Help with Partial Outage in NY

[kwired]

I plan to keep the focus on safety not upgrades.

Potential risk of starting a fire from overloaded wiring and components should be part of your safety considerations and that issue pretty much needs some kind of upgrades to resolve it or going back to what there was for appliances being utilized in that space say 80 plus years ago.

From what information you have given you don't have the proper capacity to your space to power what you wish to run, at least at certain times.
Two 15 amp circuits powering your apartment? Codes have required two 20 amp circuits as a minimum just for the kitchen for at least 60 years or more.

Until it can be remedied, you may have to consider keeping a fan (that doesn't take nearly as much energy as an AC unit) nearby to help keep you more comfortable.

 

[kwired]

Yeah I'm in the middle of remodeling my 2 upstairs offices and was looking for replacements for my two 1980ish Gibson through the wall units. (damn things weigh about 200 pounds each) and somehow I came across that picture about a week ago. When I saw 1931 building I had to go back and look again.

Here are some 1952 offerings from the big players at the time.

View attachment 2578782

I wonder when air conditioning loads started to be a serious design factor in buildings

I'd guess was becoming more common in some commercial buildings in the 60's.

Probably not too significant in dwellings until into the 70's. Maybe some window units here and there but not many were cooling the whole house until into the 70's.

When I grew up we had AC in the car but not in the house. I was already moved out for a couple years or so before my parents finally got a central AC unit. They did have a window unit in the kitchen for a little bit before finally getting the central unit. We always opened windows at night and closed them in the morning before it started warming up outside. Went to the pool a lot as a kid as well.

 

[Joethemechanic]

Somewhere around 1970 we got two 6,000 BTU units at Sears Surplus. I think they were returns. One for my parents bedroom and one for me my brother and I's room. Being our house was all K&T we had to install 20 amp dedicated circuits for each unit. The house was balloon frame so it was easy to get from the bedroom windows to the basement. What a difference it was having AC. Before that we had like a 1/2 or 3/4 belt drive industrial fan in the attic and it helped a lot, but nothing like having AC

 

[ptonsparky]

My kids reminisce about our living room slumber parties a couple times a summer. Our small two story victorian had central air only on ground floor at the time.

 

[cqueen40]

Did the electrician look at the actual voltages with and without the A/Cs running? If not, they didn't complete the job. (Changing the breaker won't help at all if it wasn't tripping in the first place.)

Best you might do for the moment is find an outlet that's on the other breaker and temporarily run a heavy extension from that to one of the A/Cs (maybe the Super can help with this?). The real answer is probably going to be running only one A/C until the brown-out is over and later getting wiring updated.

I just bought a 50 ft extension cord (it's about 43 feet from bedroom where AC is to other end of house where the other breaker powers the room). Any risk to running the AC that far? I am hoping it's short-term. LL is finally coming over to figure out the fix.

 

[hbiss]

I just bought a 50 ft extension cord

Hopefully it's #12 ga wire, not some Chinese 18 ga.

-Hal

 

[cqueen40]

Update: Two weeks ago, I filed an HP proceeding in NY Housing Court to force the landlord to make repairs. Around the same time Housing and Preservation Development had issued two violations for unsafe and inadequate lighting. That gave me leverage and woke the landlord up. He didn't add any new circuit breakers in my box or run a new line but they did something in the basement with the voltage, possibly with ConEd, so now all the units have brighter lighting and my ACs have been running fine. Could ConEd stabilized the voltage? At this point, I am done complaining if this is the fix.

 

[ptonsparky]

They could have increased the transformer size and/or the conductors to the building.
I'm a long ways from ConEd

 

[Joethemechanic]

Update: Two weeks ago, I filed an HP proceeding in NY Housing Court to force the landlord to make repairs. Around the same time Housing and Preservation Development had issued two violations for unsafe and inadequate lighting. That gave me leverage and woke the landlord up. He didn't add any new circuit breakers in my box or run a new line but they did something in the basement with the voltage, possibly with ConEd, so now all the units have brighter lighting and my ACs have been running fine. Could ConEd stabilized the voltage? At this point, I am done complaining if this is the fix.

Do you have any way of finding out if they pulled permits for this job?

 

[cqueen40]

Do you have any way of finding out if they pulled permits for this job?

yes no permits on file on dob website

 

[hbiss]

so now all the units have brighter lighting and my ACs have been running fine.

I'm sure they got ConEd to change the transformer tap. Wonder how long things will last at 140v.

-Hal

 

[Joethemechanic]

I'm sure they got ConEd to change the transformer tap. Wonder how long things will last at 140v.

-Hal

139/240 WYE? Will the POCO do that?

 

[hbiss]

139/240 WYE? Will the POCO do that?

This is NYC. For the right amount of $$$ you can get anything.

-Hal

 

[cqueen40]

139/240 WYE? Will the POCO do that?

can you clarify what you mean here? Should I be worried about anything?

 

[ptonsparky]

can you clarify what you mean here? Should I be worried about anything?

The voltage to your receptacles was increased. 139 is a bit high for the typical appliance rated at 120 volt. We don't know what they did and you haven't said what your voltage actually is, so it's pure conjecture at this point.

Come back this fall, after things have cooled down, and let us know if your toast is done in 15 seconds vs 45.

 

[Joethemechanic]

Come back this fall, after things have cooled down, and let us know if your toast is done in 15 seconds vs 45.

I hate slow toasters. That gives me an idea, I'll bet I have a small boost buck transformer

 

[Joethemechanic]

can you clarify what you mean here? Should I be worried about anything?

Go to someplace like Walmart or Harbor Freight and get yourself a cheap multimeter like this one and measure the voltage at your receptacles. Then you'll know for sure

Winter Savings Clearance! SuoKom LCD Digital Multimeter Ammeter Voltmeter Ohmmeter Current Tester Black - Walmart.com

Buy Winter Savings Clearance! SuoKom LCD Digital Multimeter Ammeter Voltmeter Ohmmeter Current Tester Black at Walmart.com

www.walmart.com

 

[tortuga]

139/240 WYE? Will the POCO do that?

Not for residential but to replace corner grounded 240 you could, if say a primary feeder needs to be configured for wye topology.
What I think happened is some 208 units have two +2.5% taps, most here are set to +2.5% so we see 214Y125 but you could in theory go the full 5% to 220Y127, which would probably be a win win for the POCO and the OP but technically slightly outside of the out of date ANSI C84 and even the NEC but if everyone is happy who cares, 139/240 would be within ANSI C84 only for a '240' three phase service where the neutral is not used.