vampires and power usage

[Michael A. Terrell]

Then tell me why you didn't reply in a more appropriate part of the thread? I was answering some questions from another poster.

[Don Klipstein]

That was where the thread started when I first saw it. Either my news server went screwy for a while or I failed to notice the thread before.

I now see that there were earlier articles having to do with power supplies that are constantly plugged in.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Don Klipstein]

Are these watts or volt-amps? Most of these sound high to me.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[M Q]

You should probably take those numbers with a grain of salt. I really need to remeasure, now that I have a Kill-a-Watt to easily give me real power. (at least for plug-in devices). The wired in devices are definitely VA, as I used one of those clamp around current probes rather than breaking the circuit. (although the 40 watt AC outdoor unit was a resistive heater). The plug in devices may be VA or Watts.

I will repost here once I have remeasured with real power numbers. (don't hold your breath -- it may be a while). I would encourage people to make their own measurements, as devices vary greatly. I have noticed that newer devices are often much better, as measured by the "how warm does it get?" method.

[mm]

Part of the thread is in alt.home.repair AND sci.electonicts.repair.

Another part is only in ahr.

I think I brought in ser, and the answers about wall warts are in the other part of the thread.

You read ser iirc. So it's not that your server is screwy or that you failed to notice.

There is almost always a third possibility, even though often people (I'm not referring to you) don't want to believe it (Either it's amnesty or it's deportation)

OH, I should have read this sentence first. OOPs. To find the posts in ahr, you should come with the subject name and the date, because there is so much traffic on Ahr that it will be hard to find otehrwise. Or use groups.google and the exact subject name.

[mm]

It's probably hard to tell the modern ones from the older ones. They all have cases made of plastic, which is the only clue I usually get for "new".

I've taken apart some of the almost cube=shaped plastic ones and all they have inside is a metal core transformer and, rarely and for big ones, a fuse wire. The big ones get less hot because they spread the heat over more area.

Is 2 to 2.5 cents per 24 hour day not worth worrying about? 2.5 cents is 9 dollars a year, times however many of these one has. Maybe 10? =

90 dollars a year, plus 90 dollars of wasted electricity and fuel at the electric generating plant, plus half of year as heat that people use AC to remove, another 90 or 180 dollars.

Not that I unplug everything. It's easy enough to do so where the receptacles are handy, but where they are behind the bed, or behind the bookshelves, not so easy.

[Don Klipstein]

In art. , mm wrote in part:

I think that air conditioning bit is exaggerated.

If you convert 90 dollars worth of electricity to heat, and half the year you have to pump out the heat, that is 45 dollers worth of heat to pump out per year.

Divide by the COP - which is (ideally) the EER divided by 3.41 (number of BTUs in a watt-hour). COP may be somewhere around 3 or 4 in practice; I would have to check that out better.

If COP is 3, then walwarts consuming $90 worth of electricity annually in a home where it is air conditioning season half the year will add $15 to the electric bill.

Meanwhile, that 2.5 cents per day sounds a bit high. It appears to me that a worse older type wallwart has idling losses around a watt or two, based on heat output.

This is about .7 to 1.5 KWH per month. Even at Philadelphia residential rate surcharged for use beyond some threshold during air conditioning season, maybe 18 cents per KWH (IIRC), that is at most 27 cents per month during air conditioning season. Without the surcharge, the per-KWH rate including transmission fees and taxes is about 14 cents, for a maximum around 21 cents per month.

However, I do think this adds up, especially when you have a lot of them.

====================================================================

Consider energy efficiency next time you are shopping for a fridge. That can make a difference of a couple dollars a month.

If you have some really old fridge made in the 1970's or before that has not died yet, find out how much electricity it is consuming, then determine a rate of return from replacing it. There is some chance that could exceed the long term rate of return of a good mutual fund, especially considering that electricity costs are likely to increase roughly with inflation in the next decade or two.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Don Klipstein]

I was reading ahr. I could have glanced too quickly through a range of subject lines towards the end of the alphabet. I scan through subject lines more carefully in the range starting with "C", "F" and "L" since I pay more attention to lighting and fluorescent lamps than to most other stuff that comes up in ahr.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[mm]

I'm going to hold my breath. If you don't see me posting, it's because I've passed out, probably right in front of the computer. Please notify the emergency number in my Bigfoot or Yahoo profile.

[dnoyeB]

electronic ones tend to be much smaller and thinner. But not necessarily.,