ready to bite somebody.
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Mar 12, 2016 04:20
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If my kitchen breaker is 20 AMP and the wire coming out of it is 12 gauge am I free to change the receptacles in the kitchen to the 20AMP kind with the slot?
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Mar 12, 2016 08:29
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Nostalgic Cashew posted:Thanks, called them and they said it is their responsibility. Vulcan posted:If my kitchen breaker is 20 AMP and the wire coming out of it is 12 gauge am I free to change the receptacles in the kitchen to the 20AMP kind with the slot?
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Mar 12, 2016 16:39
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So I'm trying to engineer a "beat bike" for a local bike riding group by taking a small T-Amp (specifically: http://www.amazon.com/Dayton-Audio-DTA-1-Digital-Amplifier/dp/B001PNOH2I) and attaching it to some bookcase or auto speakers. The T-Amp can take in either a 12V, 2A DC line or you can rig up 8 AA batteries to it to power it. I could of course just have a large collection of AA batteries, rechargeable or not, but that would be a pretty big pain replacing them and would be unfun if they ran out of power halfway through the night. At this point, it does work with AA batteries. I do have a spare car battery lying around, but I am worried that the car battery would provide too much current to the T-Amp and blow it in some spectacular way. This fear is based on the car battery itself having an internal resistance of ~50 mΩ as far as i can tell and no idea what the internal resistance of the T-Amp is. My question is this: Since the Amp can already take 12V of AA batteries without blowing itself up, can I assume it's wired up safely enough to put a car battery through it? If not, how can I determine what the effective resistance of the Amp is so I can run a parallel load through the battery to draw away sufficient enough current to make it safe but not too much such that it still outputs power to music?
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Mar 14, 2016 06:23
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The amp will only draw the same amount of power from the lead acid battery as it does from the AAs or a wall wart.
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Mar 14, 2016 06:29
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IOwnCalculus posted:The amp will only draw the same amount of power from the lead acid battery as it does from the AAs or a wall wart. Thanks, I was 66% sure that was the correct answer.
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Mar 14, 2016 06:39
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You may want to look into battery's for power wheels or peg perego ride on vehicles.. 12v, 12 amp hours, should Handle your draw.. will not weigh a billion pounds, and is a sealed battery that will be less dangerous all around. Plus comes with a charger so you could wire it up with quick connects to charge it back up instead of using a car battery charger. You can also look for a sealed lead acid battery which should be as save and a bit less money.
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Mar 14, 2016 20:00
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Good idea/bad idea? I'm in the process of making my attic useable for storage and running data cables and just reorganizing existing wiring so its not a trip hazard. A lot of this will have to play nicely with new decking. I was thinking I could just use a router and notch out the joists for the cables so I can deck on top of it all. I'm going to use meshed plastic decking(attic dek) so I'll be able to find the cabling later for any service needs. The alternative would be to route the wiring between deck plates so I'll have gaps in my decking but only 1-2" wide which would avoid notching but pose more of a trip hazard. The only issue I have with notching is the rule about not placing notches in the center 1/3 of the joist which might make cable routing much harder but I know I notches would be very very small.
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Mar 16, 2016 17:39
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What about drilling holes and running the cables through those?
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Mar 16, 2016 17:44
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kid sinister posted:What about drilling holes and running the cables through those? Not nearly as serviceable and I won't be able to locate them very easily under the insulation.
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Mar 16, 2016 17:49
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If your decking is resting directly on top of joists, you don't have enough insulation. At a minimum, you should fur it out with 2x4s or 2x6s on edge (depending on climate, joist depth, and insulation type). This will also make it trivial to run your wiring.
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Mar 16, 2016 18:20
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Zhentar posted:If your decking is resting directly on top of joists, you don't have enough insulation. At a minimum, you should fur it out with 2x4s or 2x6s on edge (depending on climate, joist depth, and insulation type). This will also make it trivial to run your wiring. That's a lot of extra material and work though.... :/ and I would lose 4-6" of headroom which I already don't have. Right now I'm in Sothern Cali so it doesn't get too cold here, mostly hot. Currently the whole attic is covered in R38 batts.
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Mar 16, 2016 18:29
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Whatever way you end up doing it, don't notch the edges of your joists. The edges are where all the strength comes from, which is why it's always best to drill through the center of a joist to not compromise them. Furring strips would still probably be the best option; you could go with 2x or 1x flat if you're not adding insulation.
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Mar 16, 2016 19:26
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Oh duh, I just realized I could just notch the decking. Would be more difficult than notching wood but it wouldn't affect anything and if I gently caress up its no big deal. I don't have a good picture of the plastic decking but its 16x16" and grated like a milk crate. Might try to do it with notching pliers.
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Mar 16, 2016 21:55
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don't notch the joists. don't notch the decking. lay down OSB with notches cut out for wires. put decking on top of that. that's the bare minimum solution. almost all flooring that looks Good isn't a load bearing member. do not treat it as such.
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Mar 24, 2016 00:52
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Hi, I have a weird question and do not want to burn my house down. I replaced pretty much every dimmer and light switch in my house with Lutron Caseta dimmers and switches (in rooms I am frequently in with lots of lights). So far I love them (though Amazon Echo support would be nice) but one of them required me to use a simple on/off switch rather than a dimmer because there is a ceiling fan in this particular room and it goes to the same switch as the high hat lights (yeah I know this is kind of stupid because if I want the lights off but the fan on I am screwed; the person who redid this room did not think of this). Anyway, the old cheap manual switch was rated for 15 amps. This is the new switch I bought if it matters. But my question is: why does it only handle 6 amps when a cheap $5 switch can handle 15 amps? What is the technical reason for this? Also, how do I know if I am going to use more than 6 amps? On this switch is the following: 10 high hats (all CFLs but I might change them all to LEDs when some are on sale because 10 is $$$$) and a ceiling fan. I am assuming this is more than 6 amps? I forget the wattage of the CFLs, and I was going to look up the manual for the ceiling fan but I don't think I'm getting a model number off of that thing unless I remove it from the ceiling, so I am unsure of how many amps that uses. If this definitely uses over 6 amps, what exactly should I do? And again, what is the technical reason this switch only supports 6 amps and not 15? Thank you in advance  edit: one thing I found of particular interest while reading the manual on this switch is that if you break off the metal tabs on the side (in order to make it fit properly in multi-gang situations), the removal of the tabs actually decreases the amount of amps the switch can support  . I had no idea that was A Thing; like I can't believe the tabs are somehow connected to anything other than the physical structure! How and why the hell does breaking them off reduce its capabilities? Here's a pic of what I mean from the manual:
Chumbawumba4ever97 fucked around with this message at 13:00 on Mar 31, 2016 |
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Mar 31, 2016 12:51
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All of your lights and the fan should have a Amperage label on them. Add them up. This will be greater or less than the rating of your dimmer. Guessing the metal plate is used as a heat sink and reducing the amount of heat that can be dissipated reduces the amount of current it can handle.
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Mar 31, 2016 13:48
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Uncle at Nintendo posted:This is the new switch I bought if it matters. But my question is: why does it only handle 6 amps when a cheap $5 switch can handle 15 amps? What is the technical reason for this? Also, how do I know if I am going to use more than 6 amps? On this switch is the following: 10 high hats (all CFLs but I might change them all to LEDs when some are on sale because 10 is $$$$) and a ceiling fan. I am assuming this is more than 6 amps? I forget the wattage of the CFLs, and I was going to look up the manual for the ceiling fan but I don't think I'm getting a model number off of that thing unless I remove it from the ceiling, so I am unsure of how many amps that uses. All that is most likely under 2 amps (if 10 CFLs drew 6 amps you wouldn't be able to run 10 incandescent bulbs on a 15 amp circuit). It has a 6 amp limit because the current is passing through a solid state relay, rather than a mechanical connection. That relay has some small resistance to it that generates heat when current passes through it, so it needs to dissipate that heat. If you break of the tabs, less heatsink reduces the heat dissipation. Too much current and the solid state relay overheats and breaks.
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Mar 31, 2016 16:26
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Uncle at Nintendo posted:But my question is: why does it only handle 6 amps when a cheap $5 switch can handle 15 amps? What is the technical reason for this? Also, how do I know if I am going to use more than 6 amps? Because the maximum amperage a piece of metal can support is directly linked to how big it is. All of the internal space inside the regular switch is used for its metal contacts, whereas the dimmer has to also cram electronics into that same amount of space. As for amperage, you may have to do some math. All of your fixtures should be rated for a maximum wattage bulb. Do you remember Ohm's Law from science class? Volts X Amps = Watts. Now the voltage is constant, 120V. Say you have a 6-outlet power strip with a switch, and with a cheapo table lamp plugged into it that only takes a 60W bulb max. Do the math, and that lamp pulls 0.5 amps at most. Well, let's put that 60W bulb in and also fill up all 6 outlets on that power strip with more 60W lamps. 0.5 amps per lamp X 6 lamps = 3 amps across the switch in that power strip. Guy Axlerod posted:Guessing the metal plate is used as a heat sink and reducing the amount of heat that can be dissipated reduces the amount of current it can handle. Yep, dimmers use their front plates as heat sinks. Smaller heat sinks = smaller heat dissipation, so reduced max amperage. edit: you have to use the MAX rating for the fixture when doing the calculations, even if you'll be putting in lesser-rated bulbs like CFLs or LEDs. Why? Because you're assuming the idiot who owns your house after you won't put in max wattage incandescents and exceed your calculations. kid sinister fucked around with this message at 18:58 on Mar 31, 2016 |
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Mar 31, 2016 18:55
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Guy Axlerod posted:All of your lights and the fan should have a Amperage label on them. Add them up. This will be greater or less than the rating of your dimmer. I didn't see the amps on the bulbs; they are high enough up that I would need a ladder but I will check that out. Thank you. I might just go LED though because they are so energy efficient and they look so drat nice (seriously the bulb is built into the high-hat; how cool is that?). That is a good theory on the metal plate. I would have never thought of that. The way I was reading it made it sound like there's an internal mechanism to not allow it to work with a certain load if it detected a piece of the metal was broken off. I tend to overthink things sometimes. Zhentar posted:All that is most likely under 2 amps (if 10 CFLs drew 6 amps you wouldn't be able to run 10 incandescent bulbs on a 15 amp circuit). OK, that is interesting. Basically because it's a lot more complicated in there, it's not able to carry the load like a simple switch does. Makes sense! Thank you. kid sinister posted:Because the maximum amperage a piece of metal can support is directly linked to how big it is. All of the internal space inside the regular switch is used for its metal contacts, whereas the dimmer has to also cram electronics into that same amount of space. I guess I get confused by the amp stuff because in my entire life (including even when I lived with my parents in their home as a kid) I never, ever tripped a breaker in my life except when my sister used the hairdryer or something. Even where I live now it has never happened even once. So in my head, my large CRT with 8 old video game consoles and stereo system should easily be past X amps or whatever and it never is. I still have a lot to learn about this stuff but it is very satisfying figuring it out myself. I also bought a switch that turns on and off depending on what time of day it is (it's directly hooked up to my porch light) and it took me like 5 years to finally figure out how to hook it up and I did it just fine the other day. I was so thrown off because there were literally six wires of all different colors coming out of it, meanwhile the switch it was replacing had two. Now to go back and try and tackle the garage light issue I posted in this thread a few years ago that even managed to stump the thread  I had an electrician come over to check that one out and even he was scratching his head. Thanks again for all the replies. I really appreciate it.
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Apr 1, 2016 14:23
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