On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 19:33:42 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

Yes indeed, and upstate NY is a good place to be from.


I always get confused about NY. I am never sure what is upstate,
downstate or something else.
I lived in Kingston and Binghampton/Endicott/Union. I was never sure
where I was. I know I got snowed on 11/10/79 and it sucked. I also
lost a ball on my drive on #1 at the IBM course in Endicott. It landed
in the snow and I did not look for it ;-)

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 19:46:22 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 7:39 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 17:58:03 -0400, Keyser Soze
wrote:

On 10/12/18 5:49 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 13:09:14 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 11:26:03 -0400, "Mr. Luddite" wrote:

On 10/12/2018 11:02 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 08:23:18 -0400, Keyser Soze
wrote:

I happen to have that info handy because I looked it up last week when I
had to replace a dead microwave oven. Here's how it is figured:

A 1200 watt output microwave takes 10. The typical formula for this is..
P = VI.. I = P/V = 1200 /120 =10 A. Hence, one would think that the
answer is 10 A.. However, this formula applies only for DC current. For
AC current,. P=VI cos (theta). where theta is the phase difference
between V and I.. This phase difference is created by the inductances
inside the microwave oven.

===

Whoo hoo! 'Airree discovered Power Factor, well known to EEs of
course, which is why most high powered AC electrical devices are
rated in KVA instead of KW. For bonus points explain why inductors
create a phase difference between voltage and current.



Eli the ice man.

For even extra credit Harry, please explain when current leads voltage
and when voltage leads current and what types of loads causes this.

For our purposes of the microwave discussion, it can pretty much be
ignored anyway. Power Factor becomes a concern in manufacturing
plants when there are, as you say, many high powered electrical devices
to be used.


You'll have to give him some time to find a cut'n'pasteable response.

===

Heh, isn't that the truth. Cosine theta indeed! :-)


It's of no interest to me.

===

I have no doubt, and all of those electrons out there are the better
for it.

By the way, lack of curiosity is the mark of a dullard.



I think we should give him a break. He was just trying to be one of the
guys.


I was happy he was learning a little about our trade.
Knowledge is always a good thing

On 10/12/18 10:10 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 19:01:31 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 6:02 PM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 10/12/18 5:56 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 15:05:02 -0400, wrote:

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 13:36:13 -0400, Keyser Soze
wrote:

On 10/12/18 1:25 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 10:07:44 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 9:42 AM, True North wrote:

Struggled last January trying to decide between the EU2000i and
the larger 2800 inverter unit. Bought the nice little suitcase
model but I'm sure if we have another extended outage, I'll be
kicking my butt.



This stuff is probably only interesting to nerds like me and
Greg.Â* We
both seem to get a kick out of trying to get the most for the least
in generators.

For most, I'd just recommend getting the biggest generator you can
afford or want and be happy with it.Â* A whole house generator like
Harry's is really nice to have but for people like me it's more fun
trying to get by on the little ones, especially given that the
need for
them is so rare.

Maybe after a few more winters, some long term outages (and more
miles on me)Â* I may spring for a whole house generator.Â* They
are popular and have come down in price somewhat but it still
kills me that they sit, unused, for months or years other than
to start up and run for 10 minutes once a week.


Of course Harry would agree for me it was just "cheap". I am $300 in
this one plus $100 for the propane kit. So far, between the original
owner and me it has been used once in 12-13 years.


We ain't gonna be able to run air conditioning, well pump, two
refrigerators, some lights, garage door opener, some other device, et
cetera, off a $400 generator. We see no reason to "rough it," as you
seem to like to do.

First "accessory" on my list when we build or buy in Hilton Head is a
whole house generator.

Yeah Mr Global Warming, thanks for pitching inÂ* ;-)

===

I hope 'Airree appreciates that Hilton Head is cold in the winter
time, too cold for outdoor activity much of the time.


Been there in all four seasons. Fall and winter are great times to ride
Hilton Head's bike trails, enjoy horseback riding, and play tennis. 60's
during the daytime, usually, 40's to 50's in the late afternoon and
evening.Â* Maybe that's too cold for a transplanted Florida pussy like
you, but I like those temps.


Ah ... bike trails, horseback riding, tennis ... all appropriate
activities for people in their 70's - 80's.


Why not?
Although I think horses are too stupid to ride but I will if I have
to. I know how
I also prefer hiking to biking but they are all appropriate for me in
the next decade. Tennis is OK. I might have trouble in 10 years
covering the court but I bet I will still be able to bring up a bruise
with my serve.

I also bet Mrs E will be riding for 30-40 more years. I haven't met
the lady but she seems like someone who will still be out there
getting it done when we are all "off to a better place" (or just
buried in the yard with my dogs, in my case)

Maybe I misunderstood

I ride my bike two or three times a week in the fall and spring, once a
week in the summer when it is usually too hot for my taste. Sometimes I
ride from where we live to the end of Chesapeake Beach. I suppose I
could do it Luddite's way, on a motor scooter.

On Sat, 13 Oct 2018 00:10:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

True North wrote:
Wayne.B

- show quoted text -

===Â*

"I hope 'Airree appreciates that Hilton Head is cold in the winterÂ*
time, too cold for outdoor activity much of the time."


No such thing as "too cold for outdoor activity".
You just need the proper clothing or gear.
I thought you were from upstate New York?


H was smart enough to move from where it snows. Snow is nice for a
weekend visit. Not to live in that crap.

Snow is OK
Sunny and nice is OK
I can even live with rain if it gets that **** over with and the sun
comes out
The one that bothers me is "sleet and freezing rain". Unfortunately
that is all too common in DC. I worked nights and that sleet turned to
black ice around 0400 and it was always "fun" in a "scare the **** out
of you" sort of way.
My car has been a ballistic hockey puck far more than once.
Fortunately everyone else was in bed and there wasn't much to hit.
You do get a lot of skid recovery practice. The trick is drive the car
into the direction it is going and when the tires finally start
turning, make small corrections until you are safe.
There are no grand maneuvers. ... until you maneuver your ass south.

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 15:21:39 -0700 (PDT), True NorthÂ*
wrote:Â*

- show quoted text -

"The issue is "proper clothes". A lot of us have contempt for clothes.Â*
You can get away with it from about 50 to around 100FÂ*
http://gfretwell.com/ftp/Oregon/Mt%2...t%20Hood.jpgÂ*
I do understand dressing for the weather tho.Â*
http://gfretwell.com/ftp/7%20Springs/Greg%20Skiing.jpg"

Around here we have about 6 seasons and I have good jackets and work jackets for each.
Wife is always complaining that I hog too much of the front closet.....not enough room for all of her jackets.

Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 10/12/2018 8:50 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 12:47:14 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:


On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 14:34:56 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
- show quoted text -
640w of waste heat coming out the vent sounds high to me. The vent on
mine is barely warm. I had more waste heat coming out of my satellite
receiver.
............

Lol!

That’s one thing fun about my vintage guitar amps. They’d get hot, you
could almost melt marshmallows over them. Think tubes. And I mean, toooobs!

Yeah "tubes" was when we thought the TV was the biggest user of
electricity ... and it might have been close if you had nat gas
appliances.
I was lucky that tubes were really just starting go away when I got
into the computer biz. I still carried a 25L6 and a 2D21 in my tool
bag. I did to a mail away electronic course when I was a kid where we
made a series of things ending up with an AM radio using the box of
parts we got each week. That was tubes.



In the days I attended ET school in the Navy tubes and tube circuitry
composed about 80 percent of the classes and school phases. It was good
though because it covered all the components required to make them do
their job and the theory and math behind them.

It wasn't until the last few phases that they got into digital circuits,
op-amps and TTL (5v) logic. CMOS and full circuit integrated "chips"
were still unheard of in those days.

Later, when attending civilian schools tubes were treated more as
historical artifacts but the circuit theory and component theory
remained much the same. I had a leg up on most of the people in
the classes I took, thanks to the Navy.




I went to NCR computer school before the service, so was transistor
trained. Tubes were the stuff you went down to the market and tested from
the TV and the oscillator tube that the Chevy radio used to generate the
different voltage in the radio. Most of my Air Force was tubes. Really
powerful tubes. TACAN which had about 3000 watt dummy load on low
voltage. 5000V on the tube. And then airborne radars, which were pretty
much tubes in the 1960’s and a Magnetron.

wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 18:59:22 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 3:45 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 14:50:19 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 1:22 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 09:24:03 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:


I need to correct some readings. The current draw of 16 amps was when
I was running the 1200 watt microwave on the generator. I realized it
may have been a higher current reading due to shape factor of the
AC waveform generated by the generator andif there was any voltage droop
due to the generator being loaded close to it's max. So, I just
measured the current it draws when powered by commercial power.

Voltage is 121 vac. Current draw is 14 amps. So, it's using 121v * 14
amperes to produce 1200 watts of microwave power output or 1694 watts
"in" to produce 1200 watts "out".

Very reasonable and believable readings to me.

Not sure about a Honda inverter but my Briggs did not have that ugly a
wave form at pretty much full load
http://gfretwell.com/Propaneproject/Waveform.jpg




I don't know the details of an inverter generator design but from what I
understand they are not dissimilar to a DC to AC inverter or switching
power supplies. Initially the output is a modified square wave but is
then smoothed into a decent sine wave. Honda and other manufacturers of
inverter generators make a big deal about this. There is no big
generator coil in an inverter.

No scope?


Nope. Lent it to a guy and never saw it again. Nice one too.
Tektronix 2445B dual trace that I bought on eBay for cheap bucks.
It worked fine.

If you search around Honda and some other inverter generator
manufacturers have posted images of the waveform for their generators.
Look pretty good.

I gave that scope in the picture to Wayne. I am sorry I didn't pluck a
few more out of the dumpster when IBM was throwing them away.
(Harvey Johnson the daddy of the AFCI and my dutch buddy got one too)
The 453 is a nice portable with fairly respectable credentials. I had
one in my car for almost 3 decades and I can make it dance ;-)
I have his big brother the 465 on my electronics bench. (little better
bandwidth and a whole lot better display)
http://gfretwell.com/electrical/CFL%...0a%20scope.jpg

BTW, that is a current transformer hanging on an AC load
That was part of a little science project I did on CT transformers.
How I will be measuring current on my generator with junk meters
http://gfretwell.com/electrical/CT%20fun/
"Stay thirsty for knowledge my friend" -A bearded American


I loaned my really nice portable Tektronix field service scope to a buddy
who was doing contracting about 20 years ago. Needed it a while back, but
do not know if still works. He passed away 3 months ago, so may ask his
wife it is still around.

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 20:39:02 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 18:59:22 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 3:45 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 14:50:19 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 1:22 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 09:24:03 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:


I need to correct some readings. The current draw of 16 amps was when
I was running the 1200 watt microwave on the generator. I realized it
may have been a higher current reading due to shape factor of the
AC waveform generated by the generator andif there was any voltage droop
due to the generator being loaded close to it's max. So, I just
measured the current it draws when powered by commercial power.

Voltage is 121 vac. Current draw is 14 amps. So, it's using 121v * 14
amperes to produce 1200 watts of microwave power output or 1694 watts
"in" to produce 1200 watts "out".

Very reasonable and believable readings to me.

Not sure about a Honda inverter but my Briggs did not have that ugly a
wave form at pretty much full load
http://gfretwell.com/Propaneproject/Waveform.jpg




I don't know the details of an inverter generator design but from what I
understand they are not dissimilar to a DC to AC inverter or switching
power supplies. Initially the output is a modified square wave but is
then smoothed into a decent sine wave. Honda and other manufacturers of
inverter generators make a big deal about this. There is no big
generator coil in an inverter.

No scope?


Nope. Lent it to a guy and never saw it again. Nice one too.
Tektronix 2445B dual trace that I bought on eBay for cheap bucks.
It worked fine.

If you search around Honda and some other inverter generator
manufacturers have posted images of the waveform for their generators.
Look pretty good.

===

The real test is to feed them into a highly inductive load and then
see what happens to the waveform. I had a brand new 9KW Kohler gen on
our old Bertram 33, not even an inverter gen. When the Heart
Interface charger started pulling serious amps, the waveform would go
to hell, the generator would act up until the charging stopped, and
that would go back and forth in this weird oscillation until the
batteries would get partially charged. The AC current draw of the
Heart Interface charger should have been well within the capabilities
of the generator but the power factor was too high. I tried various
capacitors and a few other remedies but nothing really worked.

That is a good point. The ugliest load I have is my pump motors. I
have some PCs going but they are behind a UPS. There may be an issue
with the inverter A/C in the bedroom but we have all of the non
essential loads off by then. At the end of the day, it is all about
load diversity.

wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 19:33:42 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

Yes indeed, and upstate NY is a good place to be from.


I always get confused about NY. I am never sure what is upstate,
downstate or something else.
I lived in Kingston and Binghampton/Endicott/Union. I was never sure
where I was. I know I got snowed on 11/10/79 and it sucked. I also
lost a ball on my drive on #1 at the IBM course in Endicott. It landed
in the snow and I did not look for it ;-)



A girl I dated in high school grandmother lived in Wellsville, NY.
Grandma said she did leave the hosed for 6 weeks one winter because of all
the ice and snow. My mother grew up a mile from the Wyoming border in
Nebraska and she said they saw 40 below zero. Screw that, I grew up next
to Berkeley, Ca. I saw frozen water one morning on the street in my
youth. We all stood around looking amazed. As to horses, man invented
4x4 so you did not have deal with horses.

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 20:54:48 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 8:43 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 19:46:22 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/12/2018 7:39 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 17:58:03 -0400, Keyser Soze
wrote:

On 10/12/18 5:49 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 13:09:14 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 11:26:03 -0400, "Mr. Luddite" wrote:

On 10/12/2018 11:02 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2018 08:23:18 -0400, Keyser Soze
wrote:

I happen to have that info handy because I looked it up last week when I
had to replace a dead microwave oven. Here's how it is figured:

A 1200 watt output microwave takes 10. The typical formula for this is..
P = VI.. I = P/V = 1200 /120 =10 A. Hence, one would think that the
answer is 10 A.. However, this formula applies only for DC current. For
AC current,. P=VI cos (theta). where theta is the phase difference
between V and I.. This phase difference is created by the inductances
inside the microwave oven.

===

Whoo hoo! 'Airree discovered Power Factor, well known to EEs of
course, which is why most high powered AC electrical devices are
rated in KVA instead of KW. For bonus points explain why inductors
create a phase difference between voltage and current.



Eli the ice man.

For even extra credit Harry, please explain when current leads voltage
and when voltage leads current and what types of loads causes this.

For our purposes of the microwave discussion, it can pretty much be
ignored anyway. Power Factor becomes a concern in manufacturing
plants when there are, as you say, many high powered electrical devices
to be used.


You'll have to give him some time to find a cut'n'pasteable response.

===

Heh, isn't that the truth. Cosine theta indeed! :-)


It's of no interest to me.

===

I have no doubt, and all of those electrons out there are the better
for it.

By the way, lack of curiosity is the mark of a dullard.



I think we should give him a break. He was just trying to be one of the
guys.


===

Maybe, but I can't remember the last time he gave us a break, and him
quoting power Factor theory was about the funniest thing he'd ever
written. Long live cosine theta!



That be true.
I agree. If you walked into a room full of commercial electricians and
started your power factor pitch with "cosine theta" they would throw
their coffee at you and they have been dealing with power factor their
whole career.
As I said before, for the guy at the end of the wire, this really
becomes the biggest problem when you have 3p Wye. It disappears in
"gee whiz" info in the rest of the code.