EEVblog #877 - Solar Analytics Home Energy Monitoring Installation

Installing a home energy monitoring and reporting system on Dave's home solar power system.
The 3G based wireless Connect 23 from Solar Analytics:
Designed & Manufactured by WattWatchers:

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[ForViewingOnly]

8 minutes in and I really like this guy! Electronics hobbyist and valve amp & guitar FX pedal builder... say no more. Dave, you've got to get him back again!

[Frinkbit]

If I had a mains board like that here in Sweden and called an electrician. The words "Up to code" probably wouldn't be part of the conversation.

I mean, that's just amazing.

[zlotvorx]

Learned two things from this video:
a) Electricians looks and behave the same all over the world
b) Aussie electrical panels looks terrible, like the ones from 60's we have here in Europe.

[jakubpolomsky]

That camera is astonishing. Never seen such a quick autofocus. 9:30 onwardsThanks for the video!!

[strangersound]

Get the installer guy back on the show, he was cool. :)

[slaznum]

pretty " how you doin' " on the back of that panel Dave

[shmehfleh]

Wow. Electrical boxes in Australia certainly are... different. I can't say I've ever seen an electrician drill a hole through a wooden board, mount a component onto it, and connect it to a big rat's nest of wires like that.

[KKPYN]

Whoa..that guys drill was going counterclockwise..I thought it was just the toilet that went backwords!!

[chrisridesbicycles]

Dry and sunny Australia. You'd never get away with an outdoor fusebox here in Germany.

[firecrow]

such a flattering thumbnail for this video

[Rickmakes]

I didn't realize power panels in Australia were so different from what we have in the US.

[Megabean]

I really that they give you their real time stats. That's a really awesome way to show your customers how your product working in real world conditions.

[bjornemmy]

wow that mains board is pure horror... are all boards in Australia like that?
A typical house in Belgium has around 10-15 circuit breakers and at leased 2 differential interrupters.
Mine is probably overkill but this barely anything at all ?

Funny to hear someone say December and summer in the same sentence :-)

[helloworldstein]

That's a "relatively new" distribution board? I'm afraid to ask what an older one looks like.

[tylertuthill]

This video was amazing. I love seeing guest features, especially practical videos. You pair up very well with people.

[FindLiberty]

Outstanding video review, Thank you Dave! As you pointed out, the software needs to offer more data resolution w/export and have an X/Y zoom feature added to their graphs. Oh, the H.A.L. computer voice is also conspicuously absent, but that might just cause unnecessary concern over the system becoming self-aware.

[Anamnesia]

O/T: I work in a Government department & our Computer server room is monitored by Planet Controls (QLD). It's a slightly different system to what you've got here, but it does 3G data logging & remote logon to see what conditions are in the Server room. Multi-phase voltage/amperage tracking, temperature, humidity, A/C, UPS/Battery... Just everything!

[gordslater]

15:08 the aperture (gap) around the edge of the door of the enclosure will leak some RF.
That's why EMC seals are used for critical enclosures to maintain proper shielding. The exact attenuation mainly depends on physical dimensions (gap, thickness of materials, length and orientation) of the of the aperture vs the frequency in use (actually the dimensions of the slot are usually referred to in wavelengths) Physically short slots can work quite well at higher frequencies.

The use of slots to ensure some RF gets out of conductive enclosures were first apparent on consumer devices when fashionable metal cases for cellphones became popular around a decade ago. The cases had slots engineered in them, usually around the edges) to keep attenuation to a minimum.
Some were obviously better than others, any many made the phones unusable in poor signal areas. A well-designed one only had around 2-3dB loss in most directions in my testing, some had 10 or 15dB with even deeper nulls in azimuth.

[pepper]

That's what I call through-hole mounting.

[bikejoede]

Thumbs up for Mrs. eevblog's support at 25:04!