Monitoring a three phase service for current draw and recording it.

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conmgt

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2 Phase Philly
Hello,

Are there any devices that will collect and record the current draw of a service and allow me to display that history on a graph ?

Thanks
 
conmgt said:
Hello,

Are there any devices that will collect and record the current draw of a service and allow me to display that history on a graph ?

Thanks
Click to expand...
Yes.

If you want history of an entire service usage there is a good chance your POCO may already have data available from their metering equipment.
 
Most meters have that ability, in addition to the utility's meter.

Are you looking for power quality issues, such as oscillographs or RMS values every 15 minutes, or averages over time, or what?

Check out just about any power meter company.
 
My POCO, which is PECO here in Philly, doesn't provide anything other than total consumption and demand peak in kWh at the end of the billing cycle.

My interest is in real time current draw mostly to compare against my calculations. I'd like to log on to something and pull up a graphical history of current vs time.

I've looked at power meters and the variety is vast. It's a lot to get familiar with and therefore time consuming.
If anyone has experience using or installing such a setup, tell me about it.
 
conmgt said:
My POCO, which is PECO here in Philly, doesn't provide anything other than total consumption and demand peak in kWh at the end of the billing cycle.

My interest is in real time current draw mostly to compare against my calculations. I'd like to log on to something and pull up a graphical history of current vs time.

I've looked at power meters and the variety is vast. It's a lot to get familiar with and therefore time consuming.
If anyone has experience using or installing such a setup, tell me about it.
Click to expand...
Just because they don't put certain information on your monthly bill doesn't mean they don't have all sorts of data they can make custom reports from, have you asked? Monthly bill is likely only going to contain data that directly impacts the amount of the bill.
 
conmgt said:
Hello,
Are there any devices that will collect and record the current draw of a service and allow me to display that history on a graph ?

Thanks
Click to expand...

As others have said, plenty.
Two thing you need to figure out to be able to chose:
  1. As ron discussed, how short of transients do you want/need to collect?. Sub-millisecond or 15 minute sliding averages?
  2. How long do you need/want to record?

I have used:
  1. Dranetz PX-5: ($10K) I won't ever buy anything from them again. The software is locked up with a dongle. They didn't mention it, I didn't think to ask. They might be the only power monitor equipment mfg that does that - I've never seen another. As for power quality measurements, the one I used is about 10 years old and maybe Dranetz has improved. Hope so, the memory storage is poor. It will record short transients, but not for very long. One thing it does do well: The 4 V channels are independent and will do DC. (The I channels are AC only). That is occasionally really handy.
  2. Fluke 1760: ($15K - $30K)I have rented these a couple of times. They were yellow and said "Fluke" and the crews liked that. And they are pretty versatile. I think there are other brands that will do as well - for a lot less money.
  3. Fluke 345: ($3K) Single phase, but it will do DC (both V and I). For a simple instrument it worked well. And the DC capability was quite useful for battery strings/charger T-shoot.
  4. Elspec G4500: ($13K) I'm still learning how to use this one. It has an interesting compression algorithm and a terabyte drive. It appears to be able to do sub-millisecond transients and record for a year.
 
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