Comments by "eDoc2020" (@eDoc2020) on "Technology Connections" channel.

  1.  @andymerrett  A battery-powered ignitor would need battery replacement and a physical or piezo ignitor is is much more annoying. As almost every stove has an electric (or electronic) clock built in there's no reason not to use the same electricity for lighting the stove.
    54
  2. There are already systems which do most of this. On a recent series of This Old House they installed a Mitsubuishi system which does home heating/cooling and water heating.
    23
  3.  @2sk21  Most of the circuitry runs on AC, so snubber diodes would not work.
    14
  4.  @waycoolscootaloo  The NEC only requires two circuits for kitchen appliances and the dining room needs its own circuit. Until recently the dining room circuit could be shared with the kitchen so the OP's probably was code compliant when installed. Having said that, code compliant doesn't mean well-designed.
    13
  5. If we're talking about SanDisk, have you ever noticed their old (pre-2007) logo has sun rays? What's up with that? Answer: they used to be called SunDisk.
    12
  6. Central air conditioning US homes with gas heat is installed in exactly the same way. For plenty of people with this setup a conversion to hybrid heat pump should be fairly cheap with only a few valves and a new controller.
    9
  7. Extension cords!
    9
  8. Well there wouldn't be a problem if you had them all on the same circuit. The only way it would be unsafe is if the current rating of a wire is less than the circuit rating AND the maximum potential load on the wire is greater than its current rating. If each appliance is plugged directly into the wall it should all be safe.
    7
  9. I've only ever heard of those being used in RVs.
    7
  10.  @criticalevent  You're right that most electric vehicles can't be used for vehicle to grid but hopefully that gets improved over time. You're right that when you leave home your car can't power your home but that's literally what the grid is for. Other people's storage systems would help power your house during that time and if you plug in at your destination you could power your house using the grid as an interconnect. As for inverter gear, it's not $20000. A Sol-ark is $7000 and there are plenty of cheaper options. The permits needed aren't that special, they are the same as you'd need for grid-tie solar. Even if they don't let you feed back to the grid you can still use the energy to power your own house. I agree an EV with a discharged battery goes 0km. That's why you set discharge limits so you still maintain enough range for what you need to do.
    6
  11.  @criticalevent  First of all I don't like Elon Musk bullshit either. But saying you can't grid-tie storage systems anywhere in the US is simply false. I live in Massachusetts where you definitely can, and there are incentive programs (ConnectedSolutions) for doing so. In times of grid overload they do pay more for kWh then you paid to charge the battery. They can afford to do this because wholesale electricity prices are highly variable. Today (3/26/2022) in New England wholesale electricity was $49.43 at 12:00 and $91.28 at 1:00. As for getting a permit for a 100kWh grid tie storage unit on an extension cord in a driveway does sound a bit ridiculous. 30 years ago you would think the same of people saying anybody could create home videos and anybody anywhere in the world could watch them without the creator or the viewer needing to pay for the service. Today it's obviously feasible as anybody who watches YouTube would know. The 100kWh storage unit in the driveway looks more sane when you consider that the energy capacity probably wouldn't matter, only the actual power. Saying you have a portable 5kW inverter seems much more reasonable.
    6
  12.  @jasonreed7522  The ground wire isn't zero because R is tiny, it's zero because I is tiny. That's the only difference between ground and neutral, neutral carries current while ground doesn't. If a neutral wire breaks it will rise to 120v and this is why the ground wire is separate. And a bit more of a nitpicky thing, you can't ever use the neutral wire as a hot. In 240v applications you can put colored tape over the end of the white wire at which point it ceases to be a neutral wire.
    6
  13. CR and LF have different functions. The carriage return code resets the horizontal and the line feed code increments the vertical. And a bit related the delete (7F) code is all ones and (originally) does nothing. If you punched the wrong thing onto paper tape you could punch out the rest of the holes and the computer would ignore this.
    6
  14.  @Lizlodude  My guess for your magic socket is that it was originally wired as part of a multi-wire branch circuit where each half was fed from a separate breaker (possibly one of which was your garbage disposal one). If the outlet was replaced but the tab on the new one was not broken it would result in two breakers feeding the same outlet. This should trip both breakers instantly as they should be on opposite 120v legs, but they erroneously be on the same leg if the wiring was modified at some point. This would be dangerous because the single neutral wire could then be tasked with carrying the current from two circuits. TLDR: A doubly-botched multi-wire branch circuit (MWBC) will only appear dead if two breakers are turned off at the same time. MWBCs are a great way to safely save on wire but can become unsafe if their breakers are moved around improperly.
    5
  15. Honestly if he started taking it apart he would most likely find the packet of basic service data. That would include a wiring diagram with the answers he is looking for.
    5
  16.  veevyo  I got my TI-84 Plus SE for exactly $1 at an estate sale. If you're going to brag about your discount it should be substantial. Plus mine is so much faster.
    5
  17. There's one brand (Mr. Cool) which produces DIY-capable mini-split heat pumps which don't require special tools. If they're legal in your area it's definitely worth checking out.
    5
  18. I was going to say pretty much the same thing.
    5
  19. Ring circuits. When 32 amp breakers protect 20 amp wires there's the potential for things to go horribly wrong. If there's a break in the ring all of the current can go through one wire without tripping the breaker. Even if there's good ring continuity if all of the load is on one end of the circuit most of the current will go through that half.
    5
  20. I thought the flow kept getting interrupted, but then he really made an impact.
    5
  21.  @IkBenBenG  I've never heard of pinball machines between full EM and near all electronically controlled. The ones I've seen worked on on from the late 70s use a switch matrix going to the MPU and most coils and controlled lamps are directly run from a driver board. A few coils like flippers and pop bumpers might be run by switches but all the logic is done electronically.
    5
  22. I feel much the same. Gas engines are generally 35% efficient at the high end so whole house generators are going to be fairly worse, totally tanking at lower load levels. And most of the time they will run at these lower load levels. I'd guesstimate the generator would be running at around 20% efficiency, meaning you'd need a heat pump COP of 5 to be a more efficient use of gas. Directing the hot air coming off the generator into the cold air intake of the heat pump would probably work reasonably well to boost the system efficiency. AFAIK most whole house generators are air cooled so it would be hard to use their waste heat directly. If you have a water-cooled generator it would theoretically be easier as you could use the engine as a boiler in a hydronic heating system. This is such a good idea automakers have been using this for cabin heating in ICE cars for ages.
    5
  23. And adding a heat pump is just about the same as adding a cooling-only unit. The main difference is in the thermostat wiring.
    4
  24. IMO direct linkage of steering and braking is more important. Electronic throttle body cause too much harm when the brakes can overpower the engine and you can kill the ignition power.
    4
  25. Then we can start badgering you about only having 400v where here in the US we use 277/480v in industrial applications.
    4
  26.  veevyo  When I got my calculator the color ones had just come out and the new 84SE was probably around $140 as well. The rechargeable battery in the color model is also a curse because it doesn't last as long. I ran my mono model with 3 rechargeable AAAs (and a paper clip in the fourth slot) for several months between recharging. More recently I did in fact use a Li-ion battery. I'm not saying you didn't get a good deal. It's just fun to sometimes 1-up another person.
    4
  27. @weetwteqtwtwwt The inability to heat without electricity is already a problem with 99% of existing gas heat installations. Relying on heat pumps won't change that at all.
    4
  28. Aren't those the lyrics of Hey Jude?
    4
  29.  @KinkyTurtle  I'm sure any version after the first wouldn't respond to applause, and I would suspect the original non-MCU one wouldn't respond either. I think it's much more likely it was a fake demonstration with somebody manning the lights.
    4
  30. If you're looking for something specific it's often helpful to try different search engines. What's impossible to find with one might be the first result in another and vice versa.
    4
  31. All the US light switches I've seen are rated for at least 15 amps. Maybe not really old ones but the cheapo sub-$1 ones at the store are certainly rated 15 amps. Whether or not it's wise to run them at 15 amps is another matter.
    4
  32.  @wojtek-33  That problem could be overcome by reading (in addition to education). Appliances always come with a label saying how much they power they need and extension cords always come with a label stating their maximum allowable load. If any of these aren't available all of our power cords made in the past several decades have the gauge printed on the cable.
    4
  33. If you have central AC then it is always worth it to add heat pump functionality, at least in terms of operational costs. If you don't remove your existing heating system you can choose whichever is more economical at the time.
    4
  34.  @Barracuda48082  Absorption refrigerators use much more energy than typical compressor-based refrigerators. And 12v LED bulbs are similar efficiency to 120v ones, not that it matters because the power is low either way. The problem with burning hydrogen is there's a lot of energy lost during electrolysis if you generate it from water.
    4
  35.  @lemagreengreen  Technically you can't on mine because it doesn't have a power button. You turn the knob to start the desired cycle. It's really just one mechanically-programmed cycle but the different settings (heavy, medium, light) just skip past the first prewash cycles.
    3
  36. Going uphill uses tons more battery, but going downhill actually recharges the battery. Assuming you're making round trips you shouldn't lose much overall range.
    3
  37. Runs the AM Stereo website, comments about AM radios. Makes sense.
    3
  38. Same here. There hasn't been a TC video dedicated about it but I think Alec has mentioned the shift from physical tactile controls to touchscreens and the like. I just find it annoying but it also presents an accessibility problem, something Alec also has opinions on.
    3
  39. Regarding replacing incandescent car lighting with LEDs, this warning only applies to exterior lighting. It's okay to replace the interior lighting as this does not need to meet DOT requirements. With LEDs you can make the inside lights brighter and much more useful.
    3
  40.  @paulhaynes8045  The systems being discussed here heat air directly instead of using water and radiators. However, there are similar systems which work for water-based heating systems. They would be installed in the same loop as the existing boiler. Danish YouTuber Morten Hjorth has such a system and has some videos discussing it on his channel My Playhouse.
    3
  41.  @Luke357  I don't believe you about your laptop charger. 5 amps at 120 volts would be 600 watts so it would be burning up with that much power. 5 amps output is reasonable when your laptop is working hard and/or charging at full speed but that's at only 20 volts. Average load of 10 amps would mean (assuming 240v service) 12,024 kWh/year (or 1,1752 kWh/month). EIA says average American hosehold is only 10,500 kWh per year.
    3
  42.  @greggv8  That's what I mean. Lack of population is more of a barrier to public transportation than long distances. As for city people vs rural people, there are indeed different needs and one should not force their own values at the detriment to others.
    3
  43.  @gregorymalchuk272  GU10 is just another base for line-voltage bulbs. As such, it provides no* benefit over the standard screw base. What we need is a standard form factor for flat "light engines" as they are often called. *An actual benefit of GU10 over ES is that it is more compact.
    3
  44.  @ps.2  Not as efficient because it's not a heat pump.
    3
  45.  @ps.2  I didn't say that, but I did misread the OP's comment as electric heat in general. But you're right, compared to dumb resistive heating the efficiency is the same. Ideally for heating you'd be using an electronically-controlled heat pump which could sense and automatically throttle its output to avoid exceeding your service. This technology is pretty common for EVSEs at least in the UK (where I do not live) and there's no reason it can't be on heating as well.
    3
  46.  @FowlerAskew  I haven't had that exact fault. On my first cheap DMM the barrel of the jack came loose and got pushed into the shunt bar, leading to the same result. Resoldering those barrels fixed it and made the meter more reliable; beforehand it was a bit flaky.
    3
  47. @Nigel Cam I'm assuming you haven't driven an electric car. Most people who have will tell you that they are far from glorified golf carts. In fact they generally offer better performance than gasoline cars, especially in terms of low speed acceleration.
    3
  48.  @valleyofiron125  Not to be too pedantic, but do you mean pedantic instead of padantic? Also, I don't have a fingerer. Do you mean finger?
    3
  49.  @mmmhorsesteaks  Ground fault interruption is usually handled by a device downstream of the breaker. The receptacle underneath Alec's panel has an integrated GFCI (which may also protect additional downstream outlets.) This is the standard setup in the US.
    3
  50. You could have it set up to turn on a light when you get out of bed.
    3