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Wiring it into an always off 3-pin does seem easier than messing with the wall outlet itself.
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Oct 18, 2023 23:14
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I can’t vouch for it being code-worthy but they make banana plug adapters that go into a wall socket and only connect the ground, the two blades are just plastic. StaticTek Banana Jack Outlet Plug Adapter | Universal Ground 3 Prong Outlet Earth Connection | ESD Control | Black Light Weight Unbreakable Plastic | 1 Piece | STI - DES - 09838 https://a.co/d/9KiFqC8 e: oh, UK. I dunno, there’s probably a similar thing, probably still questionably code-worthy. Bad Munki fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Oct 18, 2023 |
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Oct 18, 2023 23:26
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After a little googling it looks like this would solve your problem op
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Oct 18, 2023 23:33
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I'm kinda surprised nobody sells optoisolators for the consumer market, I'd rather complete electrical isolation for low voltage signaling over a surge protector.
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Oct 19, 2023 00:00
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Earth prong to field jack adapters exist as products, but they are really more intended for things like "Earthing point for an ESD wriststrap" used by an electronics technician, not as part of a permanent setup. (That earth prong to banana jack adapter is one of those) From a functional point of view, I'd also sideeye that pigtail for transient dissipation a bit. When designing a path for high frequency current, you care a lot about inductance and not much about DC resistance. A relatively long circular wire is not particularly friendly compared to something shorter or rectangular. ESD strap type grounds are meant more for providing a path for a trickle (microamps) of current to slowly discharge static voltages, not short out high frequency transients e: corgski posted:I'm kinda surprised nobody sells optoisolators for the consumer market, I'd rather complete electrical isolation for low voltage signaling over a surge protector. Foxfire_ fucked around with this message at 00:41 on Oct 19, 2023 |
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Oct 19, 2023 00:37
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Foxfire_ posted:It's hard to design something that can do that generically without knowing stuff about the frequency range you need to pass and how flat it needs to be. But in the context of DSL signaling it should be perfectly feasible. It's not like telco gear doesn't already have optical isolation built in on their end.
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Oct 19, 2023 00:54
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Well it's not a disaster if it does pop again, just means another 3 days without internet while my ISP posts me a new one. Happened 3 times now. I can't use most purpose built esd sockets because they'll come with high resistance - as foxfire says that's good for slowly discharging static charge and not for quickly getting rid of a fast spike. They do have optoisolators for internet connections, just sadly not yet in my area.
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Oct 19, 2023 00:55
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gonadic io posted:Well it's not a disaster if it does pop again, just means another 3 days without internet while my ISP posts me a new one. Happened 3 times now. I can't use most purpose built esd sockets because they'll come with high resistance - as foxfire says that's good for slowly discharging static charge and not for quickly getting rid of a fast spike. How does Starlink compare in pricing/speed to your current options?
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Oct 19, 2023 01:32
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corgski posted:But in the context of DSL signaling it should be perfectly feasible. It's not like telco gear doesn't already have optical isolation built in on their end.
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Oct 19, 2023 01:33
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I am absolutely in agreement with you but I was only ever wondering why the only DSL optos on the market are expensive ones for commercial installations.
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Oct 19, 2023 02:01
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corgski posted:I am absolutely in agreement with you but I was only ever wondering why the only DSL optos on the market are expensive ones for commercial installations. Because most RBOCs have fuses at the demarc and those are their standard for this type of protection. Costs spiral out of control quickly when you try to deploy CPE, especially for events that while they may be annoying/disruptive to customers, do not happen all that frequently or impact a large portion of your subscriber base.
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Oct 19, 2023 13:32
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How are you getting so many lightning strikes in the first place? Do you live in Asgard or something? Also if I'm reading this right as it being the incoming DSL line that's blowing it up maybe contact Openreach and ask them to check the local cabinet because you'd expect there to be proper grounding there.
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Oct 19, 2023 14:23
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The first time it happened I did contact them and they sent a guy round to check the cabinet because I didn't believe it was just the specific router phone chip that was fried - the lights were on on the router and it was reporting no faults. Just a sensitive and self contained chip in there I guess. The 2nd and 3rd times I just phoned them to post it. Central Ireland, and I couldn't say how normal it is. The guy who came round did specifically say it also happened to a bunch of my neighbours. I'm just hoping lovely nonconductive fiber gets to my house sooner rather than later.
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Oct 19, 2023 14:30
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how common are GFCI outlets failing in a year? I think I put this one in almost exactly a year ago. I can't seem to find any reason this one stopped working, what was plugged into it works fine on another outlet, and everything else on the circuit is working fine. It just seems like the GFCI is completely dead. edit: apparently that outlet is on a switch and it got flipped somehow, hahaha sithael fucked around with this message at 22:16 on Oct 21, 2023 |
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Oct 21, 2023 17:52
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sithael posted:how common are GFCI outlets failing in a year? I think I put this one in almost exactly a year ago. I can't seem to find any reason this one stopped working, what was plugged into it works fine on another outlet, and everything else on the circuit is working fine. It just seems like the GFCI is completely dead. I've never had a GFCI outlet fail, but I have had a GFCI breaker fail within a year of install. Just swap it out for another and don't worry about it unless it fails again.
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Oct 21, 2023 18:13
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sithael posted:how common are GFCI outlets failing in a year? I think I put this one in almost exactly a year ago. I can't seem to find any reason this one stopped working, what was plugged into it works fine on another outlet, and everything else on the circuit is working fine. It just seems like the GFCI is completely dead. It's uncommon, but you probably just got a bad one. Lots of manufacturing seems to be skipping the QC process these days so it's not entirely surprising.
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Oct 21, 2023 18:25
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For torched DSL modem guy, try using a GDT surge protection device from each phone line conductor to the ground bar in your main electrical panel with as short and wide a conductor as possible. GDT = gas discharge tube, they're essentially a little ceramic tube full of a certain noble gas that ionizes at a low enough voltage to clamp most of the transient to ground. If you do this right where the phone cable comes into your house and short-wire it to the panel ground bar you have two things working for you, the GDTs and ground strap will be a more direct path and the impedance of the remaining in-house phone wiring before it gets to the modem will reduce the remaining spike a bit more. It's unfortunate this is a DSL modem because they rely on the same high frequency signals that lightning, uh, transmits down the wires at high amplitude so you can't just say gently caress it and hang a ferrite ring on the phone cable without losing the signal all the time instead of just part of the time.
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Oct 22, 2023 12:21
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I mean, I'm sure it'd work great, but splicing the cable and setting up some gdts seems like a hassle compared to plugging in some off the shelf surge protector. Although I say that but til that (post splitter) dsl cables aren't phone cables, and the splitter is built into the wall (a little box with a picture of a computer and of a phone on the two sockets), so I bought the wrong surge protector anyway.
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Oct 22, 2023 14:50
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gonadic io posted:I have one of these because my DSL router keeps getting fried by lightning. You might also see if you can pickup a cheap UPS with rj-11 jacks that provide surge protection. This would give you a "listed solution" that doesn't involve trying to find a place to screw in something meant for a commercial application. https://www.cyberpower.com/uk/en/product/series/brics_lcd
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Oct 22, 2023 15:41
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Speaking of dumb ideas... My house has the meter base on a giant wall with no windows on the East side. On the West side is our garage. There's ~45ft "as the crow flies" between those locations (542"). On the recommendation of "It's A Long Story" we're splitting the panels up into a Meter Breaker (see earlier, it's a meter base w/ 200A breaker in a 225A enclosure and that's it.) and a sub panel that contains all the breakers for the house. This is to ease tying of the solar. Yesterday, through a game of telephone with my GC, our electrician proposed moving the sub panel into the garage because that's where most of the big wire is going anyways. (There's 3x 240V circuits there today: dryer, AC condenser, Future-EV Charger, plus it actually intercepts the current path for the double-oven and induction cooktop circuits. Plus a new 240v/20A for the heat pump evap.) All of the existing 240V circuits are the finest aluminum wire 1976 had in stock, so we're replacing it all with copper. I also wanted a big subpanel in the garage for Future Things(tm). tl;dr: 6x double pole breakers, shortest path is to garage. 100% of branch circuits in the garage. Electrician also proposed moving the solar equipment to the West Side on some GC-interpreted assumption of needing a Very Big Wire from the Solar Stuff to the Sub Panel. This doesn't make sense to me. I doodled this drawing and was wondering how wrong I am, please excuse the exact labels I don't have a solar BOM in front of me.  Goal is to keep the solar on the east side of the house, with all "main disconnects" over there within arms reach of each other, and move all the house/load circuits into the garage on the west side of the house (indoors! In California! No Sprinklers hitting it daily! Motronic will be so excited.  )
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Oct 22, 2023 16:07
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H110Hawk posted:Speaking of dumb ideas... Your drawing indicates that your solar will be connected to your house only if the service is out (it's switch by the ATS). If that's not what you want, stuff gets complicated. The power from your solar has to get to your house. There has to be a disconnect to be able to turn off power to the grid in the event of an outage. So somewhere there's going to be an AC line from your inverter to your subpanel. It will be sized to the maximum size your inverter can supply (regardless of attached generation). If you have multiple inverters, they'll all be combined in an AC combiner panel and then one line into your subpanel. The NEC specifies a maximum current able to be supplied "backfed" from another source. For a 200A panel, I think that's 80A. So you can only put 80A of solar in the panel that's directly fed by your utility, even if you've got 200A of solar and 200A of grid. If you want to do something else, then you start getting into serious weirdness. A 200A "online" ATS that provides power from 2 sources but disconnects either when it's not feeding is probably five figures. I think it's possible to feed a 400A panel from 2x 200A sources, but that's probably down to what the specific model number is listed to support. See this picture from Generac*. The inverter can supply 40A, so it's got a 40A breaker on it, even if there only 1 panel capable of 1A installed. In the event of an outage, anything on the "main distribution panel" is dead, and only those circuits connected to the "protected loads panel" have power. Note that there's a 40A cable from the inverter to MDP and another from the inverter to protected loads. Makes sense to put the inverter close to the panels if that's the case. *RGM is a "revenue-grade meter." It's for net metering. If your utility meter supports net metering, then that's just wire.
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Oct 22, 2023 17:12
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Thanks for the effort post. The "ats" in this picture is "magic box that keeps my HVAC running while the grid is down." My utility meter does indeed support net metering as I understand it - no one I know in town with solar has 2 meters. What sort of overpriced magic box(es) would it be to basically allow me to "have it all" - sell into the grid excess generation, keep my house running when the grid is down (including HVAC - I've verified inrush numbers on the battery banks. 4x 5kwh units gets me well past it), and have all the disconnects on the outside of the house? Bonus points if I can sell my stored energy into the grid between 5-8pm (the software on the battery controller supports this.)
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Oct 22, 2023 17:25
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H110Hawk posted:Thanks for the effort post. The "ats" in this picture is "magic box that keeps my HVAC running while the grid is down." My utility meter does indeed support net metering as I understand it - no one I know in town with solar has 2 meters. See NEC section 705. I know it's been going through revisions and I haven't had my 2023 code update class yet so I'm not sure if something major has changed. There are a bunch of rules about how to calculate what's legal. I BELIEVE that if you had a 400A main panel with a 200A breaker at each end AND no more than 200A of breakers in between you'd be fine. So you'd have something like this: pre:Meter with disconnect (MAIN SERVICE DISCONNECT) V (maybe a bunch of other BS depending on what your PoCo needs to ensure your ATS won't kill their people during an outage) ATS V -------- 200A main in 400A panel the rest of your breakers (all their sums no more than 200A) ???A main sized to your inverter (no more than 200A) ------- ^ (perhaps optional AC combiner box and/or solar disconnect) Inverter(s) <- Solar ^ Battery  . I don't know of a single-phase (240V w/ neutral) panel that can be fed from both ends, but I assume they exist. Your power company will have other equipment that may need to go in different places to ensure their safety.
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Oct 22, 2023 17:56
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All the software on this stuff is approved by SCE and will refuse to backfeed the meter if it doesn't sense a grid on that side. It's an extra cost on my quotes to get the fancy controller stuff. Sounds good, I'll talk to my electrician about it. I wanted to get a gut check on it, and now I have a contact at the local utility planning office. Basically the next time I spend money on this system I want to be when I have to refresh the batteries in 10 years.  Basically what if kastein went insane and designed a grid tied solar system for a 2250sqft house with 5 tons of AC. H110Hawk fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Oct 22, 2023 |
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Oct 22, 2023 18:07
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H110Hawk posted:All the software on this stuff is approved by SCE and will refuse to backfeed the meter if it doesn't sense a grid on that side. It's an extra cost on my quotes to get the fancy controller stuff. Yeah. That's what I did with my house. 16kW of solar with capacity for 24kW, 12kWh of battery, 2 inverters, ATS with generator input, protected loads panel, split "main" panel and house subpanel. "Protected loads" panel is routed through a load-shedding power switch unit (with priority) so if the battery is low and the sun isn't shining and the power's been out for more than 3 days, my system will prioritize the oven over the dryer over the water heater, with different priorities when the sun is shining vs not. Upgrading to split system HVAC took nearly all the load out. I've got 2400 sqft and replaced my 3-ton AC with a 48000 BTU split system. 1 external condenser running to an intelligent distribution box that routs refrigerant to up to 6 zones. I went from a 40A condenser, 50A air handler with electric heat, 40A supplementary heat to a single 30A breaker for ALL of my HVAC. It'll provide rated heating -4F and some heating down to -20F.
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Oct 22, 2023 18:24
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interconnection aside, i want to issue a strong, strong warning against generac's current solar, don't know if that image was just for demonstration. i spent a long rear end time at my previous company chasing issues, 85% of the 50-site fleet had hardware and software issues affecting production. the batteries themselves work pretty well but the solar has an inline switch to achieve rapid shutdown that had a 40% failure rate. they've issued a new version but i saw plenty of those ones go bad too, to the point where generac took over the responsibility of replacing them. i saw those things cook panels, found panels with holes cooked right into them! i can speak a little more freely about this now e: the switch is called 'snapRS' so you can just take a quick google to see the lawsuit-level dissatisfaction
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Oct 23, 2023 09:56
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Thanks, yeah I have negative interest in generac solar. Sounds like Tesla Solar levels of incompetence.
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Oct 23, 2023 16:26
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It could just be anecdata but my impression is that Generac has decided to go all in on the "redirect the QC budget to marketing and shareholders" strategy.
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Oct 24, 2023 00:25
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Shifty Pony posted:It could just be anecdata but my impression is that Generac has decided to go all in on the "redirect the QC budget to marketing and shareholders" strategy. That seems to have been going on for a while. They've been putting really garbage Kohler engines (but I repeat myself) in a bunch of the smaller whole house generators for a long time now. Those things eat themselves regularly on disturbingly short timescales largely taken up by weekly tests.
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Oct 24, 2023 13:30
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Motronic posted:That seems to have been going on for a while. They've been putting really garbage Kohler engines (but I repeat myself) in a bunch of the smaller whole house generators for a long time now. Those things eat themselves regularly on disturbingly short timescales largely taken up by weekly tests. What are better options in the 12-24 kw partial home backup space? Generac seems to be all I see around me.
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Oct 24, 2023 14:30
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TacoHavoc posted:What are better options in the 12-24 kw partial home backup space? Generac seems to be all I see around me. In that range (air cooled) it's largely Generac and Kohler. At least at the top end of your range the Generacs have actual Generac engines in them and not Kohler motors. If I was shopping for that right now......I'd probably look at a Briggs & Stratton then decide to save a grand and buy a Champion because both Briggs and Champion just get their Honda knockoff engines manufactured in China anyway so why pay the name brand premium. But I'd seriously think about whether I could increase (meaning probably double) my budget into something water cooled (like the Generac Protector series) that will last multiple decades with little more than annual oil changes if I was installing this in a place I was going to stay in for a long time.
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Oct 24, 2023 14:43
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If you live in a place with sun consider tripling your budget and going insane with solar + storage. I realize lots of people looking at legit whole home backup are in snowbound areas where solar won't work / won't work well when it's needed due to sun angle and literal snow covering the panels.
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Oct 24, 2023 14:49
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H110Hawk posted:If you live in a place with sun consider tripling your budget and going insane with solar + storage. Yeah, and this is a good point to temper mine with: it really depends on how bad you need it and for how long. That should be a significant component of your decision making process. You lose power a couple times a year for a few minutes, whatever. Just don't buy total junk that is going to keep costing you. Or better yet do that solar + storage thing. You lose power for multiple days, live someplace cold and need to run a heat pump or medical devices.....yeah, you probably want to think about a commercial standby generator. And how it's getting fueled and how sustainable that is during a large weather event or other disaster (i.e., natural gas vs on-site propane vs. on-site diesel and what kind of guaranteed fuel delivery service contracts you can get and actually believe).
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Oct 24, 2023 14:57
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I got a portable 8000W because it seemed like a nice middle ground for cost vs load and expected use. It’s loud as gently caress, but that’s life. Last time we lost power for 3.5 days (thanks tornadoes) we just ran the fridge off a 2000W portable inverter and made due, but I decided I’d like to have a furnace fan for when the inevitable ice storms hit.
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Oct 24, 2023 15:23
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Motronic posted:That seems to have been going on for a while. They've been putting really garbage Kohler engines (but I repeat myself) in a bunch of the smaller whole house generators for a long time now. Those things eat themselves regularly on disturbingly short timescales largely taken up by weekly tests. Generac manufacturers their own engines for the standby units though, unless you mean they are using a licensed design. They have switched a lot of manufacturing from Wisconsin to China which is ok if you stay on top of QC but if you don't things go bad real quick. Some of their portable units are definitely just rebadges. The IQ3500 is 99.9% identical to the Predator 3500W inverter you can get at Harbor Freight, just a bit more sound insulation. I know at least some of the Kohler air cooled units use their Command Pro engines which show up in a lot of commercial ride-on mowers. iirc the Courage engine line is the one you need to avoid like the plague.
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Oct 24, 2023 15:39
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Shifty Pony posted:Generac manufacturers their own engines for the standby units though, unless you mean they are using a licensed design. They have switched a lot of manufacturing from Wisconsin to China which is ok if you stay on top of QC but if you don't things go bad real quick. Then perhaps they stopped using Kohler engines in the smaller ones or I'm badly misremembering - I was indeed talking about the fixed ones. There was a rash of them scoring cylinder bores to the point of being smoke machines in under 40 hours or runtime not too many years ago. Kohler Command Pros are still junk motors that are on only the most budget of commercial equipment. Anything midline or higher is largely running the Kawasaki FS series or nicer. And yes, I do have a burning hatred of Kohler engines, which they very much earned all on their own from years of dealing with their junk on commercial equipment back when they were considered good (the garbage fire that was the Kohler Magnum series) as well as many of the newer series engines on all manner of portable equipment for the fire service as well as on job sites and in a few generators. While everything is built to a budget, Kohler didn't budget high enough.
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Oct 24, 2023 15:50
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The Kohler Courage engine has stolen way too much time from my life and my mower has a permanent C clamp on it because that’s the most popular fix to stop the oil case from exploding itself.
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Oct 24, 2023 15:53
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I picked up an open box Predator Inverter 8750 and installed a trifuel kit so I can run it off propane or my homes NG. It should be enough to power my whole house even during the summer with the AC on. My only complaint is it's fairly loud, so I'm building a collapsible "quiet box" for it to try and muffle it a bit. Obviously it won't be super effective because it has to have a lot of ventilation, but even a little bit of sound deadening and redirection I think will go a long way.
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Oct 24, 2023 17:19
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SpartanIvy posted:I picked up an open box Predator Inverter 8750 and installed a trifuel kit so I can run it off propane or my homes NG. It should be enough to power my whole house even during the summer with the AC on. My only complaint is it's fairly loud, so I'm building a collapsible "quiet box" for it to try and muffle it a bit. Obviously it won't be super effective because it has to have a lot of ventilation, but even a little bit of sound deadening and redirection I think will go a long way. Years ago I rigged up a 4 cylinder honda muffler to my no-name briggs powered generator. It definitely quieted it down, but those old briggs motors aren't only loud because of exhaust. It sounded like someone throwing a box of silverware down a set of concrete steps when running.
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Oct 24, 2023 17:22
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| # ? May 11, 2024 17:10 |
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H110Hawk posted:You might also see if you can pickup a cheap UPS with rj-11 jacks that provide surge protection. This would give you a "listed solution" that doesn't involve trying to find a place to screw in something meant for a commercial application. Just make sure it's an RJ11 version. RJ45 solutions sometimes don't even connect all 4 pairs internally.
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Oct 25, 2023 05:10
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