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Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
OK.....
So ahm happier'n'a alcoholic workin the night shift in a Jack Daniels distillery.... with my 400# deep cycle battery, 1500 W inverter (sitting in the back seat of m'truck), and my brand new blue electric blankey-poo..... Now I can curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck -- in compleat toasty comfort..... Now, don't ax me WHY I gotta curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck. Just suffice it to say, if you had my yob, you'd be curling up in a fetal position in YOUR truck, too. Except for one thing..... My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. But, what electronics are in a g-d electric blanket??? So I take apart the three-heat controller, and lo and behold, the goddamm thing looks like the motherboard of a small PC.... holy ****.... for a $25 blankeypoo???? Tryna sleuth out the ""circuitry"" of this electric blanket reminds me of the two days I spent tryna fix a $2.00 flashlight.... unsuccessfully.... holy ****.... The blanket has three wires between it and the controller, but only two of the wires register continuity!! From which I surmised, via advanced Ohm's Law, that there is only one element in the blanket, and the controller actually does control voltage/current, ie, no switching among elements, cuz, well, there's only one element. .. AND, the resistance is in fact the "right" resistance, cuz the wattage is 60 W (1/2 amp), and the ohms measure 230. So now I got an extree wire that I don't know wtf it does, amidst my awe of all this goddamm gratuitous complexity. Now, I do have an inkling surrounding this latest Conspiracy of Gratuitous Complexity -- whose fundamental purpose is, of course, to ass**** the entire Global Population up to their collective ileocecal valves, so that Orwell looks like summer fukn camp. It appears that this particular example (this blue electric blanket) of Gratuitous Complexity has to do with..... shudder shudder SAFETY!!!!! And of course the li'l CHILDREN....... Btw, a brief digression: You DO know that they now make crawling helmets for toddlers??? Yes indeedy, google helmets for babies crawling , and pick your link. Better yet, ORDER yours, right away, so's when you take the li'l future Wall Street predator-to-be to Montessori for his (first) pre-school interview, you'll be showing up correck. You yourself and the spouse should also wear matching bicycle helmets, as well, just to show Montessori that the whole Beaver family is indeed correck..... Back to this g-d blanket bidniss.... This **** blanket, for safety (it is UL listed btw), SHUTS OFF automatically EVERY GODDAMM HOUR!!!!WTF????? I mean, look, the g-d blanket is a *whole 60 effingW*!!!! My goddamm BODY puts out more heat than that.... fyi, Your BMR of about 1 cal/min is actually nearly exactly 70 W of heat.... which is why 10 blustering assholes in a meeting room make the place so goddamm hot. So some dumb QA engineering ****head sed, Oh, OH, 60 W -- spread over **24 sq ft of g-d blanket**, no less -- is MUCH too dangerous!!!! Sheeit, in that case, my 70 W of body heat puts me at risk for self-immolation, right??? Fuuuuuuuck, they couldn't have timed it for 8 hours?? 6 hours???? 4 hours????? WTF??????? So now, some while after the blanket shuts off, I'll freeze my goddamm ass off, have furtive nightmares, wake up, and flail around for the controller, just to reset it. So now I can't even g-d SLEEP worth a goddamm, in my fetal position -- and if you knew how long it takes me to get in that fetal position (in m'truck), you'd realize this is really a significant issue. OK.... so NOW ahm gettin it: SAFETY, and our precious li'l bratty g-d CHILDREN, require a solidstate automatic safety controller. ****ty li'l dropping resistors, or a xsformer, or split heating elements, just won't do it anymore. Now, they got a g-d controller in a $25 electric blanket that could have gotten Neil Armstrong to the g-d moon. Well, let me tell you, no one, but NO ONE messes with Angst's fetal position/sleep.... So I took that controller off (via the detachable connector) and hard-wire-crimped a **** 18 ga wire with a **** 99c-store two-in-a-pack unpolarized plug, so now's I got *60 uninterrupted W* of blazing power, blasting thru my li'l blue blankeypoo. What a fukn triumph..... My gripe against Gratuitous Complexity harks back to my erstwhile 1971 Datsun 510, which got better gas mileage than almost every effing car out here today, ceptin Volts'n'Prius'n'****, and mebbe that VW TDI motor.... AND, I could fix it my goddamm self. And I think I drove around Hawaii about 25 g-d times in a Datsun B-210, on a gallon of gas. Now, cars are so fukn complicated..... HOW COMPLICATED ARE THEY??????? Cars are so fukn complicated, that factory Toyoter mechanics make more money than asshole college puhfessuhs..... AS THEY RIGHTLY SHOULD, cuz college professors are just absolutely fukn useless. goodgawd..... What a sham the college credit is, and a bankrupting sham at that. Cars now weigh 50% more than in the 70s.... and you can't even adjust the g-d IDLE!!!! Well, you can, I spose, with a laptop and about $1,000 worth of g-d programming..... Part of the Conspiracy behind Gratuitous Complexity is, imo, the desire to shut out the small entreepreeneer, bidnissman. A good fraction of the people on these ng's could *make their own perfectly navigable electric car*, with a welder, lathe, milling machine, some fukn batteries and a motor. Or mebbe just a welder, drill press, and an angle grinder.... But fukn Chevrolet and Nisan barely got *their* electric cars out, the regulatory ante is so goddamm high. Near $40K for a g-d electric motor and a bunch of g-d batteries.... So, inyway, Angst finally has his new blue blankeypoo blazing away, and I'll be fellatingly positioning myself in peaceful bliss tonite, in m'truck, with my 400# marine battery/1500W inverter right behind my blissful head. Oh ****, did I say "fellatingly"??? That would be "fetally", "fetally positioning myself in peaceful bliss"..... -- EA |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On 10/11/2012 11:01 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
OK..... So ahm happier'n'a alcoholic workin the night shift in a Jack Daniels distillery.... with my 400# deep cycle battery, 1500 W inverter (sitting in the back seat of m'truck), and my brand new blue electric blankey-poo..... Now I can curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck -- in compleat toasty comfort..... Now, don't ax me WHY I gotta curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck. Just suffice it to say, if you had my yob, you'd be curling up in a fetal position in YOUR truck, too. Except for one thing..... My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. But, what electronics are in a g-d electric blanket??? So I take apart the three-heat controller, and lo and behold, the goddamm thing looks like the motherboard of a small PC.... holy ****.... for a $25 blankeypoo???? It's probably a triac style dimmer circuit - likely the cheapest way of making a three-heat electric blanket these days. It would indeed fail to work with a modified sine-wave. Sylvia. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
Sylvia Else fired this volley in
: It would indeed fail to work with a modified sine-wave. You'd have to explain that in a lot of detail for me to believe it. Please do. LLoyd |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 19:01:11 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote: And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. Well-known inverter - and cheap generator - gotcha. I mentioned it in one of these "inverter" posts regarding furnace control boards. Too bad you missed that. Only way to avoid the gotcha is to pay up for pure sine wave. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On 10/11/2012 11:23 AM, Lloyd E. Sponenburgh wrote:
Sylvia Else fired this volley in : It would indeed fail to work with a modified sine-wave. You'd have to explain that in a lot of detail for me to believe it. Please do. LLoyd Such circuits typically prevent current from flowing at all within a half cycle, until a point is reached where the remainder of the half cycle would deliver an amount of energy that would, if delivered over the entire half cycle, represent the desired power. Once triggered, the triac conducts until current drops below some smallish threshold. A circuit designed to do that with a sine-wave is going to be somewhat thrown by an input that is a modified sine-wave. Sylvia. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
Vic Smith wrote:
On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 19:01:11 -0500, "Existential Angst" wrote: And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. Well-known inverter - and cheap generator - gotcha. I mentioned it in one of these "inverter" posts regarding furnace control boards. Too bad you missed that. Only way to avoid the gotcha is to pay up for pure sine wave. Or, just put a small transformer on the affected device. Jamie |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
Jamie wrote:
Vic Smith wrote: On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 19:01:11 -0500, "Existential Angst" wrote: And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. Well-known inverter - and cheap generator - gotcha. I mentioned it in one of these "inverter" posts regarding furnace control boards. Too bad you missed that. Only way to avoid the gotcha is to pay up for pure sine wave. Or, just put a small transformer on the affected device. Jamie OR stick a small battery back-up like you use on a computer. They smooth the AC and filter it as well. -- Steve W. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 19:01:11 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote: OK..... So ahm happier'n'a alcoholic workin the night shift in a Jack Daniels distillery.... with my 400# deep cycle battery, 1500 W inverter (sitting in the back seat of m'truck), and my brand new blue electric blankey-poo..... Now I can curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck -- in compleat toasty comfort..... Now, don't ax me WHY I gotta curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck. Just suffice it to say, if you had my yob, you'd be curling up in a fetal position in YOUR truck, too. Know why a guy gets excited by a woman dressed in leather? Because it makes her smell like a new truck. -- John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc jlarkin at highlandtechnology dot com http://www.highlandtechnology.com Precision electronic instrumentation Picosecond-resolution Digital Delay and Pulse generators Custom laser drivers and controllers Photonics and fiberoptic TTL data links VME thermocouple, LVDT, synchro acquisition and simulation |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
* *My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: *some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. I noticed the same thing during the recent power failure.. The electronically controlled electric blanket will not run on my modified sine inverter. I think the third wire might be connected to a thermistor or temperature sensor in the blanket that the controller uses. If you don't mind wrecking the controller, you could wire the heater directly to the plug and use it on high... or wire in a switch with a diode and have full and 1/2. That would also defeat the timer function. Also beware this also might disable the overheat safety feature. I'd include a thermal fuse if I was going to do that. It's no fun waking up on fire. I'm thinking about designing a filter that will round off the modified sine enough so that the blanket can work with the inverter. Mark |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
Sylvia Else fired this volley in
: Such circuits typically prevent current from flowing at all within a half cycle, until a point is reached where the remainder of the half cycle would deliver an amount of energy that would, if delivered over the entire half cycle, represent the desired power. Once triggered, the triac conducts until current drops below some smallish threshold. A circuit designed to do that with a sine-wave is going to be somewhat thrown by an input that is a modified sine-wave. I'm fully aware of how SCR and Triac (or generically, Thyristor) "dimmers" function, and how to build them (from scratch, without any supplied schematic). I'm also aware that a "modified sine wave" or "simulated sine wave" would satisfy the needs of most of that type of circuit, with the exception that the initial triggering and the the subsequent "near zero"-crossing cutoff might occur late and early, respectively, from where they ought. Such circuits don't work nicely on square waves, primarily because they don't have time to properly turn off. There's usually some capacitance in the gate circuit (sometimes driven by a diac) that prevents a very rapid change from full voltage through zero to the opposite polarity from lasting long enough below the quench voltage for the device to turn off. Such _can_ be the case with a simulated sine wave, where the voltage might go from (say) +10V-0--10V on a square edge. But most inverter companies realized a long (long) time ago that doing it that way causes problems, so they switched (pun) to a waveform that stays at zero long enough for such devices to turn off properly. Only a really old, or really cheap Chinese inverter would not have that feature. For all I know, he has both AND a cheap Chinese blanket that didn't take into consideration the problems it might see on old Chinese inverters. But it's not the case that simulated sine wave inverters universally cause problems with thyristor switches. LLoyd |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 20:22:06 -0500, "Steve W."
wrote: Jamie wrote: Vic Smith wrote: On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 19:01:11 -0500, "Existential Angst" wrote: And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. Well-known inverter - and cheap generator - gotcha. I mentioned it in one of these "inverter" posts regarding furnace control boards. Too bad you missed that. Only way to avoid the gotcha is to pay up for pure sine wave. Or, just put a small transformer on the affected device. Jamie OR stick a small battery back-up like you use on a computer. They smooth the AC and filter it as well. The small standby UPS does no wave shaping when allowing the load to run on "line " voltage - and most are, at best, modified sine wave output. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Sat, 10 Nov 2012 11:19:15 +1100, Sylvia Else
wrote: On 10/11/2012 11:01 AM, Existential Angst wrote: OK..... And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. But, what electronics are in a g-d electric blanket??? So I take apart the three-heat controller, and lo and behold, the goddamm thing looks like the motherboard of a small PC.... holy ****.... for a $25 blankeypoo???? It's probably a triac style dimmer circuit - likely the cheapest way of making a three-heat electric blanket these days. It would indeed fail to work with a modified sine-wave. Sylvia. Maybe he can find a "vintage" electric blanket. on ebay or a thrift store, pr criaigs list, or an "estate sale" (which iiuc is a big yard sale when the parents or grandparents die. Mine certainly has no electronics in it, just a thermostat that reads the air temperature, not the blanket temp. I don't use mine every year -- probably only 5 or 10 --, but it's over 30 years old and working fine. I think his modern style might be only 10 years old, or less. I don't know what the new ones look like but my non-electronic controller has a clear plastic dial with numbers from 1 to 10, and a light underneath the dial that illuminates the number. If I try to use over 1.5 it's too hot in a bedroom that is 65^F. . Iff I take the metal back off the plastic case, it's clear how little is inside of it. No circuit board. Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. I'm not sure if that was ever decided to be dangerous (causing cancer iirc after many years?) , but they changed the wiring arrangement anyhow so that for every wiire going one direction, there's a nearby wire going the other direction, to neutalize the raidation. AFAIK that works. and it's probably present in any blanket less than 20 or 15 years old. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 20:01:00 -0600, "Lloyd E. Sponenburgh"
lloydspinsidemindspring.com wrote: Sylvia Else fired this volley in : Such circuits typically prevent current from flowing at all within a half cycle, until a point is reached where the remainder of the half cycle would deliver an amount of energy that would, if delivered over the entire half cycle, represent the desired power. Once triggered, the triac conducts until current drops below some smallish threshold. A circuit designed to do that with a sine-wave is going to be somewhat thrown by an input that is a modified sine-wave. I'm fully aware of how SCR and Triac (or generically, Thyristor) "dimmers" function, and how to build them (from scratch, without any supplied schematic). I'm also aware that a "modified sine wave" or "simulated sine wave" would satisfy the needs of most of that type of circuit, with the exception that the initial triggering and the the subsequent "near zero"-crossing cutoff might occur late and early, respectively, from where they ought. Such circuits don't work nicely on square waves, primarily because they don't have time to properly turn off. There's usually some capacitance in the gate circuit (sometimes driven by a diac) that prevents a very rapid change from full voltage through zero to the opposite polarity from lasting long enough below the quench voltage for the device to turn off. Such _can_ be the case with a simulated sine wave, where the voltage might go from (say) +10V-0--10V on a square edge. But most inverter companies realized a long (long) time ago that doing it that way causes problems, so they switched (pun) to a waveform that stays at zero long enough for such devices to turn off properly. Only a really old, or really cheap Chinese inverter would not have that feature. For all I know, he has both AND a cheap Chinese blanket that didn't take into consideration the problems it might see on old Chinese inverters. But it's not the case that simulated sine wave inverters universally cause problems with thyristor switches. LLoyd What he NEEDS is a 12 volt blankie. My baby brother has been a long distance trucker across north america, from Alaska to Florida - and has 12 volt mattress warmer and 12 volt electric blanket for YEARS. Lost 'em both when he rolled the truck last year. Bust his neck too, but he's back on the road - doing mostly short haul flatland driving hauling crude - less than 2 years after the crash. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 9 Nov 2012 17:53:22 -0800 (PST), Mark
wrote: If you don't mind wrecking the controller, you could wire the heater directly to the plug and use it on high... As I say above, in my experience high would be intolerably hot and even half temp, 5 out of 10 would be too hot to take, I've never used more than 2, but even in a truck cab with no other heat, I doubt anything more than 3 would be tolerable. He could test that in advance by using an extension cord from the house and sleeping in the truck with the blanket at half-temp. or wire in a switch with a diode and have full and 1/2. That would also defeat the timer function. Also beware this also might disable the overheat safety feature. I'd include a thermal fuse if I was going to do that. It's no fun waking up on fire. Really? JK |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"tm" fired this volley in news:k7khim$at3$1
@dont-email.me: Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Even well-designed ones do on the turn-on. Only a lot of down-line choking and shielding will get it down to reasonable levels. But it's not likely that the RFI emitted from a 1/2-amp controller would emit enough to be harmful to tissue. Could screw up your pacemaker, I guess... Lloyd |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
tm wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Which wouldn't be low frequency. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message ... tm wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Which wouldn't be low frequency. Wouldn't that depend on your definition of "low frequency"? My AM radio is low frequency :) |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:18:39 -0500, "Michael A. Terrell"
wrote: micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Are you saying unless something is 3000 miles ong, it can't radiate low frequency?. I don't think so. And if that were the case, then a radio transmitter broadcasting at 600 KHz would require an antenna that was a third of a mile long. The question is not whether it can radiate, but whether the low frequency is harmful. This was the controversy that also centered around power lines, often just past the backyard of people's homes. But you do remind me that most of the opinion, or maybe the consensus arfter a few years, was that that was not harmful. By then electric blankets had already been rediesigned, since they were much easier to redesign than power lines. . But yes, they're no longer thought to be a risk, I think. I'd forgotten. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On 11/9/2012 4:01 PM, Existential Angst wrote:
OK..... So ahm happier'n'a alcoholic workin the night shift in a Jack Daniels distillery.... with my 400# deep cycle battery, 1500 W inverter (sitting in the back seat of m'truck), and my brand new blue electric blankey-poo..... Now I can curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck -- in compleat toasty comfort..... Now, don't ax me WHY I gotta curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck. Just suffice it to say, if you had my yob, you'd be curling up in a fetal position in YOUR truck, too. Except for one thing..... My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. But, what electronics are in a g-d electric blanket??? So I take apart the three-heat controller, and lo and behold, the goddamm thing looks like the motherboard of a small PC.... holy ****.... for a $25 blankeypoo???? Tryna sleuth out the ""circuitry"" of this electric blanket reminds me of the two days I spent tryna fix a $2.00 flashlight.... unsuccessfully.... holy ****.... The blanket has three wires between it and the controller, but only two of the wires register continuity!! From which I surmised, via advanced Ohm's Law, that there is only one element in the blanket, and the controller actually does control voltage/current, ie, no switching among elements, cuz, well, there's only one element. . AND, the resistance is in fact the "right" resistance, cuz the wattage is 60 W (1/2 amp), and the ohms measure 230. So now I got an extree wire that I don't know wtf it does, amidst my awe of all this goddamm gratuitous complexity. Now, I do have an inkling surrounding this latest Conspiracy of Gratuitous Complexity -- whose fundamental purpose is, of course, to ass**** the entire Global Population up to their collective ileocecal valves, so that Orwell looks like summer fukn camp. It appears that this particular example (this blue electric blanket) of Gratuitous Complexity has to do with.....shudder shudder SAFETY!!!!! And of course the li'l CHILDREN....... Btw, a brief digression: You DO know that they now make crawling helmets for toddlers??? Yes indeedy, google helmets for babies crawling , and pick your link. Better yet, ORDER yours, right away, so's when you take the li'l future Wall Street predator-to-be to Montessori for his (first) pre-school interview, you'll be showing up correck. You yourself and the spouse should also wear matching bicycle helmets, as well, just to show Montessori that the whole Beaver family is indeed correck..... Back to this g-d blanket bidniss.... This **** blanket, for safety (it is UL listed btw), SHUTS OFF automatically EVERY GODDAMM HOUR!!!!WTF????? I mean, look, the g-d blanket is a *whole 60 effingW*!!!! My goddamm BODY puts out more heat than that.... fyi, Your BMR of about 1 cal/min is actually nearly exactly 70 W of heat.... which is why 10 blustering assholes in a meeting room make the place so goddamm hot. So some dumb QA engineering ****head sed, Oh, OH, 60 W -- spread over **24 sq ft of g-d blanket**, no less -- is MUCH too dangerous!!!! Sheeit, in that case, my 70 W of body heat puts me at risk for self-immolation, right??? Fuuuuuuuck, they couldn't have timed it for 8 hours?? 6 hours???? 4 hours????? WTF??????? So now, some while after the blanket shuts off, I'll freeze my goddamm ass off, have furtive nightmares, wake up, and flail around for the controller, just to reset it. So now I can't even g-d SLEEP worth a goddamm, in my fetal position -- and if you knew how long it takes me to get in that fetal position (in m'truck), you'd realize this is really a significant issue. OK.... so NOW ahm gettin it: SAFETY, and our precious li'l bratty g-d CHILDREN, require a solidstate automatic safety controller. ****ty li'l dropping resistors, or a xsformer, or split heating elements, just won't do it anymore. Now, they got a g-d controller in a $25 electric blanket that could have gotten Neil Armstrong to the g-d moon. Well, let me tell you, no one, but NO ONE messes with Angst's fetal position/sleep.... So I took that controller off (via the detachable connector) and hard-wire-crimped a **** 18 ga wire with a **** 99c-store two-in-a-pack unpolarized plug, so now's I got *60 uninterrupted W* of blazing power, blasting thru my li'l blue blankeypoo. What a fukn triumph..... My gripe against Gratuitous Complexity harks back to my erstwhile 1971 Datsun 510, which got better gas mileage than almost every effing car out here today, ceptin Volts'n'Prius'n'****, and mebbe that VW TDI motor.... AND, I could fix it my goddamm self. And I think I drove around Hawaii about 25 g-d times in a Datsun B-210, on a gallon of gas. Now, cars are so fukn complicated..... HOW COMPLICATED ARE THEY??????? Cars are so fukn complicated, that factory Toyoter mechanics make more money than asshole college puhfessuhs..... AS THEY RIGHTLY SHOULD, cuz college professors are just absolutely fukn useless. goodgawd..... What a sham the college credit is, and a bankrupting sham at that. Cars now weigh 50% more than in the 70s.... and you can't even adjust the g-d IDLE!!!! Well, you can, I spose, with a laptop and about $1,000 worth of g-d programming..... Part of the Conspiracy behind Gratuitous Complexity is, imo, the desire to shut out the small entreepreeneer, bidnissman. A good fraction of the people on these ng's could *make their own perfectly navigable electric car*, with a welder, lathe, milling machine, some fukn batteries and a motor. Or mebbe just a welder, drill press, and an angle grinder.... But fukn Chevrolet and Nisan barely got *their* electric cars out, the regulatory ante is so goddamm high. Near $40K for a g-d electric motor and a bunch of g-d batteries.... So, inyway, Angst finally has his new blue blankeypoo blazing away, and I'll be fellatingly positioning myself in peaceful bliss tonite, in m'truck, with my 400# marine battery/1500W inverter right behind my blissful head. Oh ****, did I say "fellatingly"??? That would be "fetally", "fetally positioning myself in peaceful bliss"..... Our old electric blanket died several years ago. It had the bimetalic strip type control with the 0-10 dial. We loved it because we could turn it on an hour before going to bed and the bed would be toasty warm when we went to bed. It died and we got a new one and it would not preheat the bed. We returned it to the manufacturer and they said it was working fine, but sent a new blanked anyway. New worked the same way. I am convinced the thing knows when there is a body in the bed and when there is not. It can be on for hours and the bed is still cold when we go to bed. About 1/2 hour later, the blanket is warm, but we freeze until then. Real POS design. Paul |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 21:30:28 -0600, "Lloyd E. Sponenburgh"
lloydspinsidemindspring.com wrote: "tm" fired this volley in news:k7khim$at3$1 : Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Even well-designed ones do on the turn-on. Only a lot of down-line choking and shielding will get it down to reasonable levels. But it's not likely that the RFI emitted from a 1/2-amp controller would emit enough to be harmful to tissue. Could screw up your pacemaker, I guess... Lloyd There ARE controllers that switch on the downward slope of the sine, greatly reducung theRFI. One thing for sure - an electric blanket sure plays havok with magnetometers, like in electronic compases - and electronic gyros. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:06:23 -0500, wrote:
What he NEEDS is a 12 volt blankie. I didn't know thtey had such things, but http://www.amazon.com/Heated-Fleece-.../dp/B000V8QVX6 http://www.walmart.com/ip/Maxsa-Comf...-Blue/10756183 Onlly 25 dollars for each. My baby brother has been a long They let babies drive trucks! distance trucker across north america, from Alaska to Florida - and has 12 volt mattress warmer and 12 volt electric blanket for YEARS. Lost 'em both when he rolled the truck last year. Bust his neck too, but he's back on the road - doing mostly short haul flatland driving hauling crude - less than 2 years after the crash. Glad he's doing so well |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
wrote in message ... On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 21:30:28 -0600, "Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" lloydspinsidemindspring.com wrote: "tm" fired this volley in news:k7khim$at3$1 : Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Even well-designed ones do on the turn-on. Only a lot of down-line choking and shielding will get it down to reasonable levels. But it's not likely that the RFI emitted from a 1/2-amp controller would emit enough to be harmful to tissue. Could screw up your pacemaker, I guess... Lloyd There ARE controllers that switch on the downward slope of the sine, greatly reducung theRFI. One thing for sure - an electric blanket sure plays havok with magnetometers, like in electronic compases - and electronic gyros. It's best when they switch on the zero crossings. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
tm wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message ... tm wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Well, if it has a poorly designed triac controller, it may radiate RFI. Which wouldn't be low frequency. Wouldn't that depend on your definition of "low frequency"? My AM radio is low frequency :) Ok. 1500 KHz is near the top of the AM BC Band. 300,000,000/1,500,000 = 200 meters for one cycle. How big is that blanket? :) |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
micky wrote: On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:18:39 -0500, "Michael A. Terrell" wrote: micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Are you saying unless something is 3000 miles long, it can't radiate low frequency?. No, but has to be an appreciable fraction of a wavelength, or we would be forced to use DC power for everything. I don't think so. And if that were the case, then a radio transmitter broadcasting at 600 KHz would require an antenna that was a third of a mile long. No, it doesn't. AM BC band broadcast antennas are not a full wavelength, and the aren't resonant at the transmit frequency. They all use use L/C networks to make the tower work at the allocated frequency. Some ATU are as large as the AM transmitter when the tower is difficult to configure. It gets even worse with multiple tower arrays, and different day/night patterns and transmit power authorizations. You should have seen the ATUs at the VOA station in Bethany, Ohio. They could put up to 500,000 watts of RF at any frequency from 2 to 30 MHz. They had multiple antennas, and more than one a 50,000 transmitter was switched to full power before the antenna was properly tuned, and wet the wood support poles on fire. I was a broadcast engineer at a number of radio & TV stations over the decades. The question is not whether it can radiate, but whether the low frequency is harmful. This was the controversy that also centered around power lines, often just past the backyard of people's homes. Very long power lines can radiate. That's wy there are regional power grids across the US, and they are interconnected with HV DC. But you do remind me that most of the opinion, or maybe the consensus after a few years, was that that was not harmful. By then electric blankets had already been redesigned, since they were much easier to redesign than power lines. But yes, they're no longer thought to be a risk, I think. I'd forgotten. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:18:39 -0500, "Michael A. Terrell" wrote: micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Are you saying unless something is 3000 miles long, it can't radiate low frequency?. No, but has to be an appreciable fraction of a wavelength, or we would be forced to use DC power for everything. I don't think so. And if that were the case, then a radio transmitter broadcasting at 600 KHz would require an antenna that was a third of a mile long. No, it doesn't. AM BC band broadcast antennas are not a full wavelength, and the aren't resonant at the transmit frequency. They all use use L/C networks to make the tower work at the allocated frequency. Some ATU are as large as the AM transmitter when the tower is difficult to configure. It gets even worse with multiple tower arrays, and different day/night patterns and transmit power authorizations. You should have seen the ATUs at the VOA station in Bethany, Ohio. They could put up to 500,000 watts of RF at any frequency from 2 to 30 MHz. They had multiple antennas, and more than one a 50,000 transmitter was switched to full power before the antenna was properly tuned, and wet the wood support poles on fire. I was a broadcast engineer at a number of radio & TV stations over the decades. The question is not whether it can radiate, but whether the low frequency is harmful. This was the controversy that also centered around power lines, often just past the backyard of people's homes. Very long power lines can radiate. That's wy there are regional power grids across the US, and they are interconnected with HV DC. But you do remind me that most of the opinion, or maybe the consensus after a few years, was that that was not harmful. By then electric blankets had already been redesigned, since they were much easier to redesign than power lines. But yes, they're no longer thought to be a risk, I think. I'd forgotten. Got to know the transmitter engineers at NSS Annapolis. 24 kHz at 1 million watts. The ATU was in a building four stories tall. A friend of mine and I were instrumental in saving the three 600 foot self supporting towers on Greenbury Point at the Navy Academy property. The array was called a modified Goliath Array. The main feed went to a central 1200 foot hot tower fed with four inch diameter litz cable. Six towers around the central tower were 800 feet tall and made up a capacitance hat. The hat was extended to the east to the three 600 foot towers. Two water cooled Eimac tubes made the power. They were amazingly small, maybe a foot tall. Cooled with deionized water in the anodes. A third tube was between the two that could be switched in if one of the main tubes failed. It was really sad to see the site decommissioned. A little bit of our history died. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
tm wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... micky wrote: On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:18:39 -0500, "Michael A. Terrell" wrote: micky wrote: Really older blankets might have a problem with low frequency radiation. Very doubtful, considering that one cycle is 5000000 meters long. That's 5,000 Kilometers or about 3106 miles. How big is that blanket? Are you saying unless something is 3000 miles long, it can't radiate low frequency?. No, but has to be an appreciable fraction of a wavelength, or we would be forced to use DC power for everything. I don't think so. And if that were the case, then a radio transmitter broadcasting at 600 KHz would require an antenna that was a third of a mile long. No, it doesn't. AM BC band broadcast antennas are not a full wavelength, and the aren't resonant at the transmit frequency. They all use use L/C networks to make the tower work at the allocated frequency. Some ATU are as large as the AM transmitter when the tower is difficult to configure. It gets even worse with multiple tower arrays, and different day/night patterns and transmit power authorizations. You should have seen the ATUs at the VOA station in Bethany, Ohio. They could put up to 500,000 watts of RF at any frequency from 2 to 30 MHz. They had multiple antennas, and more than one a 50,000 transmitter was switched to full power before the antenna was properly tuned, and wet the wood support poles on fire. I was a broadcast engineer at a number of radio & TV stations over the decades. The question is not whether it can radiate, but whether the low frequency is harmful. This was the controversy that also centered around power lines, often just past the backyard of people's homes. Very long power lines can radiate. That's wy there are regional power grids across the US, and they are interconnected with HV DC. But you do remind me that most of the opinion, or maybe the consensus after a few years, was that that was not harmful. By then electric blankets had already been redesigned, since they were much easier to redesign than power lines. But yes, they're no longer thought to be a risk, I think. I'd forgotten. Got to know the transmitter engineers at NSS Annapolis. 24 kHz at 1 million watts. The ATU was in a building four stories tall. A friend of mine and I were instrumental in saving the three 600 foot self supporting towers on Greenbury Point at the Navy Academy property. The array was called a modified Goliath Array. The main feed went to a central 1200 foot hot tower fed with four inch diameter litz cable. Six towers around the central tower were 800 feet tall and made up a capacitance hat. The hat was extended to the east to the three 600 foot towers. Two water cooled Eimac tubes made the power. They were amazingly small, maybe a foot tall. Cooled with deionized water in the anodes. A third tube was between the two that could be switched in if one of the main tubes failed. It was really sad to see the site decommissioned. A little bit of our history died. That Bethany VOA site is now a stinking golf course. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 20:39:10 -0800, Paul Drahn
wrote: On 11/9/2012 4:01 PM, Existential Angst wrote: OK..... So ahm happier'n'a alcoholic workin the night shift in a Jack Daniels distillery.... with my 400# deep cycle battery, 1500 W inverter (sitting in the back seat of m'truck), and my brand new blue electric blankey-poo..... Now I can curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck -- in compleat toasty comfort..... Now, don't ax me WHY I gotta curl up in a fetal position -- in m'truck. Just suffice it to say, if you had my yob, you'd be curling up in a fetal position in YOUR truck, too. Except for one thing..... My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. But, what electronics are in a g-d electric blanket??? So I take apart the three-heat controller, and lo and behold, the goddamm thing looks like the motherboard of a small PC.... holy ****.... for a $25 blankeypoo???? Tryna sleuth out the ""circuitry"" of this electric blanket reminds me of the two days I spent tryna fix a $2.00 flashlight.... unsuccessfully.... holy ****.... The blanket has three wires between it and the controller, but only two of the wires register continuity!! From which I surmised, via advanced Ohm's Law, that there is only one element in the blanket, and the controller actually does control voltage/current, ie, no switching among elements, cuz, well, there's only one element. . AND, the resistance is in fact the "right" resistance, cuz the wattage is 60 W (1/2 amp), and the ohms measure 230. So now I got an extree wire that I don't know wtf it does, amidst my awe of all this goddamm gratuitous complexity. Now, I do have an inkling surrounding this latest Conspiracy of Gratuitous Complexity -- whose fundamental purpose is, of course, to ass**** the entire Global Population up to their collective ileocecal valves, so that Orwell looks like summer fukn camp. It appears that this particular example (this blue electric blanket) of Gratuitous Complexity has to do with.....shudder shudder SAFETY!!!!! And of course the li'l CHILDREN....... Btw, a brief digression: You DO know that they now make crawling helmets for toddlers??? Yes indeedy, google helmets for babies crawling , and pick your link. Better yet, ORDER yours, right away, so's when you take the li'l future Wall Street predator-to-be to Montessori for his (first) pre-school interview, you'll be showing up correck. You yourself and the spouse should also wear matching bicycle helmets, as well, just to show Montessori that the whole Beaver family is indeed correck..... Back to this g-d blanket bidniss.... This **** blanket, for safety (it is UL listed btw), SHUTS OFF automatically EVERY GODDAMM HOUR!!!!WTF????? I mean, look, the g-d blanket is a *whole 60 effingW*!!!! My goddamm BODY puts out more heat than that.... fyi, Your BMR of about 1 cal/min is actually nearly exactly 70 W of heat.... which is why 10 blustering assholes in a meeting room make the place so goddamm hot. So some dumb QA engineering ****head sed, Oh, OH, 60 W -- spread over **24 sq ft of g-d blanket**, no less -- is MUCH too dangerous!!!! Sheeit, in that case, my 70 W of body heat puts me at risk for self-immolation, right??? Fuuuuuuuck, they couldn't have timed it for 8 hours?? 6 hours???? 4 hours????? WTF??????? So now, some while after the blanket shuts off, I'll freeze my goddamm ass off, have furtive nightmares, wake up, and flail around for the controller, just to reset it. So now I can't even g-d SLEEP worth a goddamm, in my fetal position -- and if you knew how long it takes me to get in that fetal position (in m'truck), you'd realize this is really a significant issue. OK.... so NOW ahm gettin it: SAFETY, and our precious li'l bratty g-d CHILDREN, require a solidstate automatic safety controller. ****ty li'l dropping resistors, or a xsformer, or split heating elements, just won't do it anymore. Now, they got a g-d controller in a $25 electric blanket that could have gotten Neil Armstrong to the g-d moon. Well, let me tell you, no one, but NO ONE messes with Angst's fetal position/sleep.... So I took that controller off (via the detachable connector) and hard-wire-crimped a **** 18 ga wire with a **** 99c-store two-in-a-pack unpolarized plug, so now's I got *60 uninterrupted W* of blazing power, blasting thru my li'l blue blankeypoo. What a fukn triumph..... My gripe against Gratuitous Complexity harks back to my erstwhile 1971 Datsun 510, which got better gas mileage than almost every effing car out here today, ceptin Volts'n'Prius'n'****, and mebbe that VW TDI motor.... AND, I could fix it my goddamm self. And I think I drove around Hawaii about 25 g-d times in a Datsun B-210, on a gallon of gas. Now, cars are so fukn complicated..... HOW COMPLICATED ARE THEY??????? Cars are so fukn complicated, that factory Toyoter mechanics make more money than asshole college puhfessuhs..... AS THEY RIGHTLY SHOULD, cuz college professors are just absolutely fukn useless. goodgawd..... What a sham the college credit is, and a bankrupting sham at that. Cars now weigh 50% more than in the 70s.... and you can't even adjust the g-d IDLE!!!! Well, you can, I spose, with a laptop and about $1,000 worth of g-d programming..... Part of the Conspiracy behind Gratuitous Complexity is, imo, the desire to shut out the small entreepreeneer, bidnissman. A good fraction of the people on these ng's could *make their own perfectly navigable electric car*, with a welder, lathe, milling machine, some fukn batteries and a motor. Or mebbe just a welder, drill press, and an angle grinder.... But fukn Chevrolet and Nisan barely got *their* electric cars out, the regulatory ante is so goddamm high. Near $40K for a g-d electric motor and a bunch of g-d batteries.... So, inyway, Angst finally has his new blue blankeypoo blazing away, and I'll be fellatingly positioning myself in peaceful bliss tonite, in m'truck, with my 400# marine battery/1500W inverter right behind my blissful head. Oh ****, did I say "fellatingly"??? That would be "fetally", "fetally positioning myself in peaceful bliss"..... Our old electric blanket died several years ago. It had the bimetalic strip type control with the 0-10 dial. We loved it because we could turn it on an hour before going to bed and the bed would be toasty warm when we went to bed. It died and we got a new one and it would not preheat the bed. We returned it to the manufacturer and they said it was working fine, but sent a new blanked anyway. New worked the same way. I am convinced the thing knows when there is a body in the bed and when there is not. It can be on for hours and the bed is still cold when we go to bed. About 1/2 hour later, the blanket is warm, but we freeze until then. Real POS design. Paul I was told that that last is indeed true. Something about internal sensing of warmth. They now use carbon fiber strands to heat rather than wires. I had one actually start burning over my feet, which woke me up rather suddenly. And I had to put out the burning fur of one fo the dogs who evidently had shorted out the wiring in his sleep. It was a close thing. The replacement wouldnt get warm..preheat at all and only would warm up like yours..after we were in bed. When I called the manufacture..they gave me info (pre stroke) on how it works..and I cant remember the details..but yeah...most of them dont preheat anymore. Gunner -- ""The Democratic constituency is just like a herd of cows. All you have to do is lay out enough silage and they come running. That’s why I became an operative working with Democrats. With Democrats all you have to do is make a lot of noise, lay out the hay, and be ready to use the ole cattle prod in case a few want to bolt the herd. Eighty percent of the people who call themselves Democrats don’t have a clue as to political reality. What amazes me is that you could take a group of people who are hard workers and convince them that they should support social programs that were the exact opposite of their own personal convictions. Put a little fear here and there and you can get people to vote any way you want. The voter is basically dumb and lazy. The reason I became a Democratic operative instead of a Republican was because there were more Democrats that didn’t have a clue than there were Republicans." James Carvell, DNC operative |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
wrote in message
... On Fri, 09 Nov 2012 20:01:00 -0600, "Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" lloydspinsidemindspring.com wrote: Sylvia Else fired this volley in : Such circuits typically prevent current from flowing at all within a half cycle, until a point is reached where the remainder of the half cycle would deliver an amount of energy that would, if delivered over the entire half cycle, represent the desired power. Once triggered, the triac conducts until current drops below some smallish threshold. A circuit designed to do that with a sine-wave is going to be somewhat thrown by an input that is a modified sine-wave. I'm fully aware of how SCR and Triac (or generically, Thyristor) "dimmers" function, and how to build them (from scratch, without any supplied schematic). I'm also aware that a "modified sine wave" or "simulated sine wave" would satisfy the needs of most of that type of circuit, with the exception that the initial triggering and the the subsequent "near zero"-crossing cutoff might occur late and early, respectively, from where they ought. Such circuits don't work nicely on square waves, primarily because they don't have time to properly turn off. There's usually some capacitance in the gate circuit (sometimes driven by a diac) that prevents a very rapid change from full voltage through zero to the opposite polarity from lasting long enough below the quench voltage for the device to turn off. Such _can_ be the case with a simulated sine wave, where the voltage might go from (say) +10V-0--10V on a square edge. But most inverter companies realized a long (long) time ago that doing it that way causes problems, so they switched (pun) to a waveform that stays at zero long enough for such devices to turn off properly. Only a really old, or really cheap Chinese inverter would not have that feature. For all I know, he has both AND a cheap Chinese blanket that didn't take into consideration the problems it might see on old Chinese inverters. But it's not the case that simulated sine wave inverters universally cause problems with thyristor switches. LLoyd What he NEEDS is a 12 volt blankie. My baby brother has been a long distance trucker across north america, from Alaska to Florida - and has 12 volt mattress warmer and 12 volt electric blanket for YEARS. Lost 'em both when he rolled the truck last year. Bust his neck too, but he's back on the road - doing mostly short haul flatland driving hauling crude - less than 2 years after the crash. I considered the 12V route -- blankets, heaters, seat warmers, all available, couild use the same deep cycle batt. But, I opted for 120 V stuff so I could use it inside the house as well as in the truck. But, the 12 V option might be better for some stuff. We'll see how it goes. I'm going to experiment with foiled-up 100 W light bulbs for heat, as well. Altho I also have a nice 9" Optimus parabolic heater, only 300 W -- don't yet know how to gauge wattage requirements of a small space that is exposed to the elements. My hot-wired blanket now works, and as far as the risk of fire goes, even at full blast, it's got a long long way to go before ignition... heh, famous last words, eh?? LOL -- EA |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
snipped righteous rants etc...
Products are designed to produce the best perceived value by the most customers...mitigated by applicable safety regulations. People who like to sleep in their truck are not the target demographic and never will be. If you expect to sleep "outside the box", you need to pick your electric blankets more carefully. Ranting won't help. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On 2012-11-10, Mark wrote:
Â* Â*My g-d electric blankeypoo dudn't WORK with my 1500 W fukn inverter!!!!! WTF?????? And the reason quickly became clear: Â*some electronics don't work with modified (read: ****) sine wave power. I noticed the same thing during the recent power failure.. The electronically controlled electric blanket will not run on my modified sine inverter. I think the third wire might be connected to a thermistor or temperature sensor in the blanket that the controller uses. it could just be a shield, an scr-controlled electric blanket would otherwise radiate EMI something fierce. If you don't mind wrecking the controller, you could wire the heater directly to the plug and use it on high... or wire in a switch with a diode and have full and 1/2. That would also defeat the timer function. Also beware this also might disable the overheat safety feature. it would probably be bad for the inverter too. I'm thinking about designing a filter that will round off the modified sine enough so that the blanket can work with the inverter. an off-the-shelf line filter might do that. -- š‚šƒ 100% natural --- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: --- |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
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Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"tm" fired this volley in news:k7kogp$92f$1
@dont-email.me: t's best when they switch on the zero crossings. It can't be a "duty cycle controller", and switch _only_ on the zero crossings. When a device only turns on and off at the AC zero crossings, we call it a "wire". LLoyd |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" lloydspinsidemindspring.com fired this volley in
. 3.70: When a device only turns on and off at the AC zero crossings, we call it a "wire". Oh, and yes -- I know about those controllers that do switch only at the zero-crossings, but then count cycles to accomplish duty cycle control. Those are even more "gratuitously complex" than the others, but perhaps they've gotten that sort of control down into the $0.80USD range. That's about the price it would have to be to find its way into a consumer electric blanket. LLoyd |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
On Sat, 10 Nov 2012 02:48:29 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote: My hot-wired blanket now works, and as far as the risk of fire goes, even at full blast, it's got a long long way to go before ignition... heh, famous last words, eh?? LOL It sounds like you're on a parallel path to what I have in my motorhome. It had 2 tired deep cycle batteries which I replaced and added a third. If I remember right I have about 1kwh capacity to 50%. I bought a 1000W true sine inverter on sale for $150. Now I have more battery capacity for running the furnace heavily overnight when dry camping in cold temperatures. And I don't have to use the generator nearly so often. Even the inverter microwave is OK at half power. In my rig the bedroom is at the back. It stays cool when the rest of the coach is toasty. I've considered getting an electric blanket and running it off the inverter and then turning down the furnace thermostat overnight. I should break even on the battery use and come out ahead on propane. One wrinkle is that the furnace has an outlet into the holding tank compartment. If I run the furnace too little in below freezing temperatures then I'd have to worry about the dump valves freezing. I've traveled in the off season and my record so far for being comfortable is 14 degrees Fahrenheit. Man the RV crowd really thins out when it gets cold. :) If I get a chance to experiment further I'll report here. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" lloydspinsidemindspring.com wrote in message . 3.70... "Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" lloydspinsidemindspring.com fired this volley in . 3.70: When a device only turns on and off at the AC zero crossings, we call it a "wire". Oh, and yes -- I know about those controllers that do switch only at the zero-crossings, but then count cycles to accomplish duty cycle control. Those are even more "gratuitously complex" than the others, but perhaps they've gotten that sort of control down into the $0.80USD range. That's about the price it would have to be to find its way into a consumer electric blanket. LLoyd A cheap pic could easily do that. It used to be a bi-metallic thermo switch. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
wrote in message
... ... The small standby UPS does no wave shaping when allowing the load to run on "line " voltage - and most are, at best, modified sine wave output. A UPS "modified sine wave" is a sequence of positive and negative square pulses at 160 to 170V, with enough off time between them to reduce the average (RMS?) voltage to 120V. I've seen the pulse width increase at higher loads that pulled down the peak voltage. An APC Smart-Ups has a pure sine output on battery. https://www.apc.com/products/family/index.cfm?id=165 Some of them can run off large external batteries without overheating. Check the surplus stores for used ones. The downloadable manual shows the simple but not obvious way to remove the old batteries. I just discovered that the sensor-logging feature of HWiNFO32 v4.06 freeware can record the run time of an unattended laptop on its battery, It captures the battery voltage, the power drain and the estimated percent of remaining capacity, which will show a sudden drop to empty if the battery's microcontroller IC needs to recalibrate itself with a full discharge cycle. http://www.hwinfo.com/ I use recording TV and displaying Internet weather radar as representative high and moderate power applications to check UPS run time. During an outage I wouldn't let it run idle on precious battery power though that's the easiest measurement to make. The Event Log will capture shutdown time. I haven't tried yet, but it should also show when the UPS or inverter powering the laptop plus your test load shuts off and the laptop switches to internal battery. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
m... That Bethany VOA site is now a stinking golf course. It went the way of the American values it promoted. |
Electric blankets, Gratuitous complexity??
Jim Wilkins wrote: "Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message m... That Bethany VOA site is now a stinking golf course. It went the way of the American values it promoted. It should have been turned into a museum. That site had a huge impact on W.W. II It went from an empty pasture, to the most up to date Short Wave Radio transmitter site in a very short period. It fed news & music to the world, and was a huge boost to morale. |
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