According to Gunner Asch :
On 12 Sep 2005 16:36:58 -0700, jim rozen
wrote:

[ ... ]

The good news is, the 18 amps you measure with it unloaded is mostly
reactive current. You are probably drawing something like 500 watts
total when it's not loaded, if my stone age converter is a guide.

Jim


Cool!! I try to follow the various RPC threads...but when it starts
geting into the reactive/inductive techno stuff...my eyes glaze. Im a
screw driver type. Shrug

You can reduce that unloaded current (as seen on your clamp-on
meter) by hooking a power factor compensation capacitor across the line
terminals at the input to your RPC.

They need to be AC run caps, not motor starting caps (just as tuning
caps need to be).

Just start the idler up, measure the current in one of the legs
(both should be the same, unless you've got a leakage path to ground
somewhere), hook in a capacitor, re-measure, add more and repeat until
your current starts going back up. At that point, remove the last
capacitor. I would guess that you should prepare to go up in perhaps
20-50 uF steps for the size of RPC which you are talking about.

Remember -- the clamp-on meter needs to be between the breaker
and the caps, not between the caps and the motor.

This will reduce the current seen by your wires and your circuit
breakers. It won't have much effect on your power meter -- unless you
are on a demand-metered service, in which case you would not be needing
a RPC, as you would already have three phase.

Enjoy,
DoN.
--
Email: | Voice (all times): (703) 938-4564
(too) near Washington D.C. | http://www.d-and-d.com/dnichols/DoN.html
--- Black Holes are where God is dividing by zero ---