I was SURE these were a scam

[Steve Chan]

 

Have you seen these miracle ‘energy saver' devices advertised online and dismissed them as a scam? The way they’re advertised certainly seems sketchy. Believe it or not, the theory behind them is sound! They’re still totally a scam though.

 

Seasonic makes some great, energy efficient power supplies. Check out their Vertex lineup at: https://lmg.gg/TQVT1K

[Duracellhcadhd]

Wait, 8min video with 3min of content? Not impressed, this was more a techquickie than LTT video.

[soccermomisqueen]

As someone who works in the electrical industry (yes, I know there are other names for it, but I would prefer not to narrow down where I work), this has got to be the most accessible and easy to digest videos I have ever seen on the topic.

There are other nuances that come into play with the power factor (like power factor is the ratio of how much power needs to be generated by the utility company, compared to what your meter is measuring). This is not really charges to consumers since many homes are pulling a fraction of the grid power, and it creates extra accounting work (think of it as residential customers are 90% of the accounts, but only 10% of the money, while commercial are 10% of the accounts, but generate 90% of the revenue).

 

Although the standardization institutes do take power factor into play, and the ANSI standard requires that the power factor is at 0.5 (or the current and voltage phases are 60 degrees out of sync), if the power company only has to generate 2400W (so 20A at 120V), and you are only being billed for 1200W (yes, I am aware of the time factor in it as well, but I am neglecting it for now), that is pennies, compared to having to add the line items on a bill and explain to customers why they are being billed extra for using electricity (especially when it comes out to be a few dollars a month).

For those curious, here is a quick desmos graph that shows the relation of power factor to your electric bill (capacitive load will make the phase angle more positive, while an inductive load will make it more negative (I could have that backwards, but that is how I have it graphed)): https://www.desmos.com/calculator/syi04v6pgs

My only real complaint on the video was just how short it was and that it felt like it came to an abrupt ending.

[thekingofmonks]

Mehdi has already made a video on this iirc

[CoolJosh3k]

@4:13 Since when does an electric company charge home uses extra for a bad power factor?
I thought that was only for a business?

[soccermomisqueen]

4 minutes ago, CoolJosh3k said:

Since when does an electric company charge home uses extra for a bad power factor?
I thought that was only for a business?

it depends on who is supplying the power. Generally, no. You will only see this if they are trying to squeeze every last penny out of the residents (since there are actually quite a few items in your cause that cause a very large power factor). The only downside is that the power company has to explain to customers why the number on their meter is not *exactly* what they are billed for.

The more common way for a residence to be charges a power factor surcharge is if you have a large power draw that is in a very high power factor offset (so less power read at the meter). First, they will try to get some power correction at your home (capacitor banks), and your power bill will go up (due to higher watt-hours read at the meter) to pay for the capacitor bank. If you don't use it, or refuse, then you will probably get a power factor surcharge.

TLDR; generally residential addresses don't get charged for power factor, but if you have a load that is causing a large power factor with a large usage (like a commercial building), then you will either pay for it to get fixed, or get the surcharge.

[manikyath]

1 hour ago, thekingofmonks said:

Mehdi has already made a video on this iirc

bigclive has douzens, he's almost documenting the advancements of the scam.

 

the fake capacitor thing is a fairly recent advancement.. it really makes you wonder if the effort is even worth it, any somewhat half-competent electronics hobbyist can convince bottomfeeders in the court that these are completely fake, so why not just send a freaking empty case with an LED in it? that's what the magical woowoo waves bug repellant plugs have been doing for a decade.

 

also.. i gotta say.. this might be the first video on the topic i could send to my non-techy relatives to convince them to not waste their money on this garbage.

[MON5TERMATT]

LTT video: 8:33 (minus the ads, so like 3:30???)

Big Clive Video: 9:00 (plus his 2024 edition came out 2 weeks ago)

 

Please watch both if you want to actually take a look into how they work.

I will also echo what is being said in the YT comments of the LTT vid. This video seemed too short and very rushed. 

[nhand42]

The reason power-factor isn't charged for residential is simply because the old meters couldn't measure it. They would "wind backwards" when the apparent power collapsed back into real power[1]. However the fancy new meters - the ones with time-of-use costings and wifi reporting - absolutely do measure power-factor. The only thing preventing them from billing residential for apparent power is the regulations. Which you can be assured they're working hard to change.

 

[1] The difference between real power and apparent power is stored as a magnetic field in the inductive load. Then the field collapses it pushes energy back into the grid, which is what makes the real power lower than the apparent power. But the grid has to be oversized to deal with the apparent power, because it still needs to deliver all that energy into your inductive load in the first place, even if your inductive load eventually gives some of the energy back later.

[bluehawk]

It's devices like these that make me hope one of my neighbors in my apartment complex doesn't use due to potential or inevitable fire hazards. 

[Thaldor]

The one "good" thing is that these actually can have at least 1 actual usecase: Noise reduction. If you have an apartment with just few power circuits and it's a bit old wiring so there isn't that modern grounding and you like old amplifiers, you might want one of these (with an actual capacitor inside) or just make yourself a box that connects to an outlet and has couple huge capacitors rated for your outlet voltage.

See, the usual inductive machines while they do have capacitors to smooth things out, they can still ripple into the circuit and your few decades old amp is just glorified signal booster that usually doesn't care does the signal come from the signal source or from the electricity. There is usually a lot of capacitors and a circuit for that noise reduction but there's also only that much they can do and make the amp 60 years old and you will be missing a thing or two. And on the other end the desk fan you bought from the Dollarstore doesn't even need to be THAT cheap to not have capacitors left out to save the 5 cents from manufacturing costs (I have seen couple quite expensive fans from a certain company that operate in certain settings basicly as motor directly connected to the outlet, yikes).

 

But yeah, you could either use decouplers to separate your amp from the rest of the house circuit and add noise  reduction to it, or just attach couple beefy capacitors to the house circuit and kill the induction load generated noise. Or just don't get into pre-80's amps at all.

[7charlotte]

Am I the only one who thinks this video is extremely out of place for the channel?

[Slipping Jimmy]

What was the point of this?]

Besides shilling for Seasonic.

It wasn't even tested to see if their "claims" are true.

[nether1234]

40 minutes ago, Slipping Jimmy said:

What was the point of this?]

Besides shilling for Seasonic.

It wasn't even tested to see if their "claims" are true.

Something can't work if it doesn't have the electronics to work... actually testing them would not have made any sense. We already knew the outcome

[ahuckphin]

is this a comeback of LTT "micro reviews"? I think the problem with the lack of content in this video as raised by several comments is expectation from the usual uploads. I think it's a case of you can't please everyone.

 

 

Edited December 10, 2024 by ahuckphin
updated vid with timestamp

[Rainbow_3D]

Right near the end of the video Linus mentioned a fake capacitor inside the device and commented about the cost of making a fake one against buying a real one and pointed out a weird "cement". My mind immediatley went back to this video about how some prducts on Amazon were sold with hidden Thorium inside, a radioactive element that's often a byproduct of rare earth mining and quite expensive to handle. Does anyone think this to be worth checking out?

[ThankGodItsFriday]

This sounds exactly like something Krazy Ken covered in one of his videos: