BMW’s iX3 is the company’s first normal-looking all-electric car | Circuit Breaker Parts

Usually called a Residual Current Device (RCD) or Earth Leakage Circuit Breaker (ELCB). Usually set on 30mA, but they take a small time to trip, which is dependent on how much current is leaking into the poor unfortunate 3D printerer. Much better than nothing, but not 100% guaranteed to save your life. I’d sooner leave mains voltage alone for things I’m tinkering with. I only mess with the mains for simple jobs, and then I’m very cautious.

i built the rig that day. I put an ammeter with max hold on a circuit, plugged the circuit into a known 20 amp connection, and put a load on the circuit that simulated the instrument. Turn it on, 22 amps max hold, 13 amps nominal.

Anyone know a good source of information for dummies on electromagnet math? I’d love to build one of those electro magnetic pan brakes, but blindly connecting 240VAC to a coil scares me.

(So your distribution wire can be thinner, and so cheaper, mainly because you have less current, but also because you can have a slightly higher voltage drop with less consequence !)

Hopefully one of these days we’ll go to significantly more DC distribution all over teh place, but I often wonder if I’ll see it in my lifetime. I thought I was imagining things when I was trying to remember if Japan was 50&60, but that’s pretty fascinating.

2. It’s very likely that this device will need to be used with extension cords in order to find two GFCI-free outlets in different phases. That, fundamentally, is why this project is – generally speaking – a bad idea. Still, extension cords can be used safely if you don’t draw too much current through them. The use notes in the article speak to the need to derate circuits appropriately. But that said, the derating doesn’t change just because you pull 240V instead of 120V.

My son replaced a C-Max with the regular hybrid version of a Niro recently. I would not use “reliable” and C-Max in the same sentence as it needed a new transmission at 77K miles (fortunately covered under a hybrid warranty), had a leaking engine (not covered under warranty), a Sync system that failed twice (covered under a special warranty extension that was about to expire), and numerous other problems mostly electrical in nature. We’ll see about the long-term reliability of the Kia but fuel economy has been in the high 40s (versus 35 for the C-Max) and all-around the Niro just feels like a much nicer car for less money. Personally I will definitely take a look at the plug-in version when I am next looking for a new car and it would be in the color of the one reviewed here so I hope it doesn’t get discontinued as Kia seems to like to do fairly often.

http://www.mikeholt.com/technical.php?id=grounding/unformatted/GroundResistance&type=u&title=Ground%20Resistance%20-%20It%27s%20Not%20What%20You%20Think%20%2812-30-99%29

I’ve thought about converting my Solidoodle 2 to 120v bed heating for ages now. I think it’s a good idea with a lot of benefits. I’ve been far to lazy to actually do it, however. Maybe one day I’ll get my act together. In the mean time I’ll just sit here and envy other people who have had the initiative to actually do it.

Typically, drivers are rated to handle surges in the range of 1 to 4 kV. The varistor, ranging from 7 to 14 mm in diameter, is usually located downstream of the fuse on the ac mains. However, to provide higher-level surge immunity for lighting installed outdoors in exposed surge environments, outdoor-lighting OEMs may want to add surge-protection devices (SPDs) on the ac input lines of their luminaires ahead of the LED driver.

It’s been a week and I am almost constantly having to keep the car charging while at home just to keep up. On my previous L2, I charged every 2 to 3 days. My first problem was the outlet closest to the driveway shares the circuit with the family room. Oops, popping the breaker every time. The front of the house outlet wasn’t any better. Luckily there is a basement outlet I can drive to and get a charge with no issues.

[Ron] does a nice job of explaining some basic concepts like using opto-isolators. However, the real value to the video is the easy way to interface to the existing controller. A little configuration into Home Automation rounds out the project.