ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Watthour Meter Help

What happens if he finds and removes the braking magnet from the meter? It will kill the accuracy but would presumably cause it to spin faster....if I understand how these meters work, that is

-Jon

They aren't designed to turn 20 rpm's. I would think it would destroy the bearings and gears in short order.

"They aren't designed to turn 20 rpm's. I would think it would destroy the bearings and gears in short order. "

apparently you've never seen a house with electric heat, electric oven & stove, many indoor and outdoor lights and a dual element electric water heater all on at the same time. i think it turns like 60-100 RPM

i don't think 20 RPM will burn it out, but you probly only need like 5 rpm or so in order to look good. my meter lamp only goes like 1 RPM or less with the 150 watt bulb.

Can you treat the meter like a motor? Wire it as a synchronous motor, but put resistors in series to bring the voltage way down.

I think i *MIGHT* have figured out a way to double the speed . wire the lamp as a 240 volt load. connect the cordset as a 240 volt supply to the meter (but don't actually connect it to 240 volts at the wall) don't connect anything to the neutral terminal of the meter. now the meter should measure the current TWICE. if you put a 100 watt bulb is there, it will measure 100 watts on the hot and 100 watts on the meter's other hot (which is actually the neutral in your setup), so it will spin twice as fast.


It might not work because the voltage is not at opposite "phases" as it would be with a 240 volt system. yes, i know they are not phases but i can't think of any other way to explain it.

Thanks for the ideas, I will keep playing with it.

Roger

Got it working. I took off the magnets and now it spins about 4 RPM no load and about 44 RPM with a 100 W bulb.

Thanks again for the ideas.

Roger

I think this is the first time I've ever heard of somebody wanting a meter to move faster

Minor aside — induction-disk meters need to be mounted so that the disk is level, or it's movement may become erratic. [The bearings are sensitive to gravity.]

"Got it working. I took off the magnets and now it spins about 4 RPM no load and about 44 RPM with a 100 W "

so, if removing the magnets makes it go faster than adding magnets must .... never mind, but i'm guessing you don't need those magnets anymore, so you can send them to me. I'll put them to good use



[This message has been edited by cpalm1 (edited 02-03-2004).]