DC or AC for home?
 

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.

DC or AC for home?
 

"HeyBub" wrote in message
...
As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.

When I was a kid, Boston Ed was still supplying DC to the area where I
lived.
It was truly a pain in the ass.
For instance, when you plugged in an ac/dc radio the odds were 50-50 the
polarity was wrong.
Try to shut of a light and sometimes there would be an arc across the switch
gap and you had to unsscrew the bulb to get the circuit to break and get
thearc to extinguish.
Plug in a new electric iron with temperature control and when the thermostat
tried to open the contacts would weld together. Toasters too.
Want one of those TVs towatch Friday night fights. You had to get a
converter that had DC in and gave you AC out. Or if you had bigger bucks,
you could buy a motor/genrator set.
Yeah. those were the good old days.

Charlie

DC or AC for home?
 

When I was a kid, the province of Ontario, had 25 hertz AC electricity.
Motors turned much slower and were larger, and light bulbs flickered. The
power was gradually transferred over to North American standard 60 hertz in
the 50's. The city of Toronto, being the largest was done last. Virtually
every motor, transformer and other equipment had to be replaced, exchanged
or rebuilt at that time.


"Charlie Bress" wrote in message
. ..

"HeyBub" wrote in message
...
As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.

When I was a kid, Boston Ed was still supplying DC to the area where I
lived.
It was truly a pain in the ass.
For instance, when you plugged in an ac/dc radio the odds were 50-50 the
polarity was wrong.
Try to shut of a light and sometimes there would be an arc across the
switch gap and you had to unsscrew the bulb to get the circuit to break
and get thearc to extinguish.
Plug in a new electric iron with temperature control and when the
thermostat tried to open the contacts would weld together. Toasters too.
Want one of those TVs towatch Friday night fights. You had to get a
converter that had DC in and gave you AC out. Or if you had bigger bucks,
you could buy a motor/genrator set.
Yeah. those were the good old days.

Charlie

DC or AC for home?
 

Charlie Bress wrote:

"HeyBub" wrote in message
...

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.


When I was a kid, Boston Ed was still supplying DC to the area where I
lived.
It was truly a pain in the ass.
For instance, when you plugged in an ac/dc radio the odds were 50-50 the
polarity was wrong.
Try to shut of a light and sometimes there would be an arc across the switch
gap and you had to unsscrew the bulb to get the circuit to break and get
thearc to extinguish.
Plug in a new electric iron with temperature control and when the thermostat
tried to open the contacts would weld together. Toasters too.
Want one of those TVs towatch Friday night fights. You had to get a
converter that had DC in and gave you AC out. Or if you had bigger bucks,
you could buy a motor/genrator set.
Yeah. those were the good old days.

Charlie




Me too, when I rented a one room student apartment in the Back Bay
section of Boston circa 1956.

I never thought to ask about the current supply in the building and soon
discovered the place was still on DC.

I was a "hi-fi" buff back then and after I considered what a PIA it
would be to have to use one of the vibrator converters available back
then, I just suffered for a month and then moved elsewhere.

Thanks for the mammaries!

Jeff

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.98*10^14 fathoms per fortnight.

DC or AC for home?
 

Well programs and commands always did and always will execute faster from
the DOS prompt than in ANY GUI.

steve


"HeyBub" wrote in message
...

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.

DC or AC for home?
 

"HeyBub" wrote in message
...
As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."


http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.


I used to work with an electrician years ago who had worked on converting
Columbia University over from DC to AC. Before that I had no idea that DC
was still in use.

DC or AC for home?
 

John Grabowski wrote:

I used to work with an electrician years ago who had worked on
converting Columbia University over from DC to AC. Before that I had
no idea that DC was still in use.

So you weren't at Columbia University for the latest conversion: to PC?

DC or AC for home?
 

HeyBub posted for all of us...

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.



That's strange because there is now research about supplying DC to large
computer centers because it would save money in switching power supply losses
and the accompanying heat loads they impose...
--
Tekkie Don't bother to thank me, I do this as a public service.

DC or AC for home?
 

On Mon, 19 Nov 2007 18:42:47 -0500, =?ISO-8859-15?Q?Tekkie=AE?=
wrote:

HeyBub posted for all of us...

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.



That's strange because there is now research about supplying DC to large
computer centers because it would save money in switching power supply losses
and the accompanying heat loads they impose...
--
Tekkie Don't bother to thank me, I do this as a public service.

I wish I had 12VDC distributed throughout my house. Then I could get
rid of all those ugly wall wart AC-DC convertors.

.... Never liked being surrounded by low-frequency magnetic fields
anyway. Edison was right... DC is better. Down with reactance!!!

Beachcomber

DC or AC for home?
 

Insanity! DC doesn't travel without dramatic loss. DC also causes
spectacular fires! Edison was an idiot.
"Tekkie®" wrote in message
. ..
HeyBub posted for all of us...

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.



That's strange because there is now research about supplying DC to large
computer centers because it would save money in switching power supply
losses
and the accompanying heat loads they impose...
--
Tekkie Don't bother to thank me, I do this as a public service.

DC or AC for home?
 

"claude" wrote in message ...
Insanity! DC doesn't travel without dramatic loss. DC also causes
spectacular fires! Edison was an idiot.

I suggest to you to do littly more reaserch you are right about all
and specialy that Edison was not idiot because he got credit
for some one eles work.
Tony

"Tekkie®" wrote in message
. ..
HeyBub posted for all of us...

As of today, you no longer get a choice:

"[NEW YORK] Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current
electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl
Street
power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating
current ...."

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...thomas-edison/

Next thing you know, Con Ed will be upgrading to Windows 3.1.



That's strange because there is now research about supplying DC to large
computer centers because it would save money in switching power supply
losses
and the accompanying heat loads they impose...
--
Tekkie Don't bother to thank me, I do this as a public service.

DC or AC for home?
 

EXT wrote:

When I was a kid, the province of Ontario, had 25 hertz AC
electricity. Motors turned much slower and were larger, and light
bulbs flickered. The power was gradually transferred over to North
American standard 60 hertz in the 50's. The city of Toronto, being the
largest was done last. Virtually every motor, transformer and other
equipment had to be replaced, exchanged or rebuilt at that time.

Wow...that's interesting. Much of Los Angeles was 50 Hz until well after
WWII.

Much of Amtrak's Northeast Corridor electrification (former Pennsylvania
and New Haven railroads) is still 25 Hz and probably will remain so. A
couple decades back it was expected that it would be converted to 60 Hz
(some of it did convert and the new electrification from New Haven to
Boston is 60) but most of it remains 25. Apparently, even though there are
no longer locomotives and cars that use the AC commutator traction motors
(it's all either rectifers & DC motors or rectifier - variable frequency
inverter - 3-phase AC induction motor) there are certain advantages to 25
Hz. Not enough to install new but enough to keep it if you have it.
They've been changing rotary converters to static (electronic) ones. Even
that has its drawbacks. I remember reading a technical paper that touted
the virtues of modern rotary converters.

In Europe a lot of railway electrification is 16 2/3 Hz.

I'm really curious about a reference I have seen to Con Ed still generating
DC up til about 1985. I can see how they still were supplying it but I
would have assumed that just meant a transformer / rectifier setup in the
nearest substation. But to actually generate DC? I wonder if that's true.

DC or AC for home?
 

Charlie Bress wrote:
For instance, when you plugged in an ac/dc radio the odds were 50-50
the polarity was wrong.

Hmm...I had always presumed that the polarized plug stemmed from DC. Guess
not.

Try to shut of a light and sometimes there would be an arc across the
switch gap and you had to unsscrew the bulb to get the circuit to
break and get thearc to extinguish.

Probably not a switch rated for DC.

Yeah. those were the good old days.

Sounds kinda neat actually.

Did you have an Iron Fireman for your coal furnace?