Hi there, my Watts Up? power meter showed a reading of 130V+ one day coming from PG&E here in NorCal. I confirmed this with another meter. _https://www.wattsupmeters.com/secure/products.php_ (https://www.wattsupmeters.com/secure/products.php) I called PG&E, and they were surprised that I had this capability, and said one other customer in the entire town complained as well. Turns out the auto-transformer voltage regulator in the main power central hub was busted. They said it takes months to get a new unit from Germany, so they manually set the tap to -5V. We are now getting 120 - 125V from the grid, but PG&E has to manually adjust for load changes now (air-conditioning loading during the summer etc). The technician also said that if anything blows that PG&E would pay for repairs or replacement, I would just have to reference my service call. Remember that a 10% increase in voltage will reduce bulb lifetime by 50% typically... bye, Said In a message dated 2/17/2009 09:01:24 Pacific Standard Time, [email protected] writes:
> As another matter, at light loads in your house/neighborhood, the > voltages will rise, since the distribution voltage is usually set up > so that at nominal load, it's correct, and that allows for some IR > drop in the lines. I got interested in this area a while ago. PG&E replaced the transformer on the pole right outside my house. It seems as though my light bulbs don't last as long as they used to, but I don't have any real data to back that up. _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
