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#41
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Damned Central Heating!
On Sun, 24 Mar 2019 18:59:20 -0700, sms wrote:
On 3/20/2019 3:44 PM, news18 wrote: snip Wood is a preferrable heating method to gas to electric. Since our wood heater almost needs replacement, we did look at pellets, but limited supply leading to cost gouging was a concern, plus modern heaters seem to be tin plate these days. In California, on "Spare the Air" days it is forbidden to use wood or pellets for heating. "The rule prohibits burning any solid fuel, including pellets and manufactured logs." At least human lungs have evolved to have some measure of resiliance to wood fire products. it would bbe far better if they banned ICE vehicles for the day as their products cause very serious health problem. |
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#43
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Damned Central Heating!
On Mon, 25 Mar 2019 22:59:48 -0400, Frank Krygowski
wrote: On 3/25/2019 8:43 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote: On Mon, 25 Mar 2019 16:35:36 -0500, AMuzi wrote: The voters have spoken and deserve every bit of it. Winston Churchill once said that "The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter." And someone described the democratic system as being one where the voters get the leadership that they deserved :-) It may be that the main advantage of democracy is a lower chance of violent revolt. Those who are terminally dissatisfied with the politicians in power usually realize they are in the minority. You mean like the war the U.S. fought from 1861 - 1865? -- Cheers, John B. |
#44
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Damned Central Heating!
On Tue, 26 Mar 2019 03:31:34 -0000 (UTC), news18
wrote: On Sun, 24 Mar 2019 18:59:20 -0700, sms wrote: On 3/20/2019 3:44 PM, news18 wrote: snip Wood is a preferrable heating method to gas to electric. Since our wood heater almost needs replacement, we did look at pellets, but limited supply leading to cost gouging was a concern, plus modern heaters seem to be tin plate these days. In California, on "Spare the Air" days it is forbidden to use wood or pellets for heating. "The rule prohibits burning any solid fuel, including pellets and manufactured logs." At least human lungs have evolved to have some measure of resiliance to wood fire products. it would bbe far better if they banned ICE vehicles for the day as their products cause very serious health problem. Ah but internal combustion powered machinery is necessary to maintain life in the U.S. I once commented to a bloke on the Internet who was complaining about having to drive his kids to school that why didn't he have the kids walk to school and he replied something to the effect that they couldn't walk as it was too far, a whole mile to school. I replied that I had walked a mile, or more, to school from the time I was in the first grade and he didn't believe it. -- Cheers, John B. |
#45
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Damned Central Heating!
On 3/25/2019 11:41 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:
On Mon, 25 Mar 2019 22:59:48 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote: On 3/25/2019 8:43 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote: On Mon, 25 Mar 2019 16:35:36 -0500, AMuzi wrote: The voters have spoken and deserve every bit of it. Winston Churchill once said that "The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter." And someone described the democratic system as being one where the voters get the leadership that they deserved :-) It may be that the main advantage of democracy is a lower chance of violent revolt. Those who are terminally dissatisfied with the politicians in power usually realize they are in the minority. You mean like the war the U.S. fought from 1861 - 1865? The results of that one may have emphasized my point. -- - Frank Krygowski |
#46
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Damned Central Heating!
On 3/25/2019 11:28 PM, Ralph Barone wrote:
Frank Krygowski wrote: On 3/25/2019 2:33 PM, wrote: On Saturday, March 23, 2019 at 4:09:26 PM UTC-7, Joerg wrote: On 2019-03-20 09:42, wrote: On Tuesday, March 19, 2019 at 1:28:01 PM UTC-7, Joerg wrote: On 2019-03-19 11:17, wrote: A couple of months ago when it was coldest my central heating stopped igniting. My impression from the sounds it was making was that the thermocouple was bad or the pilot light that would be ignited was dirty or some such so that the flame wasn't close enough to the thermocouple of inform it that there was a real flame there and turn the full flame on. The repairman came out and said that the pilot and thermocouple was OK and changed out the main gas valve. The heater appeared to work for six weeks and then as the weather got cold again started not lighting again. The company sent another repairman out and he said that it was the main control board and replaced that. I am now $1,600 into "repairs" and sure enough - the heater isn't lighting still. It would appear to me at this time that there is nothing more to replace but the pilot tube and the thermocouple. So I wonder how to convince the repairman that there is something wrong with one of those? We had that happen a long time ago and the cause was the electronic controller board. The central propane furnace would go VROOOOP .. PHUTAH-PHUT ... RUMBLE ... VROOOOOOOOOP ... and never stayed on anymore. When the technician came out he exclaimed "Oh look, an old Fenwal controller board!", saying he was amazed that it lasted this long. He switched it out against one from another manufacturer and all was well. I asked him to leave the old board and when probing it I found that the triac that controls the main burner valve had gone partially bad so it wouldn't be able to send a full current through the valve solenoid anymore. Could have kicked myself because instead of paying a few hundred Dollars I could have gotten one of those triac for a couple of Dollars and replaced it. If these triac are on a separate driver board then check that. There is also a suction sensor, for example a flap in the intake stream that operates a signaling switch. If that got crudded up it might at times falsely signal a failing air draft and that would cut the main valve. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ when the technician came out again the board was showing errors of "too many tries". He pulled the connector off and spread the male connector so that it would make better connection to the main gas valve and it appears to work perfectly now. Though when the main gas valve was replaced 3 months ago it all worked fine until recently. The first technician could have diagnosed that easily by measuring how many volts are actually arriving at the solenoid. This is the first order of business for me when, for example, my wife says that a certain zone in the yard doesn't get watered reliably. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ He got the correct readings because the problem wasn't the board but the connection between the board and the gas solenoid not making proper contact. Since both the board and the valve were new there really wasn't any question about their working. It took him a little while to isolate the connection. These connectors are the male and female pin types. So it is virtually impossible to measure them when connected. Off topic, but vaguely related to diagnosing electrical problems: We just visited friends who recently moved into a brand new apartment in a brand new building. They have a mysterious electrical problem: When the oven door is opened, the lights in a different room go out. The arc-fault breaker trips. The maintenance guys don't know why, but apparently lots of tenants have the same problem. We solved it temporarily by removing the oven's light bulb. Try this hypothesis on for size. The oven door switch doesn't have mechanical hysteresis (ie: if doesn't snap over from open to closed as the door opens). Since people don't normally fling open their oven doors, the switch closes slowly, causing intermittent current which the arc-fault breaker sees as an arcing fault, and trips for. Since it's a new building, it's quite likely that most of the suites have the same oven (and all of them have the same type of breakers and wiring), and therefore many people have the same problem. If it's a gas oven, then it could be very likely that the oven and the lights in the next room are on the same circuit. That sounds like a reasonable possibility. It is a gas oven. -- - Frank Krygowski |
#47
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Damned Central Heating!
On Monday, March 25, 2019 at 7:56:03 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 3/25/2019 2:33 PM, wrote: On Saturday, March 23, 2019 at 4:09:26 PM UTC-7, Joerg wrote: On 2019-03-20 09:42, wrote: On Tuesday, March 19, 2019 at 1:28:01 PM UTC-7, Joerg wrote: On 2019-03-19 11:17, wrote: A couple of months ago when it was coldest my central heating stopped igniting. My impression from the sounds it was making was that the thermocouple was bad or the pilot light that would be ignited was dirty or some such so that the flame wasn't close enough to the thermocouple of inform it that there was a real flame there and turn the full flame on. The repairman came out and said that the pilot and thermocouple was OK and changed out the main gas valve. The heater appeared to work for six weeks and then as the weather got cold again started not lighting again. The company sent another repairman out and he said that it was the main control board and replaced that. I am now $1,600 into "repairs" and sure enough - the heater isn't lighting still. It would appear to me at this time that there is nothing more to replace but the pilot tube and the thermocouple. So I wonder how to convince the repairman that there is something wrong with one of those? We had that happen a long time ago and the cause was the electronic controller board. The central propane furnace would go VROOOOP .. PHUTAH-PHUT ... RUMBLE ... VROOOOOOOOOP ... and never stayed on anymore. When the technician came out he exclaimed "Oh look, an old Fenwal controller board!", saying he was amazed that it lasted this long. He switched it out against one from another manufacturer and all was well. I asked him to leave the old board and when probing it I found that the triac that controls the main burner valve had gone partially bad so it wouldn't be able to send a full current through the valve solenoid anymore. Could have kicked myself because instead of paying a few hundred Dollars I could have gotten one of those triac for a couple of Dollars and replaced it. If these triac are on a separate driver board then check that. There is also a suction sensor, for example a flap in the intake stream that operates a signaling switch. If that got crudded up it might at times falsely signal a failing air draft and that would cut the main valve. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ when the technician came out again the board was showing errors of "too many tries". He pulled the connector off and spread the male connector so that it would make better connection to the main gas valve and it appears to work perfectly now. Though when the main gas valve was replaced 3 months ago it all worked fine until recently. The first technician could have diagnosed that easily by measuring how many volts are actually arriving at the solenoid. This is the first order of business for me when, for example, my wife says that a certain zone in the yard doesn't get watered reliably. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ He got the correct readings because the problem wasn't the board but the connection between the board and the gas solenoid not making proper contact. Since both the board and the valve were new there really wasn't any question about their working. It took him a little while to isolate the connection. These connectors are the male and female pin types. So it is virtually impossible to measure them when connected. Off topic, but vaguely related to diagnosing electrical problems: We just visited friends who recently moved into a brand new apartment in a brand new building. They have a mysterious electrical problem: When the oven door is opened, the lights in a different room go out. The arc-fault breaker trips. The maintenance guys don't know why, but apparently lots of tenants have the same problem. We solved it temporarily by removing the oven's light bulb. -- - Frank Krygowski Probably reversed polarity on the wires. Simple fix. |
#48
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Damned Central Heating!
On Tue, 26 Mar 2019 10:38:29 +0700, John B. Slocomb wrote:
On Mon, 25 Mar 2019 20:07:08 -0700, Bob F wrote: On 3/20/2019 12:04 PM, wrote: On Wednesday, March 20, 2019 at 11:09:26 AM UTC-7, sms wrote: On 3/19/2019 4:04 PM, Joerg wrote: snip We rarely use it anymore due to the price-gouging in the propane industry. We switched to cord wood and pellets. No natural gas in your area? Odd for California housing developments. There's a big move now to all-electric since the electricity can be generated without the use of fossil fuels. I don't know where you get that idea. Those new windmills are more than 500 meters high and they will not start turning in anything short of hurricane force winds so the "generator" is driven like a motor to keep them rotating. Any that you see not turning are turned off and may be broken. The results of all of this is those windmills have a net power DRAIN in most areas because while they generate a good deal of power when the wind is above 20 mph that is rare. Solar farms are almost as bad. They virtually kill the environment beneath them and they have efficiency of only 22% or so when new. They age 4 times faster than is claimed and if you do not keep them clean they can fail faster than that. At 22% efficiency at high noon when the sun is directly overhead that means that they can only generate 220 watts per square meter. A friend was planning on putting solar cells on his home in Phoenix and dragged me off to a solar show. The salesmen were taunting 20 year lifespan. I talked to the engineers and they told me soto vox that they were 5 years to 50% output if the surfaces were cleaned all the time. And this is only under perfect conditions. They are only good for output on 2 hours either side of local true noon. Any clouds greatly reduce their output. So virtually all of that crap about "green energy" is just that. They cause 100 times more environmental damage than they supposedly prevent. Birds cannot judge a windmill speed because the ends of the blades are traveling at 200 mph. The sound from the rotating blades even being driven via motor power confuse bats and when under full wind drive make super-sonic sounds so loud that they permanently deafen the insect eating bats that are environmentally important. All of this is well known and there are plenty of papers written on these subjects. Why does the media avoid these at all costs and continue to promote the fraud of climate change when the climate has been more or less stable since the end of the Little Ice Age? There is one thing I notice about those who brag about using solar power or windmills to generate electricity. They all, every one, have a small diesel generator out back of the house :-) It is that or big batteries. Shrug, even coal plants have their non- productive days and with the increasing end-of life problems the golden days of power all the time has passed. |
#49
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Damned Central Heating!
On Monday, March 25, 2019 at 8:07:45 PM UTC-7, Bob F wrote:
On 3/20/2019 12:04 PM, wrote: On Wednesday, March 20, 2019 at 11:09:26 AM UTC-7, sms wrote: On 3/19/2019 4:04 PM, Joerg wrote: snip We rarely use it anymore due to the price-gouging in the propane industry. We switched to cord wood and pellets. No natural gas in your area? Odd for California housing developments. There's a big move now to all-electric since the electricity can be generated without the use of fossil fuels. I don't know where you get that idea. Those new windmills are more than 500 meters high and they will not start turning in anything short of hurricane force winds so the "generator" is driven like a motor to keep them rotating. Any that you see not turning are turned off and may be broken. The results of all of this is those windmills have a net power DRAIN in most areas because while they generate a good deal of power when the wind is above 20 mph that is rare. Solar farms are almost as bad. They virtually kill the environment beneath them and they have efficiency of only 22% or so when new. They age 4 times faster than is claimed and if you do not keep them clean they can fail faster than that. At 22% efficiency at high noon when the sun is directly overhead that means that they can only generate 220 watts per square meter. A friend was planning on putting solar cells on his home in Phoenix and dragged me off to a solar show. The salesmen were taunting 20 year lifespan. I talked to the engineers and they told me soto vox that they were 5 years to 50% output if the surfaces were cleaned all the time. And this is only under perfect conditions. They are only good for output on 2 hours either side of local true noon. Any clouds greatly reduce their output. So virtually all of that crap about "green energy" is just that. They cause 100 times more environmental damage than they supposedly prevent. Birds cannot judge a windmill speed because the ends of the blades are traveling at 200 mph. The sound from the rotating blades even being driven via motor power confuse bats and when under full wind drive make super-sonic sounds so loud that they permanently deafen the insect eating bats that are environmentally important. All of this is well known and there are plenty of papers written on these subjects. Why does the media avoid these at all costs and continue to promote the fraud of climate change when the climate has been more or less stable since the end of the Little Ice Age? LOL! You actually BELIEVE this crap? I don't know who you are or where you live but my brother used to be the electrician for the power company that runs the windmills in the Altamont Pass area. I have seen the destruction. You only have to ride an F-ing bike through the May Rd./North Flynn Rd. area to see it. The new windmills now hardly ever generate power anymore because it takes 20 knots of wind or more to generate enough power to turn those huge blades. So they drive them by powering them up all the time to keep them revolving because they will not start in the amount of wind that is usually the highest wind they receive. The mills that are not moving are those that will not work with wind from the normal direction and they don't get powered up unless the predictions are for more northerly or southerly winds. I have gone to solar shows and while the salesmen are bragging about all sorts of efficiencies and long life the engineers tell me a far different story. Strange how an engineer can talk more openly to another engineer. So tell me what YOU know about this "crap"? |
#50
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Damned Central Heating!
On Tue, 26 Mar 2019 11:20:05 +0700, John B. Slocomb wrote:
On Tue, 26 Mar 2019 03:31:34 -0000 (UTC), news18 wrote: On Sun, 24 Mar 2019 18:59:20 -0700, sms wrote: On 3/20/2019 3:44 PM, news18 wrote: snip Wood is a preferrable heating method to gas to electric. Since our wood heater almost needs replacement, we did look at pellets, but limited supply leading to cost gouging was a concern, plus modern heaters seem to be tin plate these days. In California, on "Spare the Air" days it is forbidden to use wood or pellets for heating. "The rule prohibits burning any solid fuel, including pellets and manufactured logs." At least human lungs have evolved to have some measure of resiliance to wood fire products. it would bbe far better if they banned ICE vehicles for the day as their products cause very serious health problem. Ah but internal combustion powered machinery is necessary to maintain life in the U.S. At the moment, but there is a nit pick about maintain life and continue to prop up the mass consumer resource consumption lifestyle being towo entirely different views. I once commented to a bloke on the Internet who was complaining about having to drive his kids to school that why didn't he have the kids walk to school and he replied something to the effect that they couldn't walk as it was too far, a whole mile to school. I replied that I had walked a mile, or more, to school from the time I was in the first grade and he didn't believe it. Same. Our pocket money as kids was just nough to cover the weekly school bus fare. If I walked, I got to keep it for what I wanted to spend it on. Later on, as no one else was using the family kids bicyce, I started riding and have been adicted ever since. It is just over 100 metres to the local kids school here and one lot of stupid parents drive their child too and from scool every day. on the other hand, it iseasy to tell when it is kids to scool,/kids home from school time. We've even had a cat that would appear at the front walkway to solicit pats from the passing kids. |
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