Fix the voltage campaign (Australia)

[vk3yedotcom]

Just found this: https://fixthevoltage.org/

They reckon our mains voltage is too high, and at most times is above the 230v standard.

[james_s]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

Either way I question their claims, quoted from their site:
Overvoltage increases the amount of energy used by consumers
Overvoltage increases carbon emissions
Overvoltage reduces the efficiency of rooftop solar
Overvoltage damages domestic appliances and shortens their life
Overvoltage increases the costs on everyone’s power bills


Some of those may be true for incandescent lamps, but what else? Overvoltage will make electric resistance heaters produce more heat, so they'll run less time, same amount of energy is consumed. Electronics will all be made to accommodate the global standards, so at least 240V nominal, the vast majority of electronics these days are rated something like 90-265V so not an issue. Anything with a switchmode power supply which is almost everything these days, including lights will draw less current as the voltage increases, so more energy is not consumed and the bills won't be higher.

IMHO this sounds like a bunch of nonsense by people who know just enough about electricity to think they know everything. 

[Nusa]

Just found this: https://fixthevoltage.org/

They reckon our mains voltage is too high, and at most times is above the 230v standard.

My understanding is that while that's the nominal value, anything within +10% or -6% of that is within the standard as written.

Which in the case of the EU, was a way of writing a universal standard that allowed almost everyone to meet the spec without actually changing anything. 220, 230, 240, 250V all fall within that window.

[magic]

In fact, computer PSUs tend to have higher efficiency close to the top of their rated input voltage range because of I²R losses in components which need to be selected for the highest voltage anyway.

Can I sign a change.org petition to ban DHMO too?

[Rerouter]

A large part of the high voltages in my area is from all the solar installs backfeeding, from about 10AM - 5PM the voltage remains pegged at the max spec for the inverters,

Technically that could be something deliberate from the power companies to reduce feed in tarriff rates, but I personally think its just too much supply and not enough load in certain areas.

[Brumby]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

The standard "changed" in 2001.

Before it was 240V +6%,-10%
Now it is 230V +10%,-6%

Run the numbers - and have a giggle.  In essence, nothing in the real world had to change.

[tooki]

IMHO this sounds like a bunch of nonsense by people who know just enough about electricity to think they know everything.

Sure seems like it to me. Given that all else held equal, at a given wattage, higher voltage means lower current and smaller voltage drop, if anything we should be seeking higher voltages.

[Gyro]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

The standard "changed" in 2001.

Before it was 240V +6%,-10%
Now it is 230V +10%,-6%

Run the numbers - and have a giggle.  In essence, nothing in the real world had to change.

Same here in the UK. EU mains voltage harmonisation was merely a paper exercise.

[AlbertL]

For various opinions on the topic, Google "conservation voltage reduction".  That's what it's called in the US; it may be known by other names elsewhere in the world. 

[SilverSolder]

For various opinions on the topic, Google "conservation voltage reduction".  That's what it's called in the US; it may be known by other names elsewhere in the world.

Awesome idea....   If you cut the voltage to zero, we would use no energy at all! 

[nctnico]

For various opinions on the topic, Google "conservation voltage reduction".  That's what it's called in the US; it may be known by other names elsewhere in the world.

Unless you use incandescent light bulbs the voltage doesn't matter at all nowadays. A switch mode PSU (which is also inside CFL and LED lamps) is a constant energy pump. OTOH higher voltages reduce current and thus losses in the power distribution grid.

[tom66]

I can't see how voltage reduction would help with the majority of appliances.

Devices like dishwashers, washing machines, etc. all draw heating current to meet a temperature set point, so lower voltage will simply extend their heating cycles.  I^2 losses in feed cabling will reduce,  but this may well be counterbalanced by the losses of the machine being greater as the respective cycles operate for longer, losing more energy over that time.

The same applies for the cooling cycles of refrigerators, although perhaps the start-up current would be mildly reduced, I can't see this being considerable.

Anything with an SMPS will generally be more efficient at higher input voltages, although the difference between 230V and 245V is likely to be negligible.

In fact the only thing I could see an improvement on would be devices using fixed AC to accomplish a task with no feedback - fans, incandescent lights (do people really use these any more?) and maybe certain inexpensive LED lamps.  Almost everything else will be about the same, or better, on higher input voltages.

[SilverSolder]

I can't see how voltage reduction would help with the majority of appliances.

Devices like dishwashers, washing machines, etc. all draw heating current to meet a temperature set point, so lower voltage will simply extend their heating cycles.  I^2 losses in feed cabling will reduce,  but this may well be counterbalanced by the losses of the machine being greater as the respective cycles operate for longer, losing more energy over that time.

The same applies for the cooling cycles of refrigerators, although perhaps the start-up current would be mildly reduced, I can't see this being considerable.

Anything with an SMPS will generally be more efficient at higher input voltages, although the difference between 230V and 245V is likely to be negligible.

In fact the only thing I could see an improvement on would be devices using fixed AC to accomplish a task with no feedback - fans, incandescent lights (do people really use these any more?) and maybe certain inexpensive LED lamps.  Almost everything else will be about the same, or better, on higher input voltages.

Electric heat the same thing - it runs off a thermostat aiming for a setpoint, it will just take a little longer to get there (while using exactly the same amount of energy).  The more you think about it, the dumber the voltage reduction idea looks.

My house is still full of incandescent lamps - they are all on dimmers and last, and last, and last...   and provide the warm glowing orange light I like when dimmed!  They are dimmed 99% of the time and not cost effective to replace.

[james_s]

Unless you use incandescent light bulbs the voltage doesn't matter at all nowadays. A switch mode PSU (which is also inside CFL and LED lamps) is a constant energy pump. OTOH higher voltages reduce current and thus losses in the power distribution grid.

One of the effects I noticed when I went to CFL many years ago and later LED lighting is that I no longer noticed momentary dips in the power except if I had the bathroom vent fan on I would hear the speed sag momentarily and now I have several UPS's that kick in. Used to be every time the fridge or air compressor started or a tree branch landed on a power line somewhere the lights would dim or flicker. Modern lighting rides it out without so much as a flicker. I've even had a few incidents during wind storms when the voltage dipped to maybe 80V (from 120 nominal) for a full second or two accompanied by the loud buzz of an arc off in the distance and the LED lights didn't even dim. I only noticed it happening because it was around the holidays and I had some old incandescent Christmas lights around the window and those very noticeably dimmed and flickered.

[james_s]

Electric heat the same thing - it runs off a thermostat aiming for a setpoint, it will just take a little longer to get there (while using exactly the same amount of energy).  The more you think about it, the dumber the voltage reduction idea looks.

My house is still full of incandescent lamps - they are all on dimmers and last, and last, and last...   and provide the warm glowing orange light I like when dimmed!  They are dimmed 99% of the time and not cost effective to replace.

Philips makes (or at least made) a line of LED bulbs that turn more orange as they are dimmed. It's not exactly the same effect as you get with incandescent if you really dim them down low but it's pretty close. I have a handful of them that I put in the more vintage fixtures I have that are on dimmers. I still keep incandescent in all the lights at our cabin because it maintains the cool 1970s vibe the place has and since nobody is there most of the time the power bill rarely exceeds the fixed monthly charge just for being connected. I retired them everywhere else years ago though, except places that need them like the oven light and a couple of lava lamps that rely on the heat from the bulb to work.

[tom66]

Unless you use incandescent light bulbs the voltage doesn't matter at all nowadays. A switch mode PSU (which is also inside CFL and LED lamps) is a constant energy pump. OTOH higher voltages reduce current and thus losses in the power distribution grid.

One of the effects I noticed when I went to CFL many years ago and later LED lighting is that I no longer noticed momentary dips in the power except if I had the bathroom vent fan on I would hear the speed sag momentarily and now I have several UPS's that kick in. Used to be every time the fridge or air compressor started or a tree branch landed on a power line somewhere the lights would dim or flicker. Modern lighting rides it out without so much as a flicker. I've even had a few incidents during wind storms when the voltage dipped to maybe 80V (from 120 nominal) for a full second or two accompanied by the loud buzz of an arc off in the distance and the LED lights didn't even dim. I only noticed it happening because it was around the holidays and I had some old incandescent Christmas lights around the window and those very noticeably dimmed and flickered.

We had a proper brownout here for a few seconds and my computer SMPS didn't even blink.  The LED lights stayed on without dimming but both monitors, my GW Instek PSU and my scope rebooted (both are universal voltage 100-265V),  but the PC rode through without a blip.

Modern SMPS power supplies are quite comfortable accepting inputs well outside their nominal rating for some time, provided they aren't heavily loaded.  It's one reason I'm not convinced tap-changing UPSes are worth the money any more.

[james_s]

I can't see how voltage reduction would help with the majority of appliances.

Devices like dishwashers, washing machines, etc. all draw heating current to meet a temperature set point, so lower voltage will simply extend their heating cycles.  I^2 losses in feed cabling will reduce,  but this may well be counterbalanced by the losses of the machine being greater as the respective cycles operate for longer, losing more energy over that time.

The same applies for the cooling cycles of refrigerators, although perhaps the start-up current would be mildly reduced, I can't see this being considerable.

Anything with an SMPS will generally be more efficient at higher input voltages, although the difference between 230V and 245V is likely to be negligible.

In fact the only thing I could see an improvement on would be devices using fixed AC to accomplish a task with no feedback - fans, incandescent lights (do people really use these any more?) and maybe certain inexpensive LED lamps.  Almost everything else will be about the same, or better, on higher input voltages.

Doesn't the current draw of an induction motor increase as voltage is reduced? Assuming that's the case then I^R losses in the motor windings and supply wiring will be increased. I was under the impression that the reason for the voltage increasing over the years from the original 110/220V to 115/230, 117/234 and the current 120/240V was to squeeze more capacity out of the existing grid and reduce transmission losses.

[james_s]

Modern SMPS power supplies are quite comfortable accepting inputs well outside their nominal rating for some time, provided they aren't heavily loaded.  It's one reason I'm not convinced tap-changing UPSes are worth the money any more.

I was discussing those with an engineer friend a few months ago after we each happened to acquire a pile of older UPS's. I'm not convinced the "automatic voltage regulation" models as they're called were ever worth it. They don't work like a constant voltage transformer, they don't even have very many steps, just a couple of buck and a couple of boost taps in most cases. The quiescent draw is significantly higher than a similar UPS without that feature since the transformer is active all the time and brings with it the associated losses. It's only a few watts but it can add up to megawatt hours over the life of the unit(s). Perhaps some areas have real brownouts that last many minutes, I don't know, but my power has only ever dipped out of spec for a stretch of a few seconds at most, or gone out completely. If the voltage goes out of spec I just want the UPS to kick in and switch to battery until things settle down. It's pointless for it to try to boost the voltage up. On top of that, if everyone had auto voltage boost regulators they would only exacerbate a brownout caused by overload since they have to draw more current from the grid in order to boost the voltage. The advertise the feature as beneficial for "sensitive electronic devices" but what electronics made in the last 30-40 years are "sensitive"? My family's first PC in 1984 had a switchmode power supply, it had a 115/230 selector switch on the back so it was not the modern type but I bet it would still operate reliably from say 90-140V. 

[Zero999]

My house is still full of incandescent lamps - they are all on dimmers and last, and last, and last...   and provide the warm glowing orange light I like when dimmed!  They are dimmed 99% of the time and not cost effective to replace.

The efficiency of incandescent lamps drastically degrades when dimmed, so if you could get LED lamps with the same colour, as your dimmed incandescent lamps, you could get the same light for well under a tenth of the power.

[schmitt trigger]

The only instance where a voltage reduction would be beneficial, is on home appliances which utilize permanent-split-capacitor induction motors.
More so if they were running at light mechanical loads.


But most modern appliances have moved or will move towards BLDC motors. Since their controllers are at heart a SMPS, the efficiency gain by a slight voltage decrease most likely will be minuscule.

[floobydust]

The utility industry here uses higher voltages (~124V) as a cover up for an aging infrastructure. With growth in population, industrial usage etc. demand has increased, power factor has also degraded and utilities just want to make money. Power plants are multi-billion dollar projects, new HV power lines, transformers as well are very costly. With coal being demonized, natural gas frowned upon and all the environmentalists dreaming about solar and wind generation, building new power generation or infrastructure does carry new risk.

The easiest solution is to crank up voltage, which means lower current, so old power lines don't overheat and old substation transformers, breakers can still be used- just push your existing infrastructure.
Adding capacitor banks helps but they are very expensive and ultimately you still need to pipe in more power. It's only going to get worse when electric cars become popular.

Most loads are inductive, this seems to be what is making the payoff. I saw industrial and plant induction motors were using less current at the higher voltages. Small loads such as light bulbs, a PC are unimportant in the big scheme.

[SilverSolder]

Electric heat the same thing - it runs off a thermostat aiming for a setpoint, it will just take a little longer to get there (while using exactly the same amount of energy).  The more you think about it, the dumber the voltage reduction idea looks.

My house is still full of incandescent lamps - they are all on dimmers and last, and last, and last...   and provide the warm glowing orange light I like when dimmed!  They are dimmed 99% of the time and not cost effective to replace.

Philips makes (or at least made) a line of LED bulbs that turn more orange as they are dimmed. It's not exactly the same effect as you get with incandescent if you really dim them down low but it's pretty close. I have a handful of them that I put in the more vintage fixtures I have that are on dimmers. I still keep incandescent in all the lights at our cabin because it maintains the cool 1970s vibe the place has and since nobody is there most of the time the power bill rarely exceeds the fixed monthly charge just for being connected. I retired them everywhere else years ago though, except places that need them like the oven light and a couple of lava lamps that rely on the heat from the bulb to work.

I have swapped to LED in many locations, it's just that I like to dim REALLY low and make the place cozy! There are about two dozen incandescent ceiling lamps that just don't look right with LEDs.

The efficiency of incandescent lamps drastically degrades when dimmed, so if you could get LED lamps with the same colour, as your dimmed incandescent lamps, you could get the same light for well under a tenth of the power.

During the winter months, the heat emitted by the bulbs can be subtracted from the heating bill...  so it isn't so bad.   During summer, the days are longer and more time is spent outside.  If you do the math on it, incandescent bulbs at this geographic location are not a disaster at all.

[james_s]

I have swapped to LED in many locations, it's just that I like to dim REALLY low and make the place cozy! There are about two dozen incandescent ceiling lamps that just don't look right with LEDs.

It's true that nothing does quite match that cozy dimmed incandescent look, at least nothing that is readily available at modest prices. I did recently pick up a Philips Hue "White Ambiance" bulb which is pretty cool, it is dimmable from full brightness to a faint glow and the color temperature is tunable from a warm cozy 2200k up to icy blue 6500k daylight. It was fairly expensive though at $20 and has the complexity of needing a zigbee bridge, still it's cool that such a thing exists. I'm a lighting geek so I pretty much just bought it to play with, I don't plan to outfit my house with them.

[BravoV]

Its Elon's fault, Tesla's batteries that is attached to the grid is too powerful ... 

... duck&run ...

[coppercone2]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

Either way I question their claims, quoted from their site:
Overvoltage increases the amount of energy used by consumers
Overvoltage increases carbon emissions
Overvoltage reduces the efficiency of rooftop solar
Overvoltage damages domestic appliances and shortens their life
Overvoltage increases the costs on everyone’s power bills


Some of those may be true for incandescent lamps, but what else? Overvoltage will make electric resistance heaters produce more heat, so they'll run less time, same amount of energy is consumed. Electronics will all be made to accommodate the global standards, so at least 240V nominal, the vast majority of electronics these days are rated something like 90-265V so not an issue. Anything with a switchmode power supply which is almost everything these days, including lights will draw less current as the voltage increases, so more energy is not consumed and the bills won't be higher.

IMHO this sounds like a bunch of nonsense by people who know just enough about electricity to think they know everything.

are you serious? it kills the life time of most devices. even a heater is running at a higher watt density and thermal cycling more often. what is that going to do to even a basic coil? Basically it causes a higher temperatre

what do inrushes look like when the voltage is higher? I lived in an area next to a very spikey power grid (near a very bad load that caused frequent sags and spikes). I could make minimum wage collecting stuff and repairing stuff with fried PTCs and fuses if I wanted to.

HV trashes stuff


even basic light bulbs
https://yarchive.net/electr/incandescent_overvoltage.html

another article which I can't link here

In general, if the lamp is over-driven with a voltage just five percent higher than its rating, then the life expectancy is cut in half! This effect gets worse as the voltage goes higher. At ten percent over voltage,lamp life decreases to only 31 percent of its rated value.

It's great not to take action for the Sylvania Co. so they can feed on your wallet

Maybe these assertions would be true if people started choking their mains inlet hard core. but then you got some hot and heavy vampires all over the place. anyone have that fat guy from blade 1 come to mind?


also exploding light bulbs are not fun.

[tom66]

are you serious? it kills the life time of most devices. even a heater is running at a higher watt density and thermal cycling more often. what is that going to do to even a basic coil? Basically it causes a higher temperatre

Halogen light bulbs actually have a longer lifespan when run near the upper end of their operating voltage curve, as the halogen cycle works better when the bulb is running a bit hotter.

I have never had a wire-based (nichrome) heater fail at the element.  If there is a failure, it is due to bearings in the motor, or the thermostat or protective fuse fails open.  The elements themselves are almost always intact.

[Zero999]

During the winter months, the heat emitted by the bulbs can be subtracted from the heating bill...  so it isn't so bad.   During summer, the days are longer and more time is spent outside.  If you do the math on it, incandescent bulbs at this geographic location are not a disaster at all.

I use natural gas for heating, which is much cheaper than electricity, where I live. If you want to use electricity for heating, then go for a heat pump. Resistive heating, whether it's from incandescent lamps, or a heating element, is just a waste of energy.

[vk6zgo]

For many years, the standard Mains voltage in Western Australia was 250v, instead of the 240v standard in other States.
Electrical & Electronic equipment designed for 240v use had no discernible reduction in life expectancy.

Back when we made incandescent lamps in Australia, 240v ones would happily operate on 250v for extended periods, again with no discernible difference in life expectancy.

The "bean counters" decided it was cheaper to import lamps from third world countries, so Australian manufacture was wound up.

The imported "240v" ones had markedly reduced life times, up to a fifth as long as the old Oz ones.
Importers knew  a "nice little earner" when they saw one, & specially imported "260v" lamps for WA at a premium price---------- they lasted just barely longer than the "240v" ones!

By now, we had been "brainwashed", so at great cost, the standard mains voltage was reduced to 240v.
The 240v & 260v lamps now lasted----------(drumroll) Just as long as they did on 250v!

Anyway, we now knew that incandescent lamps were unreliable, energy guzzling inventions of Satan (or at least Edison, in between being mean to Tesla).
The saviour was to be CFLs.

I hated the bloody things-- they either worked for a while, then faded out to unusabilitlty in slightly longer time than the life of the imported  incandescents, or in some cases, were DOA.

As soon as LED lamps came on the market in quantity, I grabbed one for the lounge room.
Blow me down, if the thing didn't copy the CFLs, by starting out bright, then fading over time.
It was transferred to toilet light service, where it has performed well.

The next lot of LED lamps have been excellent, & CFLs have been banished from my house.

[themadhippy]

energy guzzling inventions of Satan (or at least Edison

Mr swan might have an issue with that statment

[coppercone2]

are you serious? it kills the life time of most devices. even a heater is running at a higher watt density and thermal cycling more often. what is that going to do to even a basic coil? Basically it causes a higher temperatre

Halogen light bulbs actually have a longer lifespan when run near the upper end of their operating voltage curve, as the halogen cycle works better when the bulb is running a bit hotter.

I have never had a wire-based (nichrome) heater fail at the element.  If there is a failure, it is due to bearings in the motor, or the thermostat or protective fuse fails open.  The elements themselves are almost always intact.

kilns burn out all the time on the elements. and heat guns are notorious for destroying the coil

not that I have alot of experience with this, my power is stable

[vk6zgo]

energy guzzling inventions of Satan (or at least Edison

Mr swan might have an issue with that statment

But he wasn't mean to the great god Tesla!

[schmitt trigger]

Interesting information about WA having such a high household voltage.
What was the reason to choose it in the first place?

On the other side of the coin there is Japan, with its ludicrously low 100 volts.
The only reason I can think of, is to create a technical barrier to imports.

[coppercone2]

certain things will last alot longer, however in DC systems the power converter needs to be analyzed on a case by case basis

[Nusa]

On the other side of the coin there is Japan, with its ludicrously low 100 volts.
The only reason I can think of, is to create a technical barrier to imports.

It's historical, dating back to 100V generators bought in the late 19th century that formed the basis of what eventually grew into their national grids. Worse yet, the ones they got from the US were 60 Hz, and the ones they got from Germany were 50 Hz. Japan's grid is still split between those two frequencies.

Note that the US nominal voltage was 110V up until the 1960's, which was close enough to 100V for many things to be compatible during the US occupation of Japan after WWII.

[SilverSolder]

During the winter months, the heat emitted by the bulbs can be subtracted from the heating bill...  so it isn't so bad.   During summer, the days are longer and more time is spent outside.  If you do the math on it, incandescent bulbs at this geographic location are not a disaster at all.

I use natural gas for heating, which is much cheaper than electricity, where I live. If you want to use electricity for heating, then go for a heat pump. Resistive heating, whether it's from incandescent lamps, or a heating element, is just a waste of energy.

I totally agree with you.  I consider it a "hobby" to have incandescent lamps.   Just like owning a horribly inefficient muscle car is a hobby...   just don't use it for everyday transport and you'll be fine!

I also have a DAZOR brand lamp over my work bench, which uses two real fluorescent tubes...    I could replace the tubes with LEDs, but why would I do that when the fluorescent tubes are just so awesome?

[GlennSprigg]

Some people forget, (or don't realize?) how much the voltage changes during the day/night depending on
the present load. When I first started my 'trade' in the 70's with E.T.S.A. (the Sth Aust Power auth then), we
had 'O.L.T.C.' (On Load Tap-Changing) Transformers in the main Switch-Yards, that would automatically try
to change output Tap voltages throughout the day. Would drop to 230v, kick in to about 250v, drop back to
about 240v by evening when everyone is cooking!. Air conditioning was not a major problem back then!! 

It's sort of like Homer Simpson, saying... "I like to think of speed signs as like a 'suggestion', like wearing pants!"
(Regarding the 'latter' in the above line, I just live outside in Jocks & singlet now.. being Australia!  ).

[james_s]

For many years, the standard Mains voltage in Western Australia was 250v, instead of the 240v standard in other States.
Electrical & Electronic equipment designed for 240v use had no discernible reduction in life expectancy.

Back when we made incandescent lamps in Australia, 240v ones would happily operate on 250v for extended periods, again with no discernible difference in life expectancy.

The "bean counters" decided it was cheaper to import lamps from third world countries, so Australian manufacture was wound up.

The imported "240v" ones had markedly reduced life times, up to a fifth as long as the old Oz ones.
Importers knew  a "nice little earner" when they saw one, & specially imported "260v" lamps for WA at a premium price---------- they lasted just barely longer than the "240v" ones!

The original ones were probably good quality 250V lamps which would also run (at significantly reduced efficiency) on 240V in other regions. It's true that a lot of newer incandescent lamps have been low quality compared to those made during the peak but lifespan is only part of the story. It's fairly trivial to make an incandescent lamp that will last 50,000 hours or more, if you don't care how many lumens per watt it produces. The vast majority of the cost of using an incandescent bulb is the electricity it consumes, so it is a false economy to optimize for long life unless the bulb is difficult to change in which case there are better choices these days.

There is no conspiracy involved in the 750-1000 hour lifespan, there is simply a tradeoff between lifespan and efficiency and 750 hours is a reasonable compromise that offers reasonable (by incandescent standards) efficiency at an acceptable lifespan. On one end of the spectrum are long life bulbs, you used to be able to get 130V bulbs that would last substantially longer on 120V but they were also quite dim for the wattage. On the other end of the spectrum are photoflood bulbs, I have a few of those and they have a rated life of 6(!) hours but they are very bright and produce a lot of light for the power they consume, again by incandescent standards. If you ignore the cost of your time to acquire and replace bulbs, the optimal lifespan for incandescent is probably around 100 hours or so. Longer life bulbs cost you more in electricity and shorter life bulbs cost you more in bulbs. In the real world the value of the time, effort and convenience shifts things toward longer life.

240V bulbs are also significantly less efficient than 120V bulbs which themselves are significantly less efficient than low voltage bulbs due to the increased thermal losses of the longer, thinner filament required for higher voltage operation. A 240V 60W bulb is pretty close in brightness to a 40W 120V bulb.

[james_s]

energy guzzling inventions of Satan (or at least Edison

Mr swan might have an issue with that statment

But he wasn't mean to the great god Tesla!

Eh, Swan and Edison independently developed similar lamps over roughly the same period of time, the idea of an incandescent lamp was not completely new and neither inventor started from scratch, they simply perfected a marketable product and while I'm less familiar with Swan, Edison's main accomplishment with the light bulb was not inventing a bulb but developing and marketing the entire infrastructure. A bulb is useless outside of the laboratory unless you have sockets and switches and dynamos, meters, and other components. Edison knew this and put together everything needed for a complete system and got it into production so consumers could actually buy it and I suspect Swan did something similar in that part of the world. Edison was not known for being a particularly nice guy but that's true of countless other accomplished people, nobody remembers Steve Jobs, Bill Gates or even Linus Torvalds for being friendly.

Tesla was brilliant but calling him eccentric would be an understatement and in the later part of his life he was downright nutty. He was a showman and enjoyed being mysterious, it can be difficult to separate his actual developments from the rumors and legends surrounding him. Aside from this, I don't think Tesla ever produced and sold a marketable product himself, he wasn't a businessman. A dozen Teslas might develop some really cool technologies but without guys like Edison, Westinghouse and others like them most of these technologies would never evolve into something people can actually buy.

[cdev]

Do parts of Australia still use the differently phased power grid?

I think it used the ground as the return?

[NiHaoMike]

240V bulbs are also significantly less efficient than 120V bulbs which themselves are significantly less efficient than low voltage bulbs due to the increased thermal losses of the longer, thinner filament required for higher voltage operation. A 240V 60W bulb is pretty close in brightness to a 40W 120V bulb.

Back in the day, there were a few "enhanced efficiency" incandescent bulbs that had built in series diodes to lower the effective voltage so that the efficiency can be improved. They were very quickly overtaken by CFLs which offered a much greater improvement in efficiency.

[drussell]

I also have a DAZOR brand lamp over my work bench, which uses two real fluorescent tubes...    I could replace the tubes with LEDs, but why would I do that when the fluorescent tubes are just so awesome?

If it is a darkish brown like it appears in your photo, then I've got one of the exact same model of articulating drafting table lamp as that.    Little red and black start/off buttons on top....

It's quite old but it is very handy, works perfectly and I really like it.

[tooki]

There is no conspiracy involved in the 750-1000 hour lifespan, there is simply a tradeoff between lifespan and efficiency and 750 hours is a reasonable compromise that offers reasonable (by incandescent standards) efficiency at an acceptable lifespan. On one end of the spectrum are long life bulbs, you used to be able to get 130V bulbs that would last substantially longer on 120V but they were also quite dim for the wattage. On the other end of the spectrum are photoflood bulbs, I have a few of those and they have a rated life of 6(!) hours but they are very bright and produce a lot of light for the power they consume, again by incandescent standards. If you ignore the cost of your time to acquire and replace bulbs, the optimal lifespan for incandescent is probably around 100 hours or so. Longer life bulbs cost you more in electricity and shorter life bulbs cost you more in bulbs. In the real world the value of the time, effort and convenience shifts things toward longer life.

Normally, I’m the first person to interject that planned obsolescence is practically entirely a myth. But in the case of light bulbs, we have a documented, official case of colluded planned obsolescence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel

Before it, light bulbs lasted 2500 hours typically. The Phoebus cartel’s members all agreed to reduce the lifespan to just 1000 hours.

[tom66]

There have been a few cases of planned obsolescence over the years.  However, I think the key issue is that people don't generally re-purchase products from suppliers who produce unreliable goods.  Quality is seen as one of the more important factors that consumers consider when purchasing a product, and while price is also a critical factor, that creates a balancing act for manufacturers.

For instance, while I am sure car manufacturers have considered making unreliable cars to sell more cars,  they ultimately spend an enormous amount of money making their vehicles last for a long period of time,  because it is bad customer image if their product only lasts 7 years. 

[tooki]

There have been a few cases of planned obsolescence over the years.  However, I think the key issue is that people don't generally re-purchase products from suppliers who produce unreliable goods.  Quality is seen as one of the more important factors that consumers consider when purchasing a product, and while price is also a critical factor, that creates a balancing act for manufacturers.

Precisely. That's why I think 99.99% of the claimed "planned obsolescence" actually isn't: what customer is going to buy from you again, if your product failed so quickly? (The entire premise of planned obsolescence is forcing the consumer to buy from you over and over again, but they won't if your product sucks.)

Hence why when it really is planned obsolescence, it requires a cartel behind it to make sure nobody makes any product that is noticeably better.

[james_s]

Normally, I’m the first person to interject that planned obsolescence is practically entirely a myth. But in the case of light bulbs, we have a documented, official case of colluded planned obsolescence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel

Before it, light bulbs lasted 2500 hours typically. The Phoebus cartel’s members all agreed to reduce the lifespan to just 1000 hours.

Dissolved in 1939, so not really relevant to most of us here. Planned obsolescence is not a complete myth, there have been cases of it, but it is not the reason light bulbs in the tungsten filament era last the length of time they do. There is a very predictable relationship between voltage, filament temperature, lifespan and efficiency. The hotter you run the filament, the more efficient the lamp and the shorter it lasts. Reducing the voltage even a modest amount results in a dramatic increase in lifespan with an equally dramatic reduction in efficiency as the spectrum is shifted toward IR.

There was one more modern case I'm aware of where bulbs were lasting too long and were later changed to reduce this. GE with their Bonus Line and Westinghouse with their Lifeguard series of mercury vapor lamps developed an electrode formulation that resulted in white deposits in the arc tube instead of the typical light absorbing black deposits. These were very good quality lamps in general, made during the peak of mercury vapor lighting and it was found that instead of lasting a few years they were lasting decades, there are a few documented cases of these lamps lasting well over 100,000 hours. My grandparents had a barn light with a GE Bonus Line lamp in it that my grandpa put up in the late 70s and it was still running dusk till dawn on the original lamp as of a few years ago when the house was sold after my grandmother passed away. By the 1980s both manufactures had gone back to electrode formulations that caused the arc tubes to blacken, although that was also around the time when high pressure sodium was really being pushed and mercury took a back seat so this may have been about cost reduction more than deliberately reducing lamp life, I don't know.

[Sal Ammoniac]

I did recently pick up a Philips Hue "White Ambiance" bulb which is pretty cool, it is dimmable from full brightness to a faint glow and the color temperature is tunable from a warm cozy 2200k up to icy blue 6500k daylight.

I'm an amateur astronomer and I replaced all of my outdoor lights (about a dozen of them) with Phillips Hue LED bulbs. Normally, I have them set to white to light up my courtyard at night, but when I have my telescopes out, I set them all to red and dim them so they don't affect my night vision much. No more tripping on things in the dark. They work great in this application.

[Sal Ammoniac]

On the other end of the spectrum are photoflood bulbs, I have a few of those and they have a rated life of 6(!) hours but they are very bright and produce a lot of light for the power they consume, again by incandescent standards.

You forgot about flashbulbs, which have a rated life of a few milliseconds. 

[tom66]

Precisely. That's why I think 99.99% of the claimed "planned obsolescence" actually isn't: what customer is going to buy from you again, if your product failed so quickly? (The entire premise of planned obsolescence is forcing the consumer to buy from you over and over again, but they won't if your product sucks.)

Yes, and I don't envy some consumer electronics manufacturers, faced with the dilemma of cheap-or-quality.  Make a quality produce but charge twice as much for it and no one will buy.  Make a cheap product that falls apart five years later and, well, no one will buy from you again.

You can clearly see when cost decisions have been made in product design.  The saying goes that any fool can build a bridge for a billion dollars, it takes an engineer to make it happen for a million.

This is also one reason I am very strongly in favour of products having a reparability rating and a requirement for parts and service manuals to be readily available, as it will reduce any *unplanned obsolescence* effects.

[engrguy42]

This "conservation voltage reduction" thing has been around (in the US at least) for 10 or 20 years. And as far as I can tell, it hasn't saved the world.

It's one of those nice ideas that make people feel good, but in terms of implementation and evaluation it's freakin' COMPLICATED, and may not be worth it. Keep in mind that utilities are REQUIRED to make sure the voltage at their customers is within state limits. ALL customers. Which means if you go around lowering your normal voltage on the feeders you now need to re-engineer the equipment you have installed to make sure that the worst case voltage on all the circuits doesn't fall below the mandated lower limits, especially for the guy at the very end of the circuit where normal voltage hangs around the lower limit in the best of cases.

They have transformers with tap changers to regulate voltage, as well as separate voltage regulators, as well as automatically and manually switched capacitors to manage voltage at all points on the circuits. And those voltage profiles vary by time of day and what kind of load is running and location on the circuit. FREAKIN' COMPLICATED !!! Which means you now have to spend lots of money to re-engineer and re-evaluate the circuit design and modify/add installed regulation and monitoring equipment. Big bucks.

Oh, and by the way, who pays those big bucks??

And depending on the type of load (industrial, residential, commercial, etc.), the benefits of the lower voltage could be either negligible or tiny, and not worth the investment. And unless you install a bunch of fancy monitoring equipment you'll never know exactly the the benefit was, if any.

Anyway, it seems like a strange time to be trying to convince the world that a tiny bit of perceived energy efficiency is what's really going to save the world.   

[vk6zgo]

There have been a few cases of planned obsolescence over the years.  However, I think the key issue is that people don't generally re-purchase products from suppliers who produce unreliable goods.  Quality is seen as one of the more important factors that consumers consider when purchasing a product, and while price is also a critical factor, that creates a balancing act for manufacturers.

For instance, while I am sure car manufacturers have considered making unreliable cars to sell more cars,  they ultimately spend an enormous amount of money making their vehicles last for a long period of time,  because it is bad customer image if their product only lasts 7 years.

Manufacturers have a perfect "out", especially with household items-------- they simply reduce the quality of the "prestige" brands, so that they are just as bad as the "El Cheapo" option.

The  mugs, sorry, "valued customers", sick of the short life of the latter, then pay a premium for a "Sunbeam", "Philips", etc, which doesn't last any longer, costs the importer the same amount, but retails for three times as much!
Now that all the "grand old names" have been whored off, that isn't hard.

Customers eventually accept that they might as well buy the "El Cheapo".
They are still paying more, overall, as they have to replace each device much more frequently, but are no longer getting suckered in by the "premium" brands.

Interestingly, there are still a few well engineered "El Cheapos" around, which have quite respectable lifetimes.
Finding them is the hard part!

I got suckered when I bought a "Wertheim" vacuum cleaner, a so-called "top of the line" model which was purported to be "German designed".(After all, it had a nice "pretend" German name,)

All I can say is the designers had never seen the inside of an Engineering classroom.
More likely drawn on the back of a placemat at the local boozer!

Needless to say, it was bloody useless, never operating for more than10 minutes before overheating, the hose continually blocking because the dumbos ran the wiring for the "power head" loose though it.
(Our little 15 year old Toshiba had wires running in the hose, too, but they were embedded in the wall.)

The Wertheim was chucked into the shed, & the poor, old, long suffering Toshiba put back into service.
After a few attempts to fix the POS, it went to the verge rubbish pickup.

After some years, the venerable Toshiba finally failed, & was replaced by a $A50 "Ozito"canister vacuum cleaner, which has worked admirably for several years.

[james_s]

You forgot about flashbulbs, which have a rated life of a few milliseconds. 

Those could arguably be classified as pyrotechnics more so than light bulbs. The light comes from burning magnesium in a pure oxygen environment, not an incandescent glow from a hot filament.

[tom66]

I got suckered when I bought a "Wertheim" vacuum cleaner, a so-called "top of the line" model which was purported to be "German designed".(After all, it had a nice "pretend" German name,)

All I can say is the designers had never seen the inside of an Engineering classroom.
More likely drawn on the back of a placemat at the local boozer!

Needless to say, it was bloody useless, never operating for more than10 minutes before overheating, the hose continually blocking because the dumbos ran the wiring for the "power head" loose though it.
(Our little 15 year old Toshiba had wires running in the hose, too, but they were embedded in the wall.)

The Wertheim was chucked into the shed, & the poor, old, long suffering Toshiba put back into service.
After a few attempts to fix the POS, it went to the verge rubbish pickup.

After some years, the venerable Toshiba finally failed, & was replaced by a $A50 "Ozito"canister vacuum cleaner, which has worked admirably for several years.

I recently got rid of our absolutely junk Zanussi vacuum cleaner - my mother had an old one that lasted 30+ years and I made the mistake and 'impulse bought' a cheap Zanussi for my new flat.  What a piece of junk!  The motor eventually died on it after about a year and a half, probably the brushes,  but the construction made it near-impossible to easily access the motor without essentially destroying the appliance. 

To replace it we bought a Miele,  it was about 3x as expensive as the Zanussi and had a lower power rating.  It:
- cleans better
- runs quieter
- doesn't produce as much dust out the back as it seems to suck up
- so far doesn't smell of burnt brushes

Most of my home is now full of appliances from manufacturers I have trust in because I have repaired similar devices in my travels.    I do not get bitten twice. 

[GlennSprigg]

Do parts of Australia still use the differently phased power grid?

I think it used the ground as the return?

Sorry if it's a bit old here mate, but that's an good & understandable question! 
Here in Australia, we transmit power at many varying voltages, depending on the distance. Ranging from 275-kv,
right down to typically 11-kv into the Suburbs.  All this is via 3-Phase Delta. Usually, the final legs in our typical
streets is 11-kv (Delta) to 415v (Star connections), and so producing a virtual 'neutral' at the star-point. The result
of this is to create 240v from each phase to the star-point, being the common 'Neutral'. You will find in the typical street,
that every 3rd or 4th house is connected to varying phases, including the common star-point. Even though this is so, our
switchboards have a main earth, as well as a link from the main earth bar to the neutral bar. We call this a M.E.N. link,
which means Mains-Earth-Neutral.  Now partially answering your question....

In some typically remote Country/Farm locations, there is a system known as S.W.E.R., which stands for 'Single Wire
Earth Return'. For that, there is a typically 9.6kv single wire transmission through the majority of the transmission, where
at the farms etc, has a 9.6kv to 415v/240v transformer, where the 'HV' uses Earth as the return! (Reduced cabling!) 

Interesting addendum....
Different countries use different HV transmission voltages. This is mainly due to to countries local cost for copper/aluminium
as opposed to cost of towers/insulators etc!! Although the higher 'HV' seems better, the local cost is a different story!!

[Sal Ammoniac]

You forgot about flashbulbs, which have a rated life of a few milliseconds. 

Those could arguably be classified as pyrotechnics more so than light bulbs. The light comes from burning magnesium in a pure oxygen environment, not an incandescent glow form a hot filament.

True, but they're still a "bulb" intended to produce light. We still call CFLs and LEDs bulbs despite their not being based on an incandescent glow from a hot filament.

[james_s]

True, but they're still a "bulb" intended to produce light. We still call CFLs and LEDs bulbs despite their not being based on an incandescent glow from a hot filament.

Well, yes, but context. In my post I was specifically discussing incandescent lamps. I left out a wide range of other electric light sources with longer and shorter lifespans, higher and lower efficiencies and other characteristics.

[tooki]

To replace it we bought a Miele,  it was about 3x as expensive as the Zanussi and had a lower power rating.  It:
- cleans better
- runs quieter
- doesn't produce as much dust out the back as it seems to suck up
- so far doesn't smell of burnt brushes

Most of my home is now full of appliances from manufacturers I have trust in because I have repaired similar devices in my travels.    I do not get bitten twice.

I wish I had a justification to buy a Miele vacuum, but my Siemens one is still going strong and I still have a bunch of bags for it... :p

[james_s]

My aunt has a Miele that she has been happy with, it cost a fortune when she bought it though, it's one of those "exotic" European brands in the US. We have a Dyson upright that my partner bought on sale back before I met her, it's actually quite good, it's the only bagless vacuum I've used that worked worth a crap, most of them need to have the bin constantly emptied and fiddled with, this one you can run until it's filled up to the line and it keeps right on sucking.

[sibeen]

We call this a M.E.N. link,
which means Mains-Earth-Neutral.  Now partially answering your question....

Just a quick correction, MEN = Multiple Earth Neutral.

Every house has one so there is multiple earth neutral connections on the output of each transformer.

[james_s]

What is a multiple earth neutral? That's not a term I'm familiar with, if we have it we probably call it something else here.

[VK3DRB]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

It has been 230V for almost 2 decades. And AM radio stations are allocated 9kHz apart, not 10kHz .

Thinking our mains is 240V is still common for some reason. But around 1995 I worked with an "engineer" at IBM who actually thought our mains voltage was 110V 60Hz. He plugged in a special 110V monitor imported from the US into our mains and wondered why it blew up. He said he had a degree in Electronic Engineering from RMIT. I suspect his degree was fake. It turned out his technical skills were quite low, and other engineers and technicians often did his work for him. His incompetence produced a number of serious electrical hazards. Despite being a nice bloke, he was fired within a year of joining the company.

[sibeen]

What is a multiple earth neutral? That's not a term I'm familiar with, if we have it we probably call it something else here.

At the entrance to each house or building, at the sites incoming switchboard a connection is intentionally made between the Earth and the Neutral. In a suburban setting a pole transformer feeds multiple households and at each of these the Earth - Neutral bond is made, so for each transformer there are multiple earth to neutral connections made.

Even if a large building has a dedicated transformer where only one earth to neutral connection is made we still call it the M.E.N link

[sibeen]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

It has been 230V for almost 2 decades. And AM radio stations are allocated 9kHz apart, not 10kHz .

Thinking our mains is 240V is still common for some reason.

It is common for the very good reason that generally the voltage is 240 volts or quite close to it. The standard changed but the voltage didn't.

[BradC]

It has been 230V for almost 2 decades.

Maybe for a VK3, but for a VK6 it has been 240 for decades, down from 250.

Thankfully we are still relatively isolated over here.

[GlennSprigg]

We call this a M.E.N. link,
which means Mains-Earth-Neutral.  Now partially answering your question....

Just a quick correction, MEN = Multiple Earth Neutral.

Every house has one so there is multiple earth neutral connections on the output of each transformer.

Oops!!  You are right of course!!     I must have had a Brain-Fart writing 'Mains' hahaha...

[GlennSprigg]

Is it? I thought the standard was 240V?

It has been 230V for almost 2 decades. And AM radio stations are allocated 9kHz apart, not 10kHz .

Thinking our mains is 240V is still common for some reason.

It is common for the very good reason that generally the voltage is 240 volts or quite close to it. The standard changed but the voltage didn't.

Yea, the AM stations 10-khz separation is not used here in Australia.  We use 9-khz separation.
That's actually quite handy here, as multiples of 9 have an interesting outcome whereby all the digits add up to 9.
As such, you know you are on station with a digital tuner!  For example....
1323-AM.  1 + 3 + 2 + 3  = 9  Ok.
954-AM.    9 + 5 + 4  = 18.  1 + 8  = 9  Ok.   
All half decent receivers here have a selectable 9 or 10 khz sep setting/switch.

[james_s]

Manufacturers have a perfect "out", especially with household items-------- they simply reduce the quality of the "prestige" brands, so that they are just as bad as the "El Cheapo" option.

It's less insidious than that. They acquire the "prestige brand" and then cost reduce the products, reducing the quality in the process but the goal is only to reduce the cost. Then they ride it out, extracting as much profit from the brand as possible until the reputation runs out. Wash, rinse, repeat. It's like mining fossil fuels, it took many years for those brands to build up their potential and then companies come along and gobble them up and wring everything they can out of it before throwing away the carcass.

[SilverSolder]

Will we eventually run out of "good brands"?

[james_s]

Will we eventually run out of "good brands"?

As others turn to junk there is more room for a new company to sprout up building good quality gear, build up a reputation and then eventually get bought out by one of these companies that goes around buying up companies and extracting everything they can from them and the cycle continues.