It's About Liberty: A Conservative Forum
Topics => TEOTWAWKI => Topic started by: Weisshaupt on April 17, 2014, 09:52:46 AM
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Okay, I haven't talked about it much, but if you are going to do Solar PV panels , you need to have a good understand of what you use the electric power for. This lets you know if you can, say, run the well water pump and the electric dryer at the same time or not. It also helps you figure out what the "emergency draw" is - how much you need in reserve to keep a freezer running etc. To do this sort of calculation you really can look at the wattage rating of the appliance, andit will let you know ( nominally) how much power it will take -- but real usage can spike and fall. And right now, with this new house, I am getting bills for over 2000 KWH an MONTH. That is huge. I would need a 13000 Watt array to power that. An array that size would make be a "power provider" and eliminate me from Net Metering and other helpful programs. So I need to get usage down. I have been doing the obvious - replacing incandescent lights with LED has a dramatic effect on usage. But alas, I am not having enough of an effect, and I don't know what systems are causing it. I might even have some load that is broken, using power with a short across a decent resistance, and not doing anything useful with it -- But how to find it ...
The answer is with an individual circuit power meter. Looked at the options and settled on this one (http://www.brultech.com/)-- its a pretty open solution - allowing 3rd party data access, IP capable, and expandable, all while retaining a price that is reasonable in comparison with other solutions ( but still not "cheap".. Ordering it today and I will report back, but I like it. It seems to have been done right, and eventually I may be able to add it into the generic monitoring system I want to write...
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Neat idea, but why would you want a 3rd party access?
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So anyone can write software that will interface with it. In other words they aren't keeping the ability to interact with the device and its data a proprietary secret.
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So anyone can write software that will interface with it. In other words they aren't keeping the ability to interact with the device and its data a proprietary secret.
Exactly.. And since I plan to write ( and potentially sell) a generic control system - this falls in line with that..
Also on that front, apparently someone had done exactly what I am planning and then the product disappeared - bought up my a larger company and then killed. I can only guess why.
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Ah! I misinterpreted. You're talking along the line of open source software. I was thinking 3rd parting monitoring through a network.
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Ah! I misinterpreted. You're talking along the line of open source software. I was thinking 3rd parting monitoring through a network.
Not surprising.. there are a number of services ( google ran one for a while as well) where that is what they do - suck up your data and allow you to see it without having to have a brain as to how thats done.