Semi-OT: Money saving electrical capacitor contraption.....

JoeE. · May 15, 2013

The guy with the shop next door to me comes over with this brochure today. Can't recall the brand name, but its some kind of a deal he's all fired up about.... says its gonna save him about half of what he pays for electricity at home. Says the guy who told him about it saves all this money and blah blah blah. It's one of those "The government doesn't want you to know, and the power companies hate us" kinda things. Just the kind of stuff he falls for...

I humored him and let him blow for a while...and never argued with him. No sense busting his bubble. I think he wasted about $800 for this box with some capacitors and assorted electrical looking widgets in it.

I guess you attach it to the wall in the room with your electric service in it, wire it to your system, turn it on and it supposedly absorbs all the surge (by discharging capacitors) so your peak usage stays low. That's the Readers Digest condensed version.

I can't think of what the brand name is, or I would have put a link to the thing on here so you guys could tear it to pieces and I could show him the results and show him he's wasting money.

He's good at welding and just fair at machining, but I'd say he skipped the class on electricity.

I googled "Capacitor bank electricity saving" and it had some pages full of stuff with people talking all about those things.....but I didn't see any name that jumped out at me that was what he had....

Rob F. · May 15, 2013

I think those do something to the power factor. Not sure though, been a long time.
Rob

cnc_machinist · May 15, 2013

Rob F. said:
I think those do something to the power factor. Not sure though, been a long time.
Rob

It is a power factor correction. It reduces amount of wasted energy due to loading inbalances that are always present in any circuit. It cant halve the energy bill, but it will bring it down 10 to 20% if properly tuned and installed on your grid.

MetalCarnage · May 15, 2013

Rob F. said:
I think those do something to the power factor. Not sure though, been a long time.
Rob

I'm fairly sure it's good for changing the "power factor" of your wallet more than anything.

-Ron

Nick Mueller · May 15, 2013

I'm fairly sure it's good for changing the "power factor" of your wallet more than anything.

It depends on how you are charged for electricity. PFC (Power Factor Correction) can save money, if you are charged that way.
Just not 50%

Nick

jkruger · May 15, 2013

If properly tuned to your power requirements it might save a significant amount. Send me your credit card info for more information......

adama · May 15, 2013

If your billed based on power factor and still use a lot of inductive devices (think strip lights, electric motors (air con, lathes, mills, large transformers like in welders etc) and such) and less modern electronics then halving your bill is praphs still pushing it but it could be a pretty large saving to be had.

First though you need to find out if your being billed that way. IMHO not all that many are when i looked into it.

Timw · May 15, 2013

Just like pesticides, if it worked the government would ban it!
My all time favorite was an ad for Solar Clothes Dryers! They were only $50. each with a limit of 5. ( back then postal fraud minimum was $300.)
Clothes pins not included!

JoeE. · May 15, 2013

I said it in my original post, but will repeat~ This is for his house, not his shop. If anything, he has central air conditioning- so possibly the biggest user there would be the compressor, burns wood to heat water to heat the house so the biggest expense there would be fractional horsepower electric circulating pump motors.

I don't see where it could do him much good. I think he thinks that halving of his already low electric bill is going to occur.

He lives out in the country. Today, I will ask him to bring in an electric bill so I can see it, to see if I could make a copy of it to show us whether he gets billed according to power factor usage.

JST · May 15, 2013

So far, I am totally unaware of any power factor penalty for house electric bills*. For industrial/commercial, yes, you may have that.

So the major correction will be to lighten his wallet and prevent all that money from causing him to tilt to one side.

* it is quite possible that at some point there might be billing for that.... it will have to wait until enough people install CFLs and other mandated "energy saving" items with bad power factor. Then it will pay well to charge for power factor, but now, not so much.... so don't expect it really soon. if and when it occurs, the type of corrector your neighbor has will probably be illegal.....

Nick Mueller · May 15, 2013

PF billing -I think- is starting in GB for private households. But I wouldn't bet my lathe for it.
Anyhow, you just have to wait 'till all are billed that way.

Nick

racen857 · May 15, 2013

There is a company around here offering the same thing. If it works as listed it would make sence to get one. But does it work?,.... still being the big question.

Lehmier Electric & Water Treatment

CougarMountain · May 15, 2013

Pfc capacators can be a two edge sword. It helps if it is properly tuned, as mentioned earlier. But can draw more current if to much is left on line when not needed. In a post I mentioned a while back ago on a Miller Syncrowave with pfc added. It would draw neary 50 amps at idle with the full kit installed, less than 10 without. Where it helped was when welding aluminum at full power, would draw only 50 amps instead of 70. So an ampmeter was installed with switching for the caps, to switch in only what was needed for the load.

GregSY · May 15, 2013

I'm kinda proud of all the guys on this BB who understand power factor and why caps are hardly God's gift to electricity.

I know of no residences that are being billed on a power factor basis. But....if you're part of the celebration (according to their advertising anyway) that's going on with 'Smart Meters' across the country, you can be sure the reason the power companies are investing all that money in new 'Smart Meters' is so they can get even more money out of your pockets in the future. Unlike the old 'Stupid Meters', the new 'Smart Meters' can measure vars and not just watts. Just why do you suppose that is?

All of us home shop guys are just the type of client they are interested in. Turn on your lathe too many times? Penalty. Turn on the mill? Penalty.

The goal is to make sure that in the future we all pay more for less, all demand is level, and we all consume power for nothing but our TV's, LED lights, and I Phones chargers.

DDoug · May 15, 2013

This brings up a question.

If you run a invertor or a phase perfect, it's taking whatever current in, and rectifying it
to a D.C. buss correct ?

Do either one of these devices effect P.F. ? or are they "purely resistive" or whatever the term is.

Philabuster · May 15, 2013

digger doug said:
This brings up a question.

If you run a invertor or a phase perfect, it's taking whatever current in, and rectifying it
to a D.C. buss correct ?

Do either one of these devices effect P.F. ? or are they "purely resistive" or whatever the term is.

From Phase Perfect website:

Phase Converter FAQs - Phase Perfect Phase Converters

What is unity power factor and why does it matter?
When AC induction motors draw current from the power lines, the sine wave pattern of the current lags the voltage. This relationship between current and voltage can be calculated through trigonometry and expressed as a number called power factor. When the power factor is one (1.00), this means that the voltage and current pattern are in sync. A poor power factor (e.g. .65) requires the utility to generate more current than the load actually needs to do its work. The utility may assess the customer a charge for this poor power factor or require the installation of power factor correction equipment. Phase Perfect always operates at near unity power factor (.99, slightly leading), so that the utility does not see the poor power factor of induction motors being operated by Phase Perfect. Rotary phase converters can actually make the power factor worse, resulting in inefficient operation and extra charges.

How efficient are Phase Perfect digital phase converters?
Phase Perfect digital phase converter operates three-phase equipment at 95-98% efficiency, while its power factor correction results in better overall efficiency than most other three-phase solutions.

If I can buy rotary or static phase converters for less, why should I buy a Phase Perfect Power digital phase converter?
Phase Perfect digital phase converters have several distinct advantages over static and rotary phase converters that provide value to the end-user. Phase Perfect typically operates at 97% efficiency, compared to typical 80-90% for rotary converters, resulting in significantly lower life-time operating cost. Phase Perfect is quick and easy to install, reducing installation cost. Most importantly, Phase Perfect always delivers clean, balanced power. Unbalanced voltage from other phase converters has the potential to damage valuable three-phase electrical equipment.

SND · May 15, 2013

Right up there with fuel magnets and the anti rust thing to hook to your car battery.
I had an uncle right into that stuff, aliens and all, pretty entertaining overall.

I try to turn things off when not in use, seems to work ok.

Zonko · May 15, 2013

SND said:
Right up there with fuel magnets and the anti rust thing to hook to your car battery.
I had an uncle right into that stuff, aliens and all, pretty entertaining overall.

I try to turn things off when not in use, seems to work ok.

You have NO clue.

Power factor is a major matter. Its not some sort of stupid BS game somebody is playing.
Just not for residental use...

My father apprenticed as a ship electrician, back in the 60s. Even then they had a full room of capacitors , in cabinets the size of big office desks. If you generate high kVAR levels of reactive power by running a shipyard full of motors and welding machines, you better get rid of all that reactive power or you ARE going to pay for it.

That reactive power is your usual phase shifted power. Current and Voltage do both have a sinus shape and line frequency, but there is a comnstant delay between them, which can be converted into a phase angle, the cosine of which is the power factor.
Old German rhyme: Bei Induktivitäten tun Ströme sich verspäten.
Translation: With inductances, currents are gonna be late

Now CFLs ....whole nother story. The input rectifier is non linear and the current drawn is not sinus or even sinusoidal. Its a chopped up mess.
Nature does not like mess, and in that aspect physics and mathematics are the same. This mess can be expressed as a mix of higher , non line frequency, sinus currents. And higher frequency means losses because the substation transformers were not designed to handle higher frequencies.

Also a reduction of power factor, but one through distortion, not phase shift. And a lot more difficult to compensate. You need a smart PFC boost rectifier which looks like a linear load to the grid.

welderboyjk · May 15, 2013

CougarMountain said:
Pfc capacators can be a two edge sword. It helps if it is properly tuned, as mentioned earlier. But can draw more current if to much is left on line when not needed. In a post I mentioned a while back ago on a Miller Syncrowave with pfc added. It would draw neary 50 amps at idle with the full kit installed, less than 10 without. Where it helped was when welding aluminum at full power, would draw only 50 amps instead of 70. So an ampmeter was installed with switching for the caps, to switch in only what was needed for the load.

Cougar I was going to mention that but it looks like you beat me to it.
Personally i can't see having PFC on my house. When you think of the inductive loads that may be running during waking hours...well pump, fridge, vacuum cleaner, furnace fan and then think of how many which would be running in the middle of the night....not many. Doesn't seem like the added draw in the "off" time would make up for savings.
BTW if you could post a linky to the welder mod I know I'd appreciate it.

Anvil Jenkins · May 15, 2013

Zonko said:
You have NO clue.

Power factor is a major matter. Its not some sort of stupid BS game somebody is playing.
Just not for residental use...

My father apprenticed as a ship electrician, back in the 60s. Even then they had a full room of capacitors , in cabinets the size of big office desks. If you generate high kVAR levels of reactive power by running a shipyard full of motors and welding machines, you better get rid of all that reactive power or you ARE going to pay for it.

That reactive power is your usual phase shifted power. Current and Voltage do both have a sinus shape and line frequency, but there is a comnstant delay between them, which can be converted into a phase angle, the cosine of which is the power factor.
Old German rhyme: Bei Induktivitäten tun Ströme sich verspäten.
Translation: With inductances, currents are gonna be late

Now CFLs ....whole nother story. The input rectifier is non linear and the current drawn is not sinus or even sinusoidal. Its a chopped up mess.
Nature does not like mess, and in that aspect physics and mathematics are the same. This mess can be expressed as a mix of higher , non line frequency, sinus currents. And higher frequency means losses because the substation transformers were not designed to handle higher frequencies.

Also a reduction of power factor, but one through distortion, not phase shift. And a lot more difficult to compensate. You need a smart PFC boost rectifier which looks like a linear load to the grid.

There is a big difference between industrial/commercial use, and HOME use, which is what the OP's friend bought into, the concept that this magic box would save on his home electric bill.

Bill

Semi-OT: Money saving electrical capacitor contraption.....

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