slower clocks

Wish that coffee makers had battery clocks..then my coffee would start on time. Lost 35 min last week. lol
Even without the power outages.

Constantly! I keep resetting the electrically operated clocks by either the battery clock or the computer clock. It's WAPA current fluctuation and isn't anything new but a real pain.

I must have been asleep at the switch. I didn't notice it until this year.

A WAPA plan to save money, or reduce maintenance?

I've heard that it's hard to run an electric utility at exactly 60Hz so that the clocks are correct, but some utilities will monitor their service and run it a tiny bit faster or slower each day so that, in the long run, the customers' clocks are not way off.

Haha - I thought the kids kept messing with the coffee pot!

Actually the grid or portion there-of (with many utilities) in the states and Europe, etc. monitor and correct the frequency in real time. See this web site and click on one of the maps. See the corrections in real time. Actually quite cool. Unfortunately WAPA does not feed into this. Old monitoring and control equipment is to blame.

http://fnetpublic.utk.edu/

It's the Bermuda Triangle. Very active lately. The V.I. is close enough to feel the effects.

On STX my clocks gain time, almost 5 minutes a day.

When a generator trips, there may not be a grid failure (outage), but it could affect the frequency until other units pick up the load. WAPA has many unit trips. See this video of a trip at the Farley Nuclear Plant and the affect on frequency.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ypyyMl_Dx0

it would be nice for it to be faster at work and slower at home

Yes - it's a pain in the a** 🙂

Pia

I go by my phone and sunrise/sunset. Much easier. 😉

Hey that sounds familiar. So that won't be a surprise when and if we move out that way. I stopped using electricity powered clocked after moving to Sicily for the same reason. Still don't use them here on the mainland of Italy.

Question-- can these clocks be "recalibrated" so to speak in the states? I have an electric clock that is now 12 minutes fast but the clock doesn't let me change the time manually. If it was taken up to the states and plugged in to a decent electric supply for a couple days, would it go back to normal? Or is forever going to be fast? (which is not the end of the world because it makes me get up a little earlier and not be late for work).

And I don't understand electricity metering or anything, but if my clock is gaining time are there any implications in terms of what I am being charged by WAPA per month? Is my meter running faster or something than those who are losing time?

Good Morning- Let's begin with the basics, shall we? Generator sets (at least in the US and good portion of the world) rotate at a fixed rpm which delivers a frequency of 60 cycles per second or 60 Hz. The formula pn/120= where p= number of poles in the generator winding, n= rpm of the generator, 120 is the constatnt.

That means that your lights and other loads are actually pulsing at sixty times a second. Most steam turbines of the size in question are rotating at about 3600 RPM-2 Pole, or 1800-4 Pole, or even 1200 RPM- 6 Pole. This is a very important fact. My guess is that the unit is a 10800 RPM Steam Turbine geared through a reduction gear to a 1200 RPM 6 Pole Generator.

The Gas Turbine Units are generally 5100 RPM geared down to 1800 RPM. So that means a 4 Pole Generator.

The speed droop (non-isochronous) for multiple units of different combustion cycles is generally 3%. That means that that the RPM change as a rule of thumb should be +/- 324 RPM for the Steam Turbine- which translates to 16.2 cycles at worst case on application of a full load.
The resultant reset and proportional band gain is similiarly offset biased to prevent this from happening. This is best explained as what happens when your lights dim or blink.

More commonly, most utilities MANDATE and REGULATE the Frequency at 59.95 to 60.05 Hz- just with the mandated frequency is 60.01 hz- so what this basically means is that WAPA is doing A VERY POOR JOB of regulating their generators.

So the answer to stxem's question is ? 😀

Right? Perhaps it's just too early in the morning for me, but I read "Let's start with the basics..." and my eyes glazed over. My bedside clock is nearly an hour and a half fast. If I need to wale up at a certain time, I use the iPhone's alarm clock. Otherwise, I only need that bedroom clock to show me how many minutes it's been while I'm getting ready to go anywhere.

READ THE FOLLOWING AGAIN CAREFULLY

More commonly, most utilities MANDATE and REGULATE the Frequency at 59.95 to 60.05 Hz- just with the mandated frequency is 60.01 hz- so what this basically means is that WAPA is doing A VERY POOR JOB of regulating their generators.

Funny, I just realized I don't have a clock in the entire apartment. I really must have adapted to island time.

So the answer to stxem's question is ? 😀

There should not we any measureable amount of extra electric charged by WAPA. The meter reads kWe-hours of usage.

So the answer to stxem's question is ? 😀

There should not we any measureable amount of extra electric charged by WAPA. The meter reads kWe-hours of usage.

But the question becomes "what is an hour" if you can't tell time based on a clock plugged into Wapa?

Sean

Frequency modulations might actually do some damage to some components / equipment. I'm not a "sparky" so I can't quantify that. Sorry.

Another perhaps seemingly stupid question--the outlet with the fast clock is also the best for charging my iphone and seems much faster than some other outlets. Could this be the case, or is it just my own bias?

Another perhaps seemingly stupid question--the outlet with the fast clock is also the best for charging my iphone and seems much faster than some other outlets. Could this be the case, or is it just my own bias?

The "faster " outlet may be at a higher voltage/hertz damaging your phone and everything else you plug into it.:-o