# Bad Weather



## exmar (Jun 29, 2015)

We haven't had an outage longer than a couple of hours for probably 7-8 years. Last night, that changed. Lost power at 7 during a "Tornado warning/High wind event," Initially restoration was scheduled for 2AM, now it's "We cannot provide a power restoration time." Never saw that message from AEP before. Cell phone is full of text alerts (NIXIE) listing roads closed due to trees/power lines down. I was initially going out to the barn to get a generator, but, looking out and seeing the rain moving horizontally due to high wind, decided that could wait. This morning, connected the generator, up and running, perishables in frig and freezer are fine. Frig was only opened once to transfer some items to a camping chest along with some frozen milk jugs of ice. Ice being refrozen right now as I only run the gen about 12 hours a day during outages. 

Naturally the forecast is 96 today and 98 tomorrow, won't run the big AC, but have a window unit I can put in for one end of the house. This little excitement is nothing to those of you who live in Hurricane areas, but Mother Nature has a way of popping up when you don't expect it. 

So, for all the posts about how often to check your generator, etc. don't have a schedule for you, but establish something and follow it, I'm glad I did and everything is working according to plan.


----------



## Browse Deweb (Jan 16, 2021)

exmar said:


> We haven't had an outage longer than a couple of hours for probably 7-8 years. Last night, that changed. Lost power at 7 during a "Tornado warning/High wind event," Initially restoration was scheduled for 2AM, now it's "We cannot provide a power restoration time." Never saw that message from AEP before. Cell phone is full of text alerts (NIXIE) listing roads closed due to trees/power lines down. I was initially going out to the barn to get a generator, but, looking out and seeing the rain moving horizontally due to high wind, decided that could wait. This morning, connected the generator, up and running, perishables in frig and freezer are fine. Frig was only opened once to transfer some items to a camping chest along with some frozen milk jugs of ice. Ice being refrozen right now as I only run the gen about 12 hours a day during outages.
> 
> Naturally the forecast is 96 today and 98 tomorrow, won't run the big AC, but have a window unit I can put in for one end of the house. This little excitement is nothing to those of you who live in Hurricane areas, but Mother Nature has a way of popping up when you don't expect it.
> 
> So, for all the posts about how often to check your generator, etc. don't have a schedule for you, but establish something and follow it, I'm glad I did and everything is working according to plan.


Been watching Ryan Hall Y'all on Youtube when there is bad weather. He and his team do a great job with storm chasing and reporting. I'm glad I live in the Northeast, where we get some moderate but infrequent storms, but nothing like the stuff you guys see in the great plains states and tornado alley. I was pondering where we might move to in retirement for a lower cost of living, and there are so many places in the US that have crazy conditions...from draught, to hurricanes, derechos, tornados, earthquakes. I may just stay put.


----------



## speedy2019 (Jan 29, 2019)

Except for having to get the gen out of the barn and set it up, but I would probably store my gen in a shed or undercover if I wasn't chair bound aswel.... I have mine all setup by the side of my house with a extension cable running inside the house from the gen.. So all I need todo go a few meters outside my house, remove the weatherproof cover, start the gen up then plug in my stuff from within the house, then let the rest of my family deal with keeping it topped up with fuel... Plus it makes monthly excercise runs easy todo


----------



## GenKnot (Dec 20, 2021)

We have been having outages here in north Texas due to extreme heat. One Dallas TV weatherman (who lives in Plano, TX) said he was without power for 30 hours at his house. Nice to have gen and window A/C just in case!









Electricity Customers Report Long Outages in North Texas


As temperatures soared into the triple digits this weekend, some Oncor customers dealt with power outages for more than 24 hours. The energy company says the heat is putting additional stress on its equipment.




www.nbcdfw.com


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

GenKnot said:


> We have been having outages here in north Texas due to extreme heat. One Dallas TV weatherman (who lives in Plano, TX) said he was without power for 30 hours at his house. Nice to have gen and window A/C just in case!
> 
> 
> 
> ...


We haven't had any outages here but I have noticed we're getting some unusual voltage sags during the day. It was down to 110 VAC yesterday afternoon. I've never seen it that low before. That tells me the grid is under a heavy load. We are already getting heat indexes well into the triple digits. The high pressure systems that stall over the state prevent rain, so there's nothing to stop the insane temperatures.


----------



## GenKnot (Dec 20, 2021)

LaSwamp said:


> I have noticed we're getting some unusual voltage sags during the day. It was down to 110 VAC yesterday afternoon.


Yes, I have noticed some voltage sags too, but not down to 110. An interesting thing I found a few months ago is that voltage is not necessarily a sign of impending doom. It is grid frequency that is monitored. I would never have thought that.


----------



## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

GenKnot said:


> Yes, I have noticed some voltage sags too, but not down to 110.


Supposedly, delivered voltage in the range of 105-132VAC is considered acceptable.

However the NEC is stricter than that:
National Electrical Code [NEC 210.19 (A)] specifies an acceptable drop of 5% to farthest outlet, which is 114 volts. The NEC does not specify maximum voltage, but plus 5% is the accepted standard. This puts the acceptable voltage range of a nominal 120-volt receptacle at between 114 and 126 volts.​​


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

tabora said:


> Supposedly, delivered voltage in the range of 105-132VAC is considered acceptable.
> 
> However the NEC is stricter than that:
> National Electrical Code [NEC 210.19 (A)] specifies an acceptable drop of 5% to farthest outlet, which is 114 volts. The NEC does not specify maximum voltage, but plus 5% is the accepted standard. This puts the acceptable voltage range of a nominal 120-volt receptacle at between 114 and 126 volts.​​
> View attachment 12060


I didn't have any issues, but it was weird to see. The fan for the fridge seemed to sound a bit off, but I don't know if that was due to the lowered VAC. When I get home, I'll check to see what the frequency is. We're in the middle of a heat wave that looks like it's going to last at least another two weeks. Ugh, it's nasty outside.


----------



## GenKnot (Dec 20, 2021)

tabora said:


> Supposedly, delivered voltage in the range of 105-132VAC is considered acceptable.


Many years ago, when I was a kid, the normal voltage was about 105. Over the decades it has gone up...110, 115, 120, and now 125. We normally run about 121 to 125 at our house. On these hot days with everyone running their A/C I see going down to 118-122.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

exmar said:


> We haven't had an outage longer than a couple of hours for probably 7-8 years. Last night, that changed. Lost power at 7 during a "Tornado warning/High wind event," Initially restoration was scheduled for 2AM, now it's "We cannot provide a power restoration time." Never saw that message from AEP before. Cell phone is full of text alerts (NIXIE) listing roads closed due to trees/power lines down. I was initially going out to the barn to get a generator, but, looking out and seeing the rain moving horizontally due to high wind, decided that could wait. This morning, connected the generator, up and running, perishables in frig and freezer are fine. Frig was only opened once to transfer some items to a camping chest along with some frozen milk jugs of ice. Ice being refrozen right now as I only run the gen about 12 hours a day during outages.
> 
> Naturally the forecast is 96 today and 98 tomorrow, won't run the big AC, but have a window unit I can put in for one end of the house. This little excitement is nothing to those of you who live in Hurricane areas, but Mother Nature has a way of popping up when you don't expect it.
> 
> So, for all the posts about how often to check your generator, etc. don't have a schedule for you, but establish something and follow it, I'm glad I did and everything is working according to plan.


stay safe exmar!
yea 100 deg days are here in iowa.
so far no storms yet....
but will all that heat it can pop up BAD storms out of nowhere!
i got cooked a bit this early am here trying to get gear back up and running for the construction clients...
i knocked off at 8 am when the sun was over the shade of the trees...
it was nice for 1/2 an hour at 5:30 to 6:00 am 
the wind came up and the temps dropped at least 5 deg.

electric utility has temp set backs on our smart thermostat today...
so far no brown out on electric.
i am ready just in case.

hey that brings up a great idea.
yea i know it costs 2-3 times as much as grid utility.
but if we switched over to our gens during the peak times that would help the national grid.

yea a tesla wall system looks good for days like today...
i could run the temp where i need it...
and charge at night... when the power is cheaper.

looking at pulling the trigger on the inverter portable air con unit this weekend...

stay safe out there!


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

I just checked. The wall is giving 60 Hz at 109 VAC. That's the lowest I have ever seen it. Seems we're getting pretty close to the lower limit. Don't know what the means, but it can't be good.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

LaSwamp said:


> I just checked. The wall is giving 60 Hz at 109 VAC. That's the lowest I have ever seen it. Seems we're getting pretty close to the lower limit. Don't know what the means, but it can't be good.


WOW!
that is low!
most appliances throw a fit at 108 vac... the start sag gets below the 70 volts ac...
and the current is way way high at the lower voltages...


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

ya made me go look
right now at my location in iowa 6:18 pm 06/14/2022
sitting at a low L1 at 118 vac- L2 at 117 vac here on a grid power that is normal of 126 vac.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

iowagold said:


> WOW!
> that is low!
> most appliances throw a fit at 108 vac... the start sag gets below the 70 volts ac...
> and the current is way way high at the lower voltages...


Oh wow. My main UPS just let out a loud click. It's activated what's called Boost AVR. It's outputting a VAC of 128 now. I didn't know it had that feature. The other UPS is showing 109 VAC. I guess it does not have a power boost like the big one does. 

This is really weird.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

yea always get the buc boost ups units for proper avr.

my big apc units i use have that.
but at 600 bucks each used they better have it lol!


----------



## OrlyP (Oct 19, 2021)

It seems that the power utilities have raised the nominal voltage without notice. When I was young we had 220V. In my teens, this was raised to around 230V and the only reason we noticed it was because it was burning out incandescent bulbs at an unusual rate. Not to mention having the TV repairman around more often than I thought they should. Today, we're at around 237-240V.

As I kid, I also took a liking on reading my grandfather's stash of vintage 1950s Popular Science. Loved the Carl and Jerry short stories... Anyway, I became aware as well that the US once had 110V, then 115V, 117, and then finally 120V... one of my many takeaways from reading old literature.

On the buck-boost/AVR feature, they're fairly standard on everything but the cheapest basic UPS. I've got them on my sensitive electronics... servers, computers, entertainment center. If any, having an AVR feature does prolong the life of the UPS battery.


----------



## GenKnot (Dec 20, 2021)

👆 Yup, 220V went to 240V just like 110-115V went to 120-125V. Just for fun I looked at the back of my old scope...


----------



## exmar (Jun 29, 2015)

tabora said:


> Supposedly, delivered voltage in the range of 105-132VAC is considered acceptable.
> 
> However the NEC is stricter than that:
> National Electrical Code [NEC 210.19 (A)] specifies an acceptable drop of 5% to farthest outlet, which is 114 volts. The NEC does not specify maximum voltage, but plus 5% is the accepted standard. This puts the acceptable voltage range of a nominal 120-volt receptacle at between 114 and 126 volts.​​
> View attachment 12060





tabora said:


> Supposedly, delivered voltage in the range of 105-132VAC is considered acceptable.
> 
> However the NEC is stricter than that:
> National Electrical Code [NEC 210.19 (A)] specifies an acceptable drop of 5% to farthest outlet, which is 114 volts. The NEC does not specify maximum voltage, but plus 5% is the accepted standard. This puts the acceptable voltage range of a nominal 120-volt receptacle at between 114 and 126 volts.​​
> View attachment 12060



I think some of the confusion stems from Mfg's power requirements or voltage or whatever they used to call it. Seems like "105-032VAC" was around for years, which was valid, but the NEC is much more strict and looks at the wire size, outlet and envelops things nicely.


----------



## exmar (Jun 29, 2015)

Power just came back for us, a lot of this area is still dark. No reported injuries, but several roofs, lots of trees, utility poles and miscellaneous items became airborne and will become clean up targets after the next couple of days in the mid 90's are past.

As I said earlier, while I have no schedule for testing, etc. back up generators, it is important to have something that is easily incorporated into your lifestyle. IF you do nothing else, just a visual inspection for rodent or other foreign invasion is critical. Observing something that shouldn't be there should then trigger a more detailed evaluation, exercising the machine and reviewing your outage plan against your current lifestyle if it's been awhile since the last significant power issue, 7-8 years in my case.

I attempted to not only share a unusual weather event which did significant damage, but how my informal plan worked. e.g. Camping cooler, frozen milk jugs of water, small window AC, 12 hour run time, no advance warning, just happened. So, the plan we've evolved over the years when power disruptions were more common still worked. Hopefully, this will provide some insight or point of departure for you to evaluate your situation.

Ten month old gas with regular Stabil, started first pull. 5W-30 Synthetic oil, generator disconnect with power inlet connector, open frame generator. Two desktops and one laptop, cell phones, frig, freezer, modems, flat screen TV, tower which provides internet and local volunteer FD radio transmission and county emergency services relay and boost. Everything worked fine during and after the event.


----------



## zz28zz (Nov 24, 2021)

Good to hear your plan worked out. Goes to show that a little preparation goes a long way. Great idea with the water jugs in the freezer. 

Yesterday, we had our first actual power failure since installing the back-up genset. 4000+ customers for abt 1 hr. Not sure why. Maybe heat related?? Been >100 degs for days now. 

Anyway, genny worked flawlessly. Saw the lights go out, counted to 20 and everything was back on. Never even got out of my chair.  Automation is awesome when it works..


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

the jugs help on a partial full freezer as well to keep it at a better run..
a full freezer works better on the chest style.
large uprights are for commercial in my book ....
you open the door and all of the cold runs out on the floor...

the chest style works well for roughing it...
we are still at 119 vac right now.
so far all of the storms went north of us.


----------



## Browse Deweb (Jan 16, 2021)

Just checked my grid power and it's 114 VAC. Not too hot in NY, but last week the grid was at 117 VAC on a cooler day. I wonder what it will sag to when we have a heat wave.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

not sure if it is with national grid voltage as low?
i thought the local house transformers set the voltage at the user level....


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

I've never seen it dip as low as 109 before. And we still have plenty of this heat wave to go.


----------



## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

iowagold said:


> not sure if it is with national grid voltage as low?
> i thought the local house transformers set the voltage at the user level....


I think it's a direct coil relationship (no smart regulation) in the residential transformer, correct? If so, then if the line 7,200 volts drops to 6,600 volts, then you'd get 110 volts on the house legs.









I believe that the regulation occurs at the feeder substations to the extent that it can...








_Loads connected along the length of the feeder will see different voltage levels with the load at the far-end of the feeder seeing the lowest voltage of all. This is illustrated by the solid line in the figure above. Note that this line indicates the voltage at the substation end of the feeder is 1.02pu. However, the voltage at feeder far-end is about 0.97pu (residential customers would be seeing about 116 volts instead of 120). If the load were to increase, the far-end voltage would drop to an even lower value. As a result, we must regulate the voltage along the feeder as the load varies. Ways to do this include substation load tap-changing transformers (LTCs), substation feeder or bus voltage regulators as shown above, line voltage regulators, and fixed or switched shunt capacitors._​


iowagold said:


> we are still at 119 vac right now.


We are at 119.5V / 120.0V on the two legs here in Maine, as well. Normally it's 122ish.


----------



## exmar (Jun 29, 2015)

This is AEP's comments about what happened. Scary thing is they cut power to hospitals? "The times they are a changing....." 

AEP, love 'em or hate 'em, (rate structures), they're usually not surprised by weather or other events which could affect power distribution. Kind of a joke, we don't need a weather app, just look at the latest email from AEP advising what we should know and do to have least effect on power.



https://www.yahoo.com/news/aep-says-very-very-unusual-190125223.html


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

ty tab
hummm
so the grid needs buck boost as well...
lol
yea i thought the local transformer had the auto reg built in...
maybe in a future reality?
lol
these days with all the new tech i would think they would have it regulated at street level...

glad we have a plan for sure.
hey that brings up a great question.
do they make a buck boost for 200 amps at 120/240?
that might be a good thing to develop for future...

so how many amps can a current production power wall produce?
if it had buck boost then it could use the battery to make up the difference if it went real low..
if it could use the grid till it gets lets say 80 volts on L1 or 160 at the 240...

most inverters need 20% more than the output to work right with no thermal issues...
in winter that heat could be used for heating the house...
summer like right now with 100 deg days in the shade..
that might be tricky at best to keep things cool.

just food for thought.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

looks like another over 100 deg F heat event here in Iowa for the 20th and 21st june 2022.
is this the result from the sun solar flare? or is some other earth event doing this?

if the sun spikes we could have an em event as well...


the cell phones are not working right during the day...
not sure if it is the heat or em wave distortion.
the tri field meter has been off the charts this week...
way higher than normal.

this could affect the grid if it gets 2x higher..


----------



## exmar (Jun 29, 2015)

exmar said:


> This is AEP's comments about what happened. Scary thing is they cut power to hospitals? "The times they are a changing....."
> 
> AEP, love 'em or hate 'em, (rate structures), they're usually not surprised by weather or other events which could affect power distribution. Kind of a joke, we don't need a weather app, just look at the latest email from AEP advising what we should know and do to have least effect on power.
> 
> ...


Neglected to mention that power was cut to two hospitals which isn't in the protocols, but this event somehow took precedent and they were automatically cut, though power was restored. Hospitals usually have their own power generators, but those come into play in a critical event, this wasn't, just load shedding to try to keep the grid up. I guess the protocols will have to be audited for the unforeseen, unanticipated and never happened before.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

the heck of it is most of the hospitals do not have 100% power backup.
just for the er and maybe intensive care as well as labs.
just the areas that have fridge or breathing gear as well as monitors for heart...

some of that gear has battery on board to help with the switch over time.

as long as they have NG connection or LP in the tanks.
they are set for a while...

gas stations need generators....
a couple in our area now have that.
and use ups units on the pumps and registers for the readout.

the hospitals and biz also need internet so a sat phone connection would be a great idea!
at least for the storm devastated areas...
they could still use cards for payment to be able to sell things.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

It got back down to 109 here yesterday afternoon, causing my UPS to bump up the power. It's 117 now and it's early morning. The power draw from all of the a/c units should be the lowest. I don't know what the means, but it cannot be good.


----------



## speedy2019 (Jan 29, 2019)

iowagold said:


> the heck of it is most of the hospitals do not have 100% power backup.
> just for the er and maybe intensive care as well as labs.
> just the areas that have fridge or breathing gear as well as monitors for heart...
> 
> some of that gear has battery on board to help with the switch over time.


Thats how I use my UPS so I dont have any power loss to some devices, plug in the UPS to the generator within a hr before the battery dies during a power outage.


----------



## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

LaSwamp said:


> It got back down to 109 here yesterday afternoon, causing my UPS to bump up the power. It's 117 now and it's early morning.


Are you quite a way down the feeder line? That would certainly account for localized voltage drop if there are a lot of heavy users upstream from you. It would be interesting to measure the voltage at a house near the supply end of the feeder.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

tabora said:


> Are you quite a way down the feeder line? That would certainly account for localized voltage drop if there are a lot of heavy users upstream from you. It would be interesting to measure the voltage at a house near the supply end of the feeder.


I'm not sure, but I live in a fairly rural area. I may be pretty far away from the supply source. The heat this summer has been miserable already, and we're not even in the hottest months yet. August and September are awful. They are also the big hurricane months here.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

It's now 108. That's the lowest I've seen. We're in the middle of a heat wave here, so there's that. I'm wondering if I may need to inform Entergy.

ETA: It got down to 107. Yikes.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

yea swamp i would give them a shout out.
it could be a local transformer or a BIG grid thing...
they can help on both.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

When I got up this morning, it was back to 120. But, it's early morning here so demand on the grid is fairly low. I'll send a message to Entergy and let them know what's up.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

snap pix and keep records swamp.
i even shoot video if it is up and down.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

iowagold said:


> snap pix and keep records swamp.
> i even shoot video if it is up and down.


I called Entergy this morning and told them about the VAC sag. They are going to look into it and let me know. If it's a local transformer that's about to go out, perhaps they can get it replaced before it blows.


----------



## pipe (Jun 27, 2021)

Would someone have a recommendation for a Home based logging application, hardware, software included?

Years ago, one of our homes had a toroid coil based logging system, mains isolated outside wall box and inside (some random open wall socket-ie. the spot inside did not matter..) the house there was a small black box (literally, it had no physical display). It allowed for a local router IP address (192.168.1.xxx) address setup and it collected data up to 30 days (programmable interval). Format was xls/xlsx.
If voltage/amps surged or dropped, the resolution was in milliseconds so it was easy to zoom in to specific events and it even had ability to setup a SMS or email alert via the wifi connection. When connected to a UPS, it worked even in the case of a long/short blackout and recorded the duration.

That company no longer exists but something like this would be nice.


----------



## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

pipe said:


> Would someone have a recommendation for a Home based logging application, hardware, software included?


I bought an inexpensive (was $12K+ new) Dranetz PP1 on eBay for $29.99 plus $19 shipping... I'm sure there are much better inexpensive WiFi-enabled devices out there now...


----------



## pipe (Jun 27, 2021)

...and you can leave this Dranetz PP1 permanently connected to mains outside ?


----------



## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

pipe said:


> ...and you can leave this Dranetz PP1 permanently connected to mains outside ?


Heck no! It's installed inside near my main panel. I ran it to monitor and balance loads when I first installed my new generator, and then left it running for a couple of months to get a sense of how stable my grid voltage is (very). More recently, I made a little two-meter box that's attached to the panel all the time, so I only turn on the Dranetz when I want to monitor/record something. Picture shows the little meter box before I installed the new amperage couplers.


----------



## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

i have switches on my meters as well..
i now only use the meters when on gen set to watch my load in summer...
air con units zap a lot of power.

winter i run at 900 to 1000 watts.
that is with the furnace fan locked to on to limit inrush one time at startup be fore kicking in the rest of the house.
fridge, chest freezer and led lights as well as the computer gear.


----------



## LaSwamp (Mar 16, 2021)

Entergy seems to have fixed the voltage sag. The past couple of afternoons when power use was at the highest, VAC remained at around 117-118. That's a huge improvement.


----------

