Yesterday I was thinking of buying this K-A-W meter but I began to realize, I'm not going to change anything even after I see the meter's results so why bother getting one. I mean I always try to save electricity in my home using age old advice so I probably have little practical reason for this device except for the fun factor. I'm old enough to know by now how to save electricity without the meter and as you pointed out, saving electricity in some cases isn't always practical.
I don't know about newer units, but my defrost goes for 45 minutes at 1500 watts. That's at least an extra kWh per day.
Greg
I'd like to hear more about this. "nice"??? There's already a switch in the breaker box, but I understand that you'd not want to use that frequently. Where did you put the added switch? What kind of switch did you use that could reliably switch 4KW? What did it cost for the switch/wire/installation/permits/inspections? How much did you actually save using it?
Last time I looked into it, the thermal time constant of a well- insulated electric water heater was on the order of days.
Not *everyone* calls them Sawsalls. I don't.
First off, the name is Sawzall, not Sawsall.
Second, I call them a reciprocating saw.
A lot depends on you. I am a retired engineer. Actually, engineers never retire, we only bug our spouses with engineering-type stuff all over the house. I've had my Kill-A-Watt for about 5 years now and probably use it once a month, on average for generally testing, etc. I also had a voltage problem where the power company was jacking up the voltage, apparently to relieve low voltage problems in other parts of our local grid. I was up to 126 volts and sometimes higher. It did cause problems with at lease one piece of electronic equipment in my house. When I called them and gave them the results, they initially brushed me off. But when I got to talk to an engineer, he was interested. They called me back about 1/2 hour later and said the problem was theirs and it would be fixed immediately. I actually watched the voltage go down about an hour later.
Every frost free fridge I've serviced has a "defrost termination thermostat". If yours runs 45 mins at 1500 watts, you totally need that thing repaired. That's not normal.
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I don't know about newer units, but my defrost goes for 45 minutes at 1500 watts.
That's at least an extra kWh per day.
Greg
an hour later.
How would they do that ???
Greg
I don't know if it sucks up power for that time, but it does stay on defrost for that time. I put a data logger on once to check temps. The freezer goes way up in temp, but fridge moderates. But DON'T OPEN ANYTHING during that period. I keep stressing we need smart units that defrost when we tell it to.
Greg
You're right on the spelling, and I know they're a reciprocating saw, but everyone I know calls them Sawzalls. Once at an auction I saw one of them on a table, and I asked a guy if they had sold that reciprocating saw yet. He said "what's that?". I pointed to the tool, a Black & Decker brand, and they guy said "That's called a sawzall". When the auctioneer finally sold it, he called it a Black & Decker sawzall. I dont even try to call them a reciprocating saw anymore because no one knows what I'm talking about. (plus that word is too long to keep saying on the job).
Sure, it meter all the small energy usage stuff, but I'm concerned with the stuff that costs me the BIG money. My electric water heater, welder, clothes dryer are at the top of that list, and all of them are
240V. I know I can sit in front of my electric meter and watch the thing spin to monitor my whole house, but I want to determine what individual items are using, particularly the ones that use the most power. A little mathematics will easily determine what my tv set uses per hour, and multiply that by the amount of hours it's turned on per day. The same for most small appliances, space heaters, and light bulbs. Most of them have a wattage rating listed somewhere on a tag.But that water heater is only running a few times per day. Even when no one is home, it will turn on to keep the water hot. I want to monitor just how much power it's using over the course of a week. I've been considering replacing it with a gas model, but then I will have to figure out the cost to have LP gas delivered, etc (no natural gas available, since this is a rural area).
Maybe when these Kill-a-watt meters include a means to measure 240v, I'll buy one. Till then, they seem pretty useless, except for someone who dont know how to determine that using a 100W lightbulb for 10 hours is one KWH consumed, and at 10 cents per KWH, it costs one cent to leave it turned on for an hour.
At the same time, I will say that these meters might be helpful for monitoring a refrigerator, freezer, or air cond. Those are also large usage items and they CAN be tested with it (except central air cond). But if I want to monitor the WHOLE picture, these meters are not capable.
an hour later.
I don't know, but it involved going to some site, probably a substation. BTW, the voltage, after they corrected it, was about 112 ... sometimes lower sometimes a little bit higher. However, over the months that follow, it has crept up to about 120 on average. I don't know if it goes at high as before (126 or higher) because I changed out the piece of electronic equipment that seemed to be responding to the problem. It was a set of computer speakers. I could duplicate the problem on the bench with a Variac. When the voltage would go to about 125, the speakers would start buzzing. I have several pairs of these speakers and all exhibit the same problem. So, I changed out the wallwart to a different 12 volt wallwart. Now those speakers have no problem.
Exactly. I've heard of power companies overseas giving them away to customers (as part of a drive to save energy; I assume local governments ultimately paid for them), but I'm not aware of any power companies over here doing that - but it sure would be nice! :-)
cheers
Jules
People around here used to always call them Sawzalls but now that many people own a reciporcating saw, many of started calling "Recip Saw". Seems both are interchangeable now, at least locally.
I just bought a brand new Makita one today!
I currently have about 122 volts. Where I used to work, 125 was the norm.
Greg
Are you aware that you quoted 83 lines of previously-posted material just to add a single line to this thread?
You, Art Todesco and "Doug" are responsible for quoting most or all of this entire thread in each of your respective replies.
Is there any reason why you people are doing this?
The water heater is one of the more predictable loads you have. The nameplate sez how many watts. You only need to know how long it runs.
A 240V mechanical clock clipped across the load will accumulate run time. But it might be easier to use a battery powered clock that runs off a 120/240V wall wart. Or a 240/120 stepdown transformer.
It's a very simple thermodynamic model. It's nearly 100% efficient, so you can calculate exactly how many killowatt-hours it takes to heat a pound of water from the inlet temp to the outlet temp. You can measure flow with a milk jug and a stopwatch. If you know the ambient temperature and the thermostat setting, you can calculate radiation loss with only one actual measurement of how long it takes to heat back up after you've turned it off for a few hours without using any hot water.
Turning down the thermostat will help some with the radiation loss. But people taking a shower will just turn up the hot to get the water temp they like and defeat any savings you might get there.
I can save a significant percentage by washing my face in the kitchen instead of the bathroom. The kitchen is much closer to the WH and wastes less filling the pipes. But the real savings is time. It takes so long for the hot water to get thru the low-flow spigot that I can walk to the kitchen and back several times over. But a significant percentage savings of approximately zero use is still zero.
But knowing doesn't help much. One of my guilty pleasures is a long, hot shower. I know I can save $$$, I choose not to.
There's been enough talk about global warming and energy efficiency that most people have already done the things that don't inconvenience them in any way. But when it starts becoming an inconvenience, they/we backslide.
I've been
The math on that one will be interesting. My neighbor recently replaced his worn-out gas water heater. Cost him $900. My electric cost me $130, and I didn't have to pay someone to run a gas pipe for conversion. I'm sure there's a break-even point, but I don't use enough hot water to get there. If you use a lot of hot water and depending on where you live, a solar preheater may be a good investment.
That's not a technical problem, it's a logistic one. In the US, lots of 240V stuff doesn't plug in. For the stuff that does, there are several different plugs. And I'd have to pull the clothes dryer out of the closet, hook up a vent pipe extension and crouch at floor level to read the thing. The higher voltages and currents will result in more people electrocuting themselves or setting the house on fire. The product liability lawyers don't like that risk.
Till then, they seem pretty useless, except for someone
I gave a lot of thought to the welder issue. Probably get better answer in a welding newsgroup, but isn't the cost of a weld pretty closely related to how much metal you put down? IF you can get adequate strength with less metal, do so. Don't need any measurements to do that. Then, there's that old risk/reward ratio. Would be a shame to save a penny on a weld and lose an arm when the mower broke apart.
I maintain that two people with a stopwatch can easily determine the incremental load of any device with a switch by watching the utility meter. Absolute accuracy is not necessary. No matter what behavior modification you employ, you're likely to be back to your old ways in a month or so.
Most of the lighting in my house is provided by three 1.5W LED lamps. But I'm too lazy to turn them off when I leave the room. I estimate I waste at least 80% of that 4.5Watts. My bad...
I use mine every time I start the portable generator to exercise it. I check both the voltage and the frequence, under load and no load. Last fall I found that the automatic voltage regulation was off some and took it in for servicing. It may have very well saved some electronics the next power outage.
On 4/11/2012 7:57 PM, gregz wrote:
On 4/11/2012 7:57 PM, gregz wrote: > Art Todesco wrote: >> On 4/11/2012 2:39 PM, gregz wrote: >>> Art Todesco wrote: >>>> On 4/11/2012 12:23 PM, Doug wrote: >>>>> On Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:03:43 -0700, mike wrote: >>>>>
We're running about 124v except when I flush the toilet.
It takes a bit more time using this iPad, but I usually do NOT delete lines. I figured someone would bitch.
Greg
That's assinine thinking.
Why?
Why drag the entire expanding thread into each and every response?
The entire thread (all previous posts) are easily visible and accessible. If someone is reading a thread, one post at a time, there's no need to repeat the material with each successive response.
I know that people got into the bad habbit of doing that with e-mail 10+ years ago, but usenet is not an e-mail conversation.
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