Holy sh!t, our power is posessed.. UPDATE.. fixed.

[Eli]

Well I looked at the meter again and now it's barely moving, as it should be...

This is bizarre, and I'm beginning to think it's something to do with the house. Ugh.

 

[JohnCU]

Maybe you have a short somewhere that isn't fused? Pulling huge amounts of current and then none?

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: mchammer
Not this again, you have posted so many threads about the bad wiring in your house. This is like the problems you were having with your girlfriend where you were putting off dealing with relationship issues.

Huh? I never put off dealing with our relationship issues, I addressed them immediately once I knew. My relationship with her is the most important thing in the world to me.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
Maybe you have a short somewhere that isn't fused? Pulling huge amounts of current and then none?

I suppose, but that doesen't explain the 30 second duration surges to 150V+...

Sitting at a realitivly normal 127V right now, but turning something high draw like the microwave on makes the whole house sag, and that's not normal.

They just called me back and said it would be a few hours before they could have someone out, joy.. lol.

 

[Shawn]

Uhh, if you don't have a UPS, TURN THE COMPUTER OFF NOW!

 

[Xyclone]

Originally posted by: suse920

Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Unplug s*** now and call power provider.

- M4H

 

[JohnCU]

Depends on the inductance of your circuitry maybe... v = Ldi/dt, if the current is spiking it will cause huge amounts of voltage.

*yawn*

 

[mchammer]

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: mchammer
Not this again, you have posted so many threads about the bad wiring in your house. This is like the problems you were having with your girlfriend where you were putting off dealing with relationship issues.

Huh? I never put off dealing with our relationship issues, I addressed them immediately once I knew. My relationship with her is the most important thing in the world to me.

OK well all I know is there was a long thread about it with much knashing of teeth. Glad to hear things are going better. Anyway once you put up on here a pic of your breaker panel and everyone was saying it was messed up bad, and also that you would get shocks touching stuff in there. I would turn off all the breakers and call the power co.

 

[mchammer]

Then go to neighbor's house to post updates

 

[JohnCU]

Can you get a power factor reading from that meter?

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
Depends on the inductance of your circuitry maybe... v = Ldi/dt, if the current is spiking it will cause huge amounts of voltage.

*yawn*

Ahh... Hmm. Yeah.

Maybe that "voltage leak" I've posted about before finally got really bad or something?! :Q

It started at the same time this rain/wind started.. so I thought for sure it had something to do with that. Dunno though.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
Can you get a power factor reading from that meter?

From the Kill-A-Watt? Yeah, but it only applies to things that are plugged into it... ?

 

[JohnCU]

oh you can't plug it into an outlet? and hit PF?

 

[mchammer]

Lights for plant growing causing the problem?
:shiftyeyes;

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: Eli
I have to shut every light and thing in the house off to be able to boot up.. I probably shouldn't even be trying, but it is amusing.

We've been experiencing ... very abnormal power conditions for the last almost 2 hours now.

It's fluctuating between brownout and WAY overvotage.. Holy sh!t, it just spiked to 158V.. my poor computer.. *prays it doesen't blow up*

Back down to 95V now.. My computer shuts off when it dips below 90V, I hope I can make this post this time.

Trying to get some pics and a video uploaded...

Normally, open circuit voltage is about 122V.. but something is awry. With everything in the house shut off, I've only got ~108V ... and just turning on my computer brings it down to ~93-95V... I even had to shut off my monitor and my 15W overhead fluorescent to get it to boot up, until Windows' idle kicked in.

Ugh, another spike to 156V.. This is insane. When it does that, it stays there for anywhere from 20-30 seconds to a minute or more.

PIC of spiked voltage

PIC of low voltage, where it's sitting right now

Movie of effects on lightbulb

Where it gets really bright is a spike to ~156V, the other times it's fluctuating between 95 and 105V...

:Q

Seems like a transformer problem.

Let us know after the utility Co comes by and checks it out.

 

[mchammer]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
oh you can't plug it into an outlet? and hit PF?

No cause PF is determined by the device drawing the power. For example, a light bulb is a simple resistive load, so the power factor is perfect, ie 1. A standard PC is not very good and is about a 0.7

What he could try is to check the PF of a light bulb and make sure it is 1.0

Otherwise that device could not measure the power factor of all of the devices in the house combined.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
oh you can't plug it into an outlet? and hit PF?

You can, but it just reads 1.00 without anything plugged into it.

My stereo has a PF of 0.63.. lol.

The voltage is pretty normal right now, but it still sags.. Just turning the 17W overhead fluorescent bulb on, it drops from ~122 to ~118V, currently.

Turning on something like the microwave(900W) brings it below 90V and my computer reboots. And you can tell that the microwave is underpowered.

 

[JohnCU]

oh yea duh im not familiar with that device i thought maybe it could simulate a load or something.

 

[Eli]

Whoa.

Okay, well the voltage just took another dive to 95V...

When I hit PF in this state, it reads ~0.25.. with nothing plugged in.

WTF does that mean?! :Q

 

[JohnCU]

.25 is a highly highly highly inductive load. i think? or really capacitive.

it's the cosine of the phase angle of the voltage minus the phase angle of the current... but the cosine is even so i can't remember how you figure out if it's leading or lagging...

 

[mchammer]

Dude there is some weird ****** going on in there. Nothing would be .25

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: mchammer
Dude there is some weird ****** going on in there. Nothing would be .25

Actually, I have an old rackmount variable power supply that would normally read about 0.25, depending on the voltage and load it was producing.

But I don't understand why it's reading 0.25 with nothing plugged into the Kill-A-Watt. Maybe the KAW's calculations get messed up with such a low voltage? It barely turns on at ~90V. It's all dim.

 

[mchammer]

Try it with a light bulb, should be 1 or close to it.

 

[Eli]

Whoa, wacky.

The outlet in the utility room is reading ~158V right now... 147V with a 60W bulb plugged in.

And yeah, the PF is 0.99 - 1.0.

At 147V, the 60W bulb draws 81W. :laugh:

But the circuit that my computer is on right now is only reading ~97V... It helps having two Kill-A-Watts.

I never noticed that the voltages were different on different circuits before. That doesen't make any sense from a power provider perspective, so I'm beginning to think that it IS the house wiring. Great.

 

[Eli]

Okay....

So now the voltage in the utility room is only ~90, and the voltage on the circuit my computer is on is ~158V.

The 60W bulb only draws 40W at 90V.. lol

This is messed up.