Most reacted threads

The topic of DC breaker wiring polarity (ie, which side of the breaker is the source and which is the sink) has been raised a few times on the forum. I'm not sure if this clip has been posted before, but if not this is a must for everyone to watch.

While wandering around the interwebs I came across this observation of a certain elcheapo inverter. This is the high frequency design, not the low frequency models also under that name, but gives some good insight into just how bad they can be. Also mentioned is how a lot of high frequency...

We often talk about power losses / voltage drops / etc in cabling for PV systems and youtube spat out the latest John Ward clip at me today. Some people may find this useful.

Tech Ingredients, What you do when you get tired of that electric car ;)

Thought someone might find this interesting. As an aside, it also gives a very good indication of where all those 2nd hand batteries that are mentioned on the forum came from, how they have been used, and to what point their capacity has been degraded to at time of replacement.

Yes, I can just see the port. It's marked UART, but I can't work out where the cable goes.

Putting aside the obvious scam debunk the part that interested me was the heating pattern in the block of cheese. The corner heating makes sense when you think about the penetration depth of 2.4GHz.

As we all know we have to treat our batteries and cells properly. Poor quality cells won't accept a charge, and you can easily ruin a quality cell by overcharging. Here's a youtube guide, with a seasonal flare.

... and now we know why too! https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-09-17/stinging-tree-toxins-similar-cone-snail-venom-queensland/12669088

Interestingly youtube threw this WeberAuto clip up this morning, probably as a result of my recent viewing of LV arcing. It's a discussion of the amp rating, not the voltage rating, but worthwhile watching none-the-less. https://diysolarforum.com/threads/inverter-fuse-question.1669/#post-14727

Thought some people might find this interesting. In part 2 a dehumidifier gives a good demonstration of just how much current a conventional AC motor compressor draws at start up.

After a break due to injury the WeberAuto youtube channel is back in action. If you want a good look into the guts of an EV, complete and I mean complete teardowns etc, this is the channel for you. People into reusing EV batteries might also find the channel useful as he pulls down the battery...

Someone else is bound to find these more useful than the usual Y connectors. No comment as to them having any sort of regulatory approval but if a low voltage string of parallel panels is your game, they might be useful. https://www.solar-junction-box.com/Product/MC4-T-Branch-Connector.html

Another clip someone may find interesting, 30A wire fuse. Note the current and interval before it breaks. Now think back to that cheapie AC fan you bought from China and the ludicrously thin wire in its cord. Which will happen first? Your 15A (15A is the typical GPO circuit rating in...

This guy is really trying hard to improve powerjack inverters by reworking them, so that deserves praise, but even so clips like this show that they are non-too-flash. Starts playing 10mins 30 secs in where you can see the AC waveform going whacky under approx 80% load. Crikey, at 20 mins he...

Since there's a lot of DIYers here I thought some might be interested in watching this. It has an RMS mode which I'm sure will be useful to some reading this.

A different view on things.

Temperatures are mild, flowers are blooming and the birds are gouging people's eyes out.

Improve your personal security and enhance your safety with one of these

On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me.... oooone bin of rotten mangos. (what a b!)

A bigclive youtube clip that mentions the effects of DC flowing through an RCD/GFCI that is not rated for DC applications. I've mentioned DC vs RCDs in passing on the forum quite some time ago. Once upon a time you only need to be worried about DC from external sources but with the increasing...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-15/denham-near-shark-bay-first-wa-town-to-be-powered-by-hydrogen/11870472 The article references fuel cells but last time I heard they were prohibitively expensive, maybe there have been some breakthroughs in materials.

Thought someone might be interested in this run through of what's inside a typical cheapie inverter. Look at that overshoot around 20mins, ouch.

Queensland ute driver going 100kph uses knife to battle brown snake trying to bite him between his legs

bigclive pulls apart a car voltage stabliser, obviously its a fake product but the fake capacitors are the weird part. They've actually put the proper contents in the can, admiitedly radically undersized for the size of the can, but not added the electrolyte. That makes no sense. If they are...

I can't remember nor find the thread but I mentioned LED lamps improving and using multiple LED strings of different numbers of LEDs to spread the load across the AC wave, and also to reduce flicker / improve brightness. The diodegonewild youtube channel has done a clip that talks about this.