Power Planner experience
Power Planner experience
(OP)
Does anybody have experience with the Power Planner savings device unit ? if so can you share it with me ?
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Power Planner experience
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Power Planner experiencePower Planner experience(OP)
Does anybody have experience with the Power Planner savings device unit ? if so can you share it with me ?
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RE: Power Planner experience
http://chuck-wright.com/powerplanner.html
http://www.energysmart.com/newsodsa.htm
http://www.energysmart.com/
http://www.uahc.org/ct/tbd/tbdppform.html
etc. for more info
RE: Power Planner experience
MarkE is a contributor to this board. His site is www.lmphotonics.com. He has a discussion of the practicality of the approach. Also search on NASA/Nola device.
Then, grab your wallet and run in the other direction.
RE: Power Planner experience
RE: Power Planner experience
Then there is www.energyautomation.com they are strictly a PF controller they also claim to save 20-30% in energy savings and guarntee the savings. I don't know how real these claims are. If these products are so real why are they not widely used.Any experts on this subject can shed some light?
RE: Power Planner experience
Please, do a subject search at this site. It has been fairly thoroughly discussed (and no waiting for responses!)
RE: Power Planner experience
Something else , has some one take a look of www.kwhsavings.com ? I would like to read some comments on that too? thanks.
RE: Power Planner experience
The bottom line is that you can only save a portion of the energy being wasted.
The web site that you mention www.kwhsavings.com states that many motors are running at about half load. This could be true, and continues that because of this, "huge amounts of excess energy are wasted" I would suggest that this is not the case. If you look at the efficiency curve of induction motors, you find that it does not fall significantly till well below half load. In fact, under some circumstances, from an efficiency stand point, you are better to run a larger motor at reduced load than a smaller motor at full load!
Your figures for savings are not unrealistic in the right applications. Some applications will result in negative savings.
Best regards,
Mark Empson
http://www.lmphotonics.com
RE: Power Planner experience
Looks like you 2 have the most experience & knowledge in this area. Although Mark's site www.imphotonics.com deals in great deal on this subject.
I am looking for direct answer to direct question of COMPARO DOES ANY BODY (OTHER THAN THE MANUFCATURER) HAS EXPERINCE USING POWER PLANNER & ITS EFFECTIVENESS AS ENERGYSAVING DEVICE?
How about the other vendors with similar products. DO they do the job they claim?
www.powerefficiencycorp.com
www.kwhsavings.com
www.savawatt.com
www.somar.co.uk
www.electricflo.com
www.energyautomation.com
Thanks
RE: Power Planner experience
and you power2engineer , I back you up completely with you request. I just wonder if some one has investigated all these impressive testimonnials of energy savings ?, for example when you look into energysmart.com
RE: Power Planner experience
I have had considerable experience with the technology, but not with the brands that you mention. I was heavily involved with product development and commisioning in the early days of the technology, so I am talking from experience, not just theory.
Good luck with your quest to find some real recommendations.
Best regards,
Mark Empson
http://www.lmphotonics.com
RE: Power Planner experience
RE: Power Planner experience
What do you need to know about the power planner. I have more than 35 of their units attached to various motors in my plant. Which Planner do you have? Power Planner I, II, or III. Also what is the size of the planner (10-850amps). What type of motor are you using it on? I will be glad to give you some helpful tips on getting the most energy savings available.
RE: Power Planner experience
Hi Marke, it is a pitty that you do not have any experience with the Power Planner. Dan Bach , the owner of energysmart.com has patented the improved technology from Nola. you can read about it in the webpage from patent office. the thing is that even that I followed very careful their instructions how to calibrate the P.P. and what application is right for , I never get those beautiful savings they mention
///The mentioned beautiful savings may be under worst conditions, i.e. the most energy wasteful conditions. Apparently, these most energy wasteful conditions are not everywhere.\\\
RE: Power Planner experience
It would be nice if these guys would drop the act and give us some hard evidence that these devices work and actually save a substantial amount of energy in the average installation.
Unfortunately in the twenty odd years since this device was patented (as I understand it) by Frank Nola ....it has never ever lived up to the claims of its promoters .
Why is it that this device is ONLY being marketed heavily by companies on the fringe of electrical engineering ?? . Do the boffins at Siemens , ABB or Allen Bradley not know enough to take advantage of this incredible money saver ??
The answer is that in the average installation .....with a correctly rated Motor ....there is just not enough energy to be saved .The companies mentioned above KNOW that ...and will not risk their reputations by overpromoting a feature that has dubious advantages.
In other words , customers are being misled .
or perhaps conned would be a better word .
RE: Power Planner experience
Well said!!
I would add, that it is not just with correctly sized motors that there is nothing to be gained. The claims made are often that many motors are oversized, therefore there is lots of energy to be saved. Look at the efficiency curves of induction motors and it becomes obvious that the motor needs to be operating at less than about 30% load for the efficiency to fall significantly. In other words, you need to be using a motor, not 50% oversized, but 200 - 300% oversized before you will begin to achieve results, small that thery are!!
Additionally, claims of new technology working significantly better than the original technology proposed by Nola and others can not alter the basic characteristics of the induction motor, just optimise the voltage applied to minimise the losses occuring. You can only save part of what is being wasted, or to put it another way, you can sometimes improve the operating efficiency of the motor by optimising the voltage applied.
Best regards,
Mark Empson
http://www.lmphotonics.com
RE: Power Planner experience
"" You can only save part of what is being wasted, or to put it another way, you can sometimes improve the operating efficiency of the motor by optimizing the voltage applied.""
Yes, this is true; especially, if a motor has a very high efficiency. Then, there is not much room left for energy savings, if that motor is properly applied and with an appropriate load, i.e. stable and continuous load.
Some room for energy savings may be left in switching from the rotary motion to the linear motion, e.g. from rotating machinery to linear motion machinery, if the mechanical application favors it. Then, the motor-load set efficiency is scrutinized.
RE: Power Planner experience
I am surprised you have managed to save as much as 5 or 6%. Based on feedback from others (second hand information, not from practical experience) 2 to 3% appears to be the norm.
Great post HarryDampers. Sounds like a network marketers dream come true! I suspect some day soon, you'll have someone from AMWAY (or similar) knocking at your door with one of these 'you beaut' devices under his arm.
Regards,
GGOSS
RE: Power Planner experience
Rockwell Automation/Allen Bradley and for that matter many other manufacturers of soft starters offer the energy saving feature within some of their soft starter product. unlike the others however, the big boys are far too smart to make unsubstantiated claims about the amount that can be saved.
Regards,
GGOSS
RE: Power Planner experience
Lets be fair , many starters have the feature ..........but NONE of the mainstream manufacturers are foolish enough to base their whole marketing campaign around some very flimsy claims .
That must tell you something .
RE: Power Planner experience
RE: Power Planner experience
The unit I have tried is a P.P. III 60 amps unit and believe me I have followed very carefully the application and calibration procedure and no way I can get those high savings. why dont you tell us about your experience with the 35 units you mention in your post? , and I would appreciate very much any tips on how to improve the savings with the P.P.
Now to you GGOSS . It is true that one can get 5% savings . I measured with a Fluke power meter and the right way which is at the line side of the P.P. and not at the load side as the manufacturer recommends because that is WRONG and perhaps that could be one of the reasons why ignorant " engineers" think they get 10 to 30% savings ( they are recording wrong in the load side of the P.P. )
RE: Power Planner experience
The best applications for this type of controller tend to be pump with recirc. or a throttle valve downstream of the pump, or fans with dampers. In these cases the energy put in by the pump is lost across the regulating element.
Look at the whole application of the motor and load when deciding on energy saving devices.
RE: Power Planner experience
RE: Harry Dampers comment about why other major mfgrs don't push this. We did. In 1973 when President Carter's administration was passing out government rebate checks for anything that had the words "energy, savings and/or reduction" in the sales literature. The reality caught up with us later when the customers found out that unless their applicatoion was EXACTLY the same as the benchmark ap, the results were disappointing. My company decided 8 years ago to quit including it in our soft starters. It caused more dissapointment and ill will than it was worth. I think you are correct too in your statement about Rockwell having it in there just to keep themselves in the running when it shows up in a specification. I keep getting bumped out of project submittals because we don't have it and they do. In 99% of those applications, the same engineer specifies a bypass contactor as well, rederring the energy saver useless altogether! There is no limit to the depth which ignorance will drag some people.
RE: the OP's request for real applications. I used to be a Systems Integrator and applied many of them during those Carter years. I had success with only 2 applications: bowling pin resetters and a severelly oversized well pump. The bowling pin resetters run all day disengaged from the load by a clutch. When the pins get knocked down, the clutch engages for about 30 seconds and couples the load to the motor. The extreme unloaded time actually made it come out to be a true cost recovery device. Those are 1 phase by the way. The pumps were in Alaska and belonged to the Alaska Area Native Health Dept. Since the maintenance crews had to drive service trucks for days to get to villages, they only wanted to carry one well pump with them and use it at every site regardless of needed capacity; universal parts replacement etc. etc. In some villages, 30HP was adequate, but in others, 5HP would have sufficed. When they put the 30HP in a site that could only use 5HP, they trimmed the impeller and put on an energy saver to help reduce fuel consumption by the deisel gensets. I heard they eventually abandoned the program as too complicated. We tried them on wood chippers, turbine pumps, air compressors, vent fans, vacuum pumps etc. etc. etc. In all the rest of the applications the only benefits came from soft starting.
I could go on ad-nauseum (and perhapse have). These albatrosses have enjoyed a resurgence due to the internet. I hope it doesn't further damage the public's response to legitimate benefits of soft starters.
Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati
RE: Power Planner experience
Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati