Re: [OT] Gas inspections

From	Robert Riches <spamtrap42@jacob21819.net>
Newsgroups	comp.os.linux.misc
Subject	Re: [OT] Gas inspections
Date	2026-10-30 17:01 +0000
Organization	none-at-all
Message-ID	<slrn11e9jbi.n12.spamtrap42@one.localnet> (permalink)
References	(20 earlier) <uHGdnfkDuaVUnH_3nZ2dnZfqn_adnZ2d@giganews.com> <fmm9rmxsp9.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <BcmdnZ9q9r0nMH_3nZ2dnZfqn_ednZ2d@giganews.com> <slrn11e5d5b.r90.spamtrap42@one.localnet> <NMSdndj2bZfMgnn3nZ2dnZfqn_udnZ2d@giganews.com>

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On 2026-10-30, c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
> On 10/28/26 22:51, Robert Riches wrote:
>> On 2026-10-29, c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>     I don't. Almost impossible to overload a 200a feed.
>>>     A/C plus both water heaters plus standard stove
>>>     plus top burners plus the microwave ....
>> 
>> The "200A" figure in the US is much more theoretical than
>> practical, at least with Portland General Electric as the
>> utility.  Over 30 years ago when I had a house built, PGE
>> installed a new 25KVA on-ground transformer just for our new
>> house because the new house was on the last-to-be-developed lot
>> in the area and was on a long driveway, too far from other houses
>> to connect to their transformers.  Even if power factor was
>> unity, 25KVA into 240V is only 104A.
>
>    Well, 'conditions vary'.
>
>    IF you have especially long feeds then you likely
>    will never see the 200A. A lot will go poof in
>    resistance/reactance. I have a neighbor, can JUST
>    see his house, that has an especially long feed
>    out of a nearby subdivision. He probably will
>    never see 200A - but is surely WIRED for it.
>
>    Oddly, the feed comes pretty exactly from the
>    house he originally grew up in. Weird.
>
>> I mentioned to the PGE supervisor that I could approach or maybe
>> exceed 25KVA without excessive effort: A/C, electric cooking
>> stove with 4 burners plus oven (preparing Thanksgiving,
>> Christmas, or other big family feast), electric clothes dryer, a
>> couple of 1650W hair dryers, and (a few years later) nine 500W
>> halogen exterior lights, plus misc. indoor lights and appliances
>> He said PGE routinely puts _SIX_ houses, each with at least 200A
>> service, on a single 25KVA transformer.  That helped me
>> understand why PGE's transformers every once in a while would
>> explode, and now why there are odd-shaped black patches that look
>> like scorch marks on the exterior of the pole-mounted transformer
>> that supplies my current house and one other house.
>
>    SIX houses on a single 25 transformer ??? That's
>    practically criminal !

No disagreement from me on that point.

>> By the way, the big exterior lights were controlled by X10
>> switches.  I had an X10 controller on my nightstand.  With the
>> press of one button, I could light up the entire area around the
>> house brightly enough to mow the lawn.  I did that once (at about
>> 8pm on a September evening with stars visible in the black sky)
>> just to be able to say I had.
>
>    X10 can indeed be useful. Have an out-building with
>    some floods and such on it ... the old switch wiring
>    out of my house went bad. Had my electrical guys put
>    in an X10 setup - one on my porch, the other end on
>    the out-building. WORKS ! Much cheaper than a total
>    underground re-wire too. The electrician kinda freaked
>    that I thought so far 'out of the box' - his usual
>    reality was 'dig, destroy, re-do all'.
>
>    I think there are functional alts to X10 also now.
>    Found a remote relay on McMaster/Carr that uses
>    RF connections for switching, but not X-10. MAY
>    need that in the next year or so. Bookmarked.

X10 was/is pretty good, but it's far from perfectly reliable.  If
you _MUST_ have a command take effect, you may need to repeat it
a few times just to be certain it got through noise and such.

Insteon was/is a pretty good upgrade.  Sadly for many/most of
their customers, the company and its servers went away during or
shortly after the Covid scamdemic.  Anyone who used the Insteon
"hub" that depended on the Insteon servers found all their
Insteon equipment effectively bricked the day the bankruptcy
lawyers moved in and unplugged the servers.  Some of that
equipment is being sold on FleaBay, some of it at lower than
original prices.

My Insteon setup uses a local modem and some local Python code to
control porch lights and a few other things.  Even with Insteon,
commands are not perfectly reliable.  I repeat each automated
porch light control three times to improve reliability, but that
sometimes is not enough.

I understand there are other protocols that use the power-lines
for communication for power device control.  Someday, I'll need
to replace the Insteon stuff with one of whichever of those that
are still around at that time.

-- 
Robert Riches
spamtrap42@jacob21819.net
(Yes, that is one of my email addresses.)

Thread

Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Martin Davies-Roundhill <enduphere.xyz@gmail.com> - 2026-10-15 14:52 +0000
  Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Ames <commodorejohn@gmail.com> - 2026-10-15 07:57 -0700
    Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-15 19:33 +0100
      Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> - 2026-10-15 19:40 +0000
  Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-15 17:01 +0200
  Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Beej Jorgensen <beej@beej.us> - 2026-10-15 17:29 +0000
  Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-15 19:27 +0100
    Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-15 18:47 +0000
      Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> - 2026-10-15 19:40 +0000
        Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-15 23:35 +0200
          Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-16 01:41 +0000
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 10:47 +0100
              Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-16 18:40 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 23:17 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-17 02:53 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> - 2026-10-17 18:33 +0000
          Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 10:46 +0100
          Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Ames <commodorejohn@gmail.com> - 2026-10-16 07:58 -0700
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Leroy H <lh@somewhere.net> - 2026-10-16 15:59 +0000
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 18:46 +0200
              Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 18:32 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 19:41 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-16 18:26 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 22:40 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 23:11 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-17 03:06 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-18 14:46 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-17 12:24 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-17 11:31 +0100
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 18:46 +0200
              Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 18:35 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 19:43 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-16 18:34 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-16 22:47 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-17 02:40 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-17 12:33 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-17 12:04 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-17 13:40 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Stéphane CARPENTIER <sc@fiat-linux.fr> - 2026-10-17 11:56 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-17 13:59 +0200
                Programming Books (was Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control?) John Bokma <contact@johnbokma.com> - 2026-10-17 15:01 +0200
                Re: Programming Books (was Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control?) rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-17 18:26 +0000
        Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 10:45 +0100
          Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-16 13:56 +0200
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 15:38 +0100
          Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2026-10-16 15:19 +0000
            Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-16 17:09 +0100
              Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-16 18:21 +0000
              Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2026-10-23 19:34 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> - 2026-10-23 20:28 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-23 22:44 +0000
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-24 03:18 -0400
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-24 13:44 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-24 13:09 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-24 14:45 +0200
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-24 14:02 +0100
                [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-24 21:23 +0200
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-26 01:16 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-26 11:33 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-26 11:08 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-26 13:28 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-26 13:07 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-26 09:08 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-26 13:59 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-26 22:28 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-26 21:39 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-26 23:03 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-27 00:44 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-26 09:05 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-26 22:47 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections Lars Poulsen <lars@beagle-ears.com> - 2026-10-27 06:34 -0700
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-27 14:37 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections rbowman <bowman@montana.com> - 2026-10-27 18:38 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-28 13:05 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-28 10:07 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-28 18:06 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-28 17:57 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-28 22:21 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections Robert Riches <spamtrap42@jacob21819.net> - 2026-10-29 02:51 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-29 21:48 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-30 00:38 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-30 11:04 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections Robert Riches <spamtrap42@jacob21819.net> - 2026-10-30 17:01 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-29 21:45 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-29 23:41 +0000
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-30 04:11 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections Lars Poulsen <lars@beagle-ears.com> - 2026-10-27 06:19 -0700
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-27 10:11 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections Lars Poulsen <lars@beagle-ears.com> - 2026-10-28 06:32 -0700
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-28 10:32 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-28 18:10 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-28 22:32 -0400
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-10-29 21:49 +0100
                Re: [OT] Gas inspections c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> - 2026-10-30 04:23 -0400
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Lars Poulsen <lars@beagle-ears.com> - 2026-10-24 11:52 -0700
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-24 10:35 +0100
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? Lars Poulsen <lars@beagle-ears.com> - 2026-10-24 11:40 -0700
                Re: Personal agents on Linux: what should stay under the user's control? The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2026-10-24 10:31 +0100

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