# LED efficiency and waste heat production



## Bud9051

The earlier versions I bought did as you describe. I was shocked to discover later on when I removed a newer 60w led that had been on for several hours that I could take it out with my hands, no burn. I haven't seen this extra heat discussed but both my old hot one and new cool one were both 13.5 w rated.

I agree, strange.
Bud


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## u2slow

Watts are watts... doesn't matter if heat or light. Unless they are outright lying in the specs. Light output also diminishes with age/runtime. What you could do is check with an ammeter to verify.

You'll find wattage differences between LED lamps with the same lumen output; or conversely, lumen difference between the same wattages. There, and argument can be made about efficiency or cheapness.


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## SPS-1

LED bulbs are supposed to be about 85% to 90% efficient. So a 17 Watt LED bulb, is still making about 2 Watts of heat.


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## user_12345a

LED bulbs are designed with heat-sinks so the all the heat is dissipated at a certain part - cfls have it even.

Total heat dissipation is what matters, not surface temperature of a hot part.


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## 3onthetree

The "cheapness" of LEDs being comparably hot at the base (usually where the driver is) is probably because the lamps "designed" by Chinese manufacturers (versus lamps designed by western companies that are made in China) haven't engineered the proper heat sink required. And no one seems to like to see diffusers/fins for heat sinks on their lamps. LEDs that do not last anywhere near the stated hours are undoubtedly from heat buildup on the electronics.


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## user_12345a

Depends on which leds you get.


There can be heatsink/heat dissipation areas without fins - the base is designed to dissipate heat even if it's plastic. The good quality ones have metal or ceramic base.

I bought ge 100w replacement leds with metal base, but the metal is painted white and the bulbs are heavy.

The quality has gone down - 25 000 hours used to be the norm, now most are rated at 15k and the cheapest are at 10k.


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## bfrabel

SPS-1 said:


> LED bulbs are supposed to be about 85% to 90% efficient. So a 17 Watt LED bulb, is still making about 2 Watts of heat.


Nope. Not true. That's not how it works.

A 17 watt bulb will make 17 watts worth of heat (or 58 btu's per hour to be more specific)

The light produced might be "85% efficient" (whatever that means), but the heat produced will always be "100% percent efficient".

All electric devices (except for refrigeration systems such as heat pumps) produce the exact same amount of heat for a given amount of watts that is consumed. Doesn't matter if it's a LED, or an incandescent, or an ipad charger, or an electric toothbrush. If it uses 17 watts, it's producing 58 btu's worth of heat.


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## SPS-1

bfrabel said:


> A 17 watt bulb will make 17 watts worth of heat (or 58 btu's per hour to be more specific)


If that were true, you would have a 17 Watt heater, plus all the light is free energy. 

Although eventually it will become heat, but not at the bulb. 

15 Watts worth of power is emitted as light, and 2 Watts as heat. That light will eventually be absorbed by walls, furniture. etc., and be converted to heat. But that's not the bulb that is getting 17 Watts worth of heat.


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## bfrabel

SPS-1 said:


> If that were true, you would have a 17 Watt heater, plus all the light is free energy.
> 
> Although eventually it will become heat, but not at the bulb.
> 
> 15 Watts worth of power is emitted as light, and 2 Watts as heat. That light will eventually be absorbed by walls, furniture. etc., and be converted to heat. But that's not the bulb that is getting 17 Watts worth of heat.


Maybe your laws of electricity and thermal dynamics are different since you're in Canada.

Where I live, if light bulb (or ANY other electrical device that doesn't have a refrigeration compressor) is consuming 17 watts of power, and it's hooked up to 120V, that means that it's drawing about .14 amps AND producing 58 btu's of heat per hour, and it's not from the light that's radiating into the walls, its from the power that is being consumed.

I suspect that your 85% efficiency rating that you are referring to means that it produces 85% more light than an equally rated incandescent bulb would produce at the same wattage, or something like that. I'm not entirely sure.

I do know that it's a fact that 1000 watts worth of light bulbs will produce the same amount of heat as a 1000 watt electric heater. It doesn't matter if those light bulbs are LED or incandescent, or if they were 1000 watts worth of vacuum cleaners or a computer that draws 1000 watts, or a direct short of some wires in your walls that happen to draw 1000 watts. It will all produce the same amount of heat.

(Of course those shorted wires will have the heat super concentrated in one small area, and the LED bulbs will probably spread the heat out over a large area, but over all it's the SAME amount of heat).


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## SPS-1

bfrabel said:


> Maybe your laws of electricity and thermal dynamics are different since you're in Canada.


No, we just have smarter people.


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## SPS-1

Do an experiment for me please. 

Take your 17 Watt light bulb, put a reflector behind it, and put a big photovoltaic solar cell in front of the LED bulb. Now connect the solar cell to a small electric heater, and turn on the light.

In your world, you get 17 Watts of heat from the bulb, plus a few more from the heater hooked up to solar cell. So you get 20 or so Watts of heat while only paying for the consumption of 17 Watts. Neat trick.

In my world, the light that is emitted from the bulb is not radiated as heat from the bulb. The total of bulb, the little electric heater, plus the temperature rise of the solar cell adds up to 17 Watts.


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## Missouri Bound

SPS-1 said:


> No, we just have smarter people.


Then you better go ask one.
bfrabel is 100% right.


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## Missouri Bound

SPS-1 said:


> Do an experiment for me please.
> 
> Take your 17 Watt light bulb, put a reflector behind it, and put a big photovoltaic solar cell in front of the LED bulb. Now connect the solar cell to a small electric heater, and turn on the light.


One of those "smarter" people wouldn't be comparing apples to oranges like you are.


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## HotRodx10

Missouri Bound said:


> Then you better go ask one.
> bfrabel is 100% right.


Maybe you better find one of those smarter people to ask. You and bfrabel are wrong. A 17 Watt, 85% efficient LED bulb produces about 2 Watts of heat. The other 15 Watts is radiant energy (light) that doesn't become heat until it is absorbed by a surface.


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## tom_poconos

bfrabel said:


> I do know that it's a fact that 1000 watts worth of light bulbs will produce the same amount of heat as a 1000 watt electric heater.


Aren't light bulbs converting some of the wattage into visible light (LEDs a lot more so than incandescent), and not infrared, therefore they would not produce as many BTUs as an electric heater? Heat is infrared on the EMF spectrum, light is closer to ultra violet. This is as much as I remember from high school physics.


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## Missouri Bound

HotRodx10 said:


> The other 15 Watts is radiant energy (light) that doesn't become heat until it is absorbed by a surface.


Thanks for agreeing.
I'm surprised you don't think radiant energy is heat.
My baseboard heaters are radiant......they must be defective if they are heating.


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## HotRodx10

Missouri Bound said:


> I'm surprised you don't think radiant energy is heat.


As I said, it is converted to heat when it is absorbed by a surface, until then it's light. (which is also what SPS-1 wrote, that bfrabel and then you argued with) If you'll go back to the OP, the question was regarding "...LED bulbs produce a lot of heat at their bases...is this heat produced in the circuit board of LEDs accounted for?"

I was addressing the OP's query about the direct heat at the base of the bulb. Yes, everything becomes heat eventually. I took physics in high school too (and in college, plus thermodynamics).


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## SPS-1

That article seems to be written by somebody not very technically educated. I wouldn't take it too literally. LED bulbs do produce heat. 

In the winter, I don't worry much about leaving the lights on. All that energy ends up as heat anyways (most after being absorbed by surroundings). Sure, my natural gas heat is somewhat less expensive, but its not a huge cost delta.

On the other hand, in the summer, with any lights on, first you pay for the power to run the light, then for the power to run the AC to pump the heat outdoors. So I am pretty anal about not having lights on unnecessarily. That's where the increased efficiency of LED's really shines --- for any lights that actually are turned on, first they consume far less energy, then your AC has to run less to pump out the heat. Double savings.


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## HotRodx10

It's high school physics, people. A light bulb produces some radiant energy (radiation, e.g. light) and some direct heat (conduction). For an incandescent bulb, 80-90% of the energy input is output as direct heat from the filament, with the other 10-20% emitted as radiation (ultraviolet, visible light, and/or infrared). For an LED, it's typically 10-12% direct heat, mostly from the resistors, etc. in the base. The other 88-90% of the input energy is output as radiation (usually nearly all within the visible light spectrum). The percentage of energy emitted as radiant energy is the lighting efficiency.

In both cases, the radiation is converted to heat when it is absorbed by matter (a solid, liquid, or gas). The distinction between energy emitted as heat and radiant energy *converted* to heat, is somewhat important to the discussion at hand, in that the OP was asking about the heat *at the bulb*. Where the distinction becomes more important is in the discussion of solar heat gains, minimizing A/C requirements, particularly as it relates to windows ("Low-E" glass, shading, etc.). Most of the heat gain from windows is from radiation, with smaller amounts from convection and conduction.


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## HotRodx10

SPS-1 said:


> ...I am pretty anal about not having lights on unnecessarily.


That's good. Since you're in to saving on your energy bill, I'll take this opportunity to expand a little on my last post. For much bigger savings, make sure your awnings or eaves on your south facing windows have the right projection to shade the glass in the summer, but not in the winter.


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## KayBur

Have you considered installing solar panels? Of course, this is not a cheap pleasure, but I read that it pays off in a few years. Although it all depends on the region and power consumption. If you live in Alaska, you won't get a lot of energy from the sun - a fact.


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## bfrabel

KayBur said:


> Have you considered installing solar panels? Of course, this is not a cheap pleasure, but I read that it pays off in a few years. Although it all depends on the region and power consumption. If you live in Alaska, you won't get a lot of energy from the sun - a fact.


If you do get solar panels, be sure to put them on the INSIDE of the house, in order to re-capture energy that would be otherwise wasted by the LED's, especially at night time when they would otherwise be completely useless. 👍


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## Missouri Bound

bfrabel said:


> If you do get solar panels, be sure to put them on the INSIDE of the house,


God, I hope you are joking because that is the dumbest idea in the world.


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## bfrabel

Missouri Bound said:


> God, I hope you are joking because that is the dumbest idea in the world.


Really? Dumbest idea in the world? Come on, I'm talking about using solar panels, to power lights, that power the solar panels. Maybe you're just not smart enough to understand the level of genius that I came up with here.

Alright, if you don't like the panels on the inside of the house idea, how about we keep the panels outside, but mount a huge spot light above them that will turn on at night and on cloudy days. That way the panels can still produce power and not be completely useless at night and/or on cloudy days.

Oh wait, never mind. Maybe that's a dumb idea. 

Seriously though, if you are one of those greenie types who wants to be as energy efficient as possible, why not install solar panels inside of the house to re capture some of the light energy that would otherwise be wasted? I'm sure it wouldn't be much, and the savings would never come close to paying for the panels, but it would still be something, right?


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## Bud9051

I'm afraid I'm with Missouri, not worth the effort, besides ....

Bud


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## CaptTom

Wow. My head is spinning from the tangential discussion about whether light is considered "heat" or not.

I only wanted to point out that at least some of the heat produced by an LED "bulb" is from the power supply, not the LED itself. The power supply is often the most expensive part of the product. Cheap ones are less efficient, and waste more energy in the form of heat. They're also less reliable. And if they're not designed to adequately disperse the heat, they can overheat, fail, even cause a fire.


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## Missouri Bound

bfrabel said:


> Really? Dumbest idea in the world? Come on, I'm talking about using solar panels, to power lights, that power the solar panels.


While you are at it, invent a perpetual motion device that powers itself.
You are out of your friggin' mind.


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## SPS-1

bfrabel is being sarcastic because it bothers him that some people are energy conscious.


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## Missouri Bound

Sarcasm doesn't work well in forums.
Like "smell-o-vision", it still stinks but doesn't work well.


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## KayBur

bfrabel said:


> If you do get solar panels, be sure to put them on the INSIDE of the house, in order to re-capture energy that would be otherwise wasted by the LED's, especially at night time when they would otherwise be completely useless. 👍


Your sarcasm is out of place. Of course, solar panels do not provide 100% electricity (well, the sun is not shining enough everywhere). But solar panels help save on electricity bills.


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## HotRodx10

As I read back over this thread, trying to see how we got this far afield from the OP, I realized I erred in my earlier post; likely the bulk of the energy emitted by an incandescent bulb is radiant energy, just not visible light, but rather infrared.

In case anyone is still confused by the discussion surrounding that aspect of the thread, *radiation* (infrared, visible light, ultraviolet, microwaves, etc.) *is not heat*. Radiation is *converted to* heat when absorbed by matter. That's why, in a microwave oven, only the food gets hot. It's also why infrared space heaters warm people quicker and more efficiently than forced air heaters, because they warm primarily the surfaces where the radiation is absorbed (your skin, e.g.), and very little energy goes to warming the air.


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## viper

I couldn't make it through this thread but did see several 'mostly' accurate statements. The reality is all, including the OP need to grasp is ALL energy used for lighting becomes heat. ALL of it! You do you divide what is light and what is heat. Hotrod was correct in that several light spectrums are produced and each spectrum will heat differently but ultimately it is all heat. This is why we take every single watt consumed into an energy heat gain calculation for AC. I could explain this in extreme detail but that is a moot issue here. 

The issue the OP mentions of LED lighting is multi faceted because you are dealing with vendors that outright lie about their LED performance AND you have localized heating from drivers vs for diffused heating from other bulb types. 

This is what folks need to understand is LUMENS or any other measure of visible light compared to the the energy required to produce that light. This is lumens/watt. Good LEDs will produce about 140 lumens/watt today but trust me, many flat lie about that. Some like I have seen at Mendards are more honest, but still horrible in performance indicating 70 lumens/watt. No, they don't actually advertise that value, they give you "lumens", then give you "watts". But any engineer will quickly grab the calc and do the math. This is why not all LEDs are created equal and cheap LEDs are used in cheap fixtures because many people buy just because it says "LED" and "super efficient"....lmao. 

For comparison, incandescent is about 12-15 lumens/watt, and fluorescent can get to about 95 lumens/watt. However, one of the HUGE factors in lighting is called "lumen maintenance" which refers to lights losing some of their light output over time. Fluorescent serves a big factor there. Incandescent and LED, not so much. Regardless of the "life" that is advertised on LEDs today, you will find very few that will even approach their life in hours. This is usually not the LED itself that fails, but the driver, but who cares, it failed! This is what irritates me with LED. LIES! 

I could talk for hours on lighting but LED is the future, but only in the good stuff. Most at big box stores is crap. You can bet on it.


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## Bob Sanders

viper said:


> Regardless of the "life" that is advertised on LEDs today, you will find very few that will even approach their life in hours. This is usually not the LED itself that fails, but the driver, but who cares, it failed! This is what irritates me with LED. LIES!


It is perhaps a lie, but a lie for different reasons.

LED's don't actually need a driver if operated under the right circumstances. All they really need is a current limiter (a resistor) because they can't regulate their own current draw and will burn themselves up.

LED's need a driver system because they are being operated on 120vac... a current which they don't work well with. Led's work best with low voltage DC current. Unfortunately we have already decided the household current and voltage standards so it's a little late to back out of that. It's just simply easier to provide a driver with each led so we can cheat the system.

Now if I was going to build an energy efficient home it would in fact contain led lighting because the led's themselves do last a h*ll of a long time. It would simply be done up without the drivers... a central 12 volt power supply and distribution system for all household lighting. That would delete the need for led's with onboard drivers.


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## viper

Bob, while I absolutely agree about DC lighting, and I predict the future holds "dual wired homes", LEDs require more than a resistor to survive reliably. However, I totally agree that most of what a "driver" is, is an AC/DC power supply and nothing more, which requires a bridge rectifier and filter caps, and those caps are certain to eventually fail. Caps are the failure mode in the majority of electronics. 

What I have proposed to others is a central, DC power supply within a home. A quality supply can easily run for 20hrs without issue. I know this from industrial equipment. 

But you must remember that LED life is a function of their voltage and drive current. many manufacturers are pushing cheap LEDs way beyond just to obtain some lumens, but they simply won't survive. Without thermal management, they will die as most do. The life cycles they advertise are nothing short of a lie and they know it. But most home owners don't count electrons like me. they just believe what the package says.


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## Bill McC

bfrabel said:


> Nope. Not true. That's not how it works.
> 
> A 17 watt bulb will make 17 watts worth of heat (or 58 btu's per hour to be more specific)
> 
> The light produced might be "85% efficient" (whatever that means), but the heat produced will always be "100% percent efficient".
> 
> All electric devices (except for refrigeration systems such as heat pumps) produce the exact same amount of heat for a given amount of watts that is consumed. Doesn't matter if it's a LED, or an incandescent, or an ipad charger, or an electric toothbrush. If it uses 17 watts, it's producing 58 btu's worth of heat.


A heat pump is not making heat, it is transferring heat from outdoors to indoors. The Mitsubishi Hyper heat units are 100 percent efficient down to -5 degrees, above that temperature those things are animals. The heat pump is a totally different device. There is also heat made by the windings of the motor and friction but it is a small amount. Most compressors also have a band heater at their base to stop refrigerant migration, it is always on but is very low wattage 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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## HotRodx10

Bill McC said:


> A heat pump is not making heat, it is transferring heat from outdoors to indoors. The Mitsubishi Hyper heat units are 100 percent efficient down to -5 degrees, above that temperature those things are animals. The heat pump is a totally different device. There is also heat made by the windings of the motor and friction but it is a small amount. Most compressors also have a band heater at their base to stop refrigerant migration, it is always on but is very low wattage
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


Wow, your BS gets shut down in other threads, so you go dig up this dormant one, just to spread more misinformation. The only thing you were right about was your first sentence, which only restated what bfrabel wrote about heat pumps. The rest of your post is either irrelevant or wrong.


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## viper

Bill McC said:


> A heat pump is not making heat, it is transferring heat from outdoors to indoors. The Mitsubishi Hyper heat units are 100 percent efficient down to -5 degrees, above that temperature those things are animals. The heat pump is a totally different device. There is also heat made by the windings of the motor and friction but it is a small amount. Most compressors also have a band heater at their base to stop refrigerant migration, it is always on but is very low wattage
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


Mind blown!!!! Someone commented that heat is heat, and you went to Mt Everest yapping about heat pumps that are "100% efficient".... Do tell me more about how you talked those electrons into the 100% thing, cuz I think everyone else on the planet is getting screwed.


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## Bill McC

HotRodx10 said:


> Wow, your BS gets shut down in other threads, so you go dig up this dormant one, just to spread more misinformation. The only thing you were right about was your first sentence, which only restated what bfrabel wrote about heat pumps. The rest of your post is either irrelevant or wrong.


There is nothing incorrect about my statement. The whole post is most accurate. When it is warmer outside you can raise that 100 percent efficiency substantially to about 400 percent. I do not have any BS to shut down so it persists. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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## viper

Bill McC said:


> There is nothing incorrect about my statement. The whole post is most accurate. When it is warmer outside you can raise that 100 percent efficiency substantially to about 400 percent. I do not have any BS to shut down so it persists.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


I would assume you have the supporting maths for that? Let's sort through that. 

Be over here waiting.


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## HotRodx10

Bill McC said:


> When it is warmer outside you can raise that 100 percent efficiency substantially to about 400 percent.


Yeah, and by that logic, my window fan has a cooling efficiency of 800% when it's 40 degrees outside and my house is still too warm from the latent heat of the afternoon sun. You're talking nonsense, again, which shouldn't (and doesn't) surprise me.


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## Bill McC

HotRodx10 said:


> Yeah, and by that logic, my window fan has a cooling efficiency of 800% when it's 40 degrees outside and my house is still too warm from the latent heat of the afternoon sun. You're talking nonsense, again, which shouldn't (and doesn't) surprise me.


All through the range of 30 degrees through 65 degrees outdoor temperatures the heat pump delivers about 400 percent efficiency. 

You do not always get your maximum BTU's however the unit works at about 400 percent efficiency in those ranges and then drops lower. The ampeage the unit draws drops off the colder it gets, so you cannot get the same BTU's you get at 65 degrees but what you get is delivered at 400 percent efficiency. Just look up units heat output and wattage draw and compare that to a strip heaters draw. This is just standard information. I put in a lot of heat pumps so I know what they do and do not do. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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## roughneck

Bill McC said:


> All through the range of 30 degrees through 65 degrees outdoor temperatures the heat pump delivers about 400 percent efficiency.
> 
> You do not always get your maximum BTU's however the unit works at about 400 percent efficiency in those ranges and then drops lower. The ampeage the unit draws drops off the colder it gets, so you cannot get the same BTU's you get at 65 degrees but what you get is delivered at 400 percent efficiency. Just look up units heat output and wattage draw and compare that to a strip heaters draw. This is just standard information. I put in a lot of heat pumps so I know what they do and do not do.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


No, wrong again. 
By the way, your providing a ton of training material for my classes. The apprentices can see right through your incoherent ramblings.


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## Bill McC

roughneck said:


> No, wrong again.
> By the way, your providing a ton of training material for my classes. The apprentices can see right through your incoherent ramblings.





roughneck said:


> No, wrong again.
> By the way, your providing a ton of training material for my classes. The apprentices can see right through your incoherent ramblings.


For the record, you are claiming that heat pumps do not produce about 400 percent efficiency over electric heat, that would be 100 percent efficient?

Sincerely,

William McCormick


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## roughneck

Bill McC said:


> For the record, you are claiming that heat pumps do not produce about 400 percent efficiency over electric heat, that be would be 100 percent efficient?
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


For the record I’m claiming not one post you’ve made anywhere in this forum is remotely correct, this one included.


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## viper

Bill McC said:


> For the record, you are claiming that heat pumps do not produce about 400 percent efficiency over electric heat, that be would be 100 percent efficient?
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


Bright bulb on the tree, let me 'attempt' to enlighten. Maybe in all your readings and regurgitations, you can do a little more on the reading side. In the heat pump world, we refer to the energy in vs out ratio as COP or coefficient of performance. Why don't we just call it "efficiency"? Because the definition of efficiency is work in/work out. When energy changes states, there are losses, we know this. Tesla knew this, Eddison knew this, every physicist on the planet EXCEPT you knows this. So when you look at how in the world you can get so many btus OUTPUT relative to the WATTS INPUT, it is because we are extracting heat (energy) from the outdoor air and 'pumping' it into our homes. 

I don't buy that you install heatpumps for a minute because COP is taught in every trade school for heat pumps. 

Then to blow your mind even more, we have this SEER/EER thing in air conditioning, in which if you run those maths, they also exceed 400% eff. WOW!!! But I won't further burden you with pseudo science like latent and sensible loads. 

When I TEACH basic thermodynamics, I use the example of a fuel pump, pumping gasoline. This is precisely the same as your BS, but may help you understand it better. By your math, if a pump uses 100W to pump 1gal of gasoline into a home, that pump just made 118,000-341.2=117,659btus!!!!!

Now us less educated folks understand something called "pumping efficiency" in which we use the viscosity and density of a fluid to obtain the power needed at "100%" eff. But since us less smart folks know there will be losses in the pump, we either run simulated computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations, or real world testing. 

But wait a minute, what runs that pump? Is that, is it...........an electric motor??? Yes, the rest of the world realizes motors do NOT run at 100% eff. Remember state change above. Can't do'r brah. But once we obtain the motor efficiency at load (because it changes with load), then and only then can we know that fluid pump efficiency. 

Or we can do this crazy thing....called a torque test in which torque and speed input to a pump is tested, which is actually the 'right' way to obtain real pumping efficiency. 

But not even ONCE have I seen a pump take off and start delivering me 400%. But like I say, if you start taking those meds correctly, this may start to make more sense.


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## HotRodx10

Bravo, viper! Thanks for taking the time to explain all of that. I like the gas pump analogy; it's better than what I came up with. I figured there was a term for heat pump performance; now I know what to call it.


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## Bill McC

viper said:


> Bright bulb on the tree, let me 'attempt' to enlighten. Maybe in all your readings and regurgitations, you can do a little more on the reading side. In the heat pump world, we refer to the energy in vs out ratio as COP or coefficient of performance. Why don't we just call it "efficiency"? Because the definition of efficiency is work in/work out. When energy changes states, there are losses, we know this. Tesla knew this, Eddison knew this, every physicist on the planet EXCEPT you knows this. So when you look at how in the world you can get so many btus OUTPUT relative to the WATTS INPUT, it is because we are extracting heat (energy) from the outdoor air and 'pumping' it into our homes.
> 
> I don't buy that you install heatpumps for a minute because COP is taught in every trade school for heat pumps.
> 
> Then to blow your mind even more, we have this SEER/EER thing in air conditioning, in which if you run those maths, they also exceed 400% eff. WOW!!! But I won't further burden you with pseudo science like latent and sensible loads.
> 
> When I TEACH basic thermodynamics, I use the example of a fuel pump, pumping gasoline. This is precisely the same as your BS, but may help you understand it better. By your math, if a pump uses 100W to pump 1gal of gasoline into a home, that pump just made 118,000-341.2=117,659btus!!!!!
> 
> Now us less educated folks understand something called "pumping efficiency" in which we use the viscosity and density of a fluid to obtain the power needed at "100%" eff. But since us less smart folks know there will be losses in the pump, we either run simulated computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations, or real world testing.
> 
> But wait a minute, what runs that pump? Is that, is it...........an electric motor??? Yes, the rest of the world realizes motors do NOT run at 100% eff. Remember state change above. Can't do'r brah. But once we obtain the motor efficiency at load (because it changes with load), then and only then can we know that fluid pump efficiency.
> 
> Or we can do this crazy thing....called a torque test in which torque and speed input to a pump is tested, which is actually the 'right' way to obtain real pumping efficiency.
> 
> But not even ONCE have I seen a pump take off and start delivering me 400%. But like I say, if you start taking those meds correctly, this may start to make more sense.


Or if you had installed them and put an amp meter on them, and did the math you would know that the amperage goes up and down with the outdoor temperature. Which means the wattage goes up and down with the outdoor temperature. The colder it is the less heat the unit can move from outdoors to indoors. However the wattage changes in a similar ratio in some models. So if at 65 degrees the unit is making 75,710 BTUs and using 4.91 kW, and a strip heater outputting, 75,710 BTUs is consuming 22,189 watts, where I come from we divide 22,189 by 4,910and get 4.519 or 451 percent. Now all units have different curves at different temperatures so the ratio does change from unit to unit and over a different temperature range. This same unit at 30 degrees is only 300 percent efficient.

But some units output about 400 percent over the 65 to 30 degree range.










Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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## viper

Bill McC said:


> Or if you had installed them and put an amp meter on them, and did the math you would know that the amperage goes up and down with the outdoor temperature. Which means the wattage goes up and down with the outdoor temperature. The colder it is the less heat the unit can move from outdoors to indoors. However the wattage changes in a similar ratio in some models. So if at 65 degrees the unit is making 75,710 BTUs and using 4.91 kW, and a strip heater outputting, 75,710 BTUs is consuming 22,189 watts, where I come from we divide 22,189 by 4,910and get 4.519 or 451 percent. Now all units have different curves at different temperatures so the ratio does change from unit to unit and over a different temperature range. This same unit at 30 degrees is only 300 percent efficient.
> 
> But some units output about 400 percent over the 65 to 30 degree range.
> 
> View attachment 669301
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


HOLY SH*&! like literally what I told you just went right through. Almost like nothing is between the ears to stop it. I would encourage you to bring this response to the next engineering meeting. We will provide the party hats!!!!

IT IS NOT EFFICIENCY!!!!!! You are over here 'ezplaining' to me about this crazy thing about variable compressor compression ratios having an affect on current draw, which is just mind boggling.... And that, wow, this gadget 'makes' more btus the warmer it is outside..... Please go try to process your newly found knowledge from an owner's manual. Better yet, sign up for formal education. I know you were building atom bombs at 4yo, but you just missed this 5min chapter called "thermodynamics in the universe".

Again, walk into any pro meeting calling COP as efficiency and you will win the speshal award. The magic device IS NOT MAKING ENERGY!!!!! Let me dumb this down further to 2nd grade. Billy asks you to deliver $100 to Sally for the 'good time' last night. Billy is giving you $5 to deliver the cash. How much money did you make???? You are the delivery boy! And you didn't get no play last night.

EDIT: Just for clarity, could you tell me what the bottom row is in your attachment again? What does that say? Let's try this together......C......O.................P


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> HOLY SH*&! like literally what I told you just went right through. Almost like nothing is between the ears to stop it. I would encourage you to bring this response to the next engineering meeting. We will provide the party hats!!!!
> 
> IT IS NOT EFFICIENCY!!!!!! You are over here 'ezplaining' to me about this crazy thing about variable compressor compression ratios having an affect on current draw, which is just mind boggling.... And that, wow, this gadget 'makes' more btus the warmer it is outside..... Please go try to process your newly found knowledge from an owner's manual. Better yet, sign up for formal education. I know you were building atom bombs at 4yo, but you just missed this 5min chapter called "thermodynamics in the universe".
> 
> Again, walk into any pro meeting calling COP as efficiency and you will win the speshal award. The magic device IS NOT MAKING ENERGY!!!!! Let me dumb this down further to 2nd grade. Billy asks you to deliver $100 to Sally for the 'good time' last night. Billy is giving you $5 to deliver the cash. How much money did you make???? You are the delivery boy! And you didn't get no play last night.
> 
> EDIT: Just for clarity, could you tell me what the bottom row is in your attachment again? What does that say? Let's try this together......C......O.................P


Efficiency requires unity to be understood, and strip heaters provide unity for conversion of watts to heat, they are 100 percent efficient. By looking at the watts a heat pump unit draws at any BTU output you can compare it to a strip heater draw to create the same BTUs and then get the efficiency of the unit. This seems like COP to me but why would I put that through my mind when I understand what the actual efficiency is. This is a DIY forum and many might not understand how COP is derived, now they do. Now if their unit does not have a chart they can do it on the fly.

This is useful when you are deciding when to have the strip heaters or other sources of backup heat kick in. I never argued that what I was describing, was watts in and watts out because that is what I described. But you seemed to think it was not. 

It is like specific gravity the number of a substance's specific gravity would be confusing unless you knew that it was based on water as unity or 1. Then whatever an element's specific gravity is you know it is that many times more or less than the weight of water. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## viper

Bill McC said:


> This seems like COP to me but why would I put that through my mind when I understand what the actual efficiency is. This is a DIY forum and many might not understand how COP is derived, now they do.* Now if their unit does not have a chart they can do it on the fly.*


Well if I ever see you in my classroom, I will certainly hand over the mic! You are winning! 

Except........how exactly would you like someone to "do it on the fly" you suppose? I'd like to hear that one since it is obvious neither of us are learning today.


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> Well if I ever see you in my classroom, I will certainly hand over the mic! You are winning!
> 
> Except........how exactly would you like someone to "do it on the fly" you suppose? I'd like to hear that one since it is obvious neither of us are learning today.


By the way of the temperature differential between supply and return air and the CFM, to get the BTUs/watts delivered. A lot of units do not come with a chart of ramping COP so you do not know when to kick in the auxiliary heat. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick.


----------



## viper

Bill McC said:


> By the way of the temperature differential between supply and return air and the CFM, to get the BTUs/watts delivered. A lot of units do not come with a chart of ramping COP so you do not know when to kick in the auxiliary heat.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick.


Gotcha. So someone will be able to know their CFM how exactly? 

As well, you mention "kicking in" the aux heat. How do you do that? a switch? 

One last thing, you mention about supply air temp, but I am curious about the latent loads in heating. Can you elaborate?


----------



## supers05

viper said:


> Gotcha. So someone will be able to know their CFM how exactly?
> 
> As well, you mention "kicking in" the aux heat. How do you do that? a switch?
> 
> One last thing, you mention about supply air temp, but I am curious about the latent loads in heating. Can you elaborate?


You're putting way too much energy into this. @Bill McC is a raging lunatic. His first post here was the closest I've seen him get to bring right...... Then he had to double down and prove his inadequacies.

On a side note, at least your posts were well written.


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> Gotcha. So someone will be able to know their CFM how exactly?
> 
> As well, you mention "kicking in" the aux heat. How do you do that? a switch?
> 
> One last thing, you mention about supply air temp, but I am curious about the latent loads in heating. Can you elaborate?


On jobs that I install and anyone else should too, I keep the ductwork under 0.2 inches of water column pressure, the pressure the system was designed to push, the default number of CFM through. So I just multiply the temperature differential of supply and return by CFM and then multiply that by 1.08 and I get the BTUs. I will be honest I just multiply CFM and temperature differential, haha. It is more than close enough to see where the unit is if I have a chance to be there while it is cold. If I have a bypass damper installed it raises the return air temp and it still all works out about the same. Because supply air temperature goes up and the area heats more quickly. The COP would not be accurate either if the duct system is over 0.2 inches of water column pressure. 

Without a chart, you really need some experience though to set up a heat pump in summer and have the auxiliary kick in perfectly in winter or work together with the heat pump that is still 200 percent efficient but now too small to heat the area because of the losses. Having the auxiliary kick in for five minutes is often enough to bring the room to temperature and then the heat pump can maintain it. At some point, the heat pump running non-stop is more expensive than the auxiliary kicking in and out five times an hour for five minutes. 

But a homeowner may feel reassured that the unit is actually only putting out, let us say 200 percent efficiency and realizing that the amount of BTUs from the calculation would not be able to heat the home and it is time for the auxiliary. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> On jobs that I install and anyone else should too, I keep the ductwork under 0.2 inches of water column pressure, the pressure the system was designed to push, the default number of CFM through. So I just multiply the temperature differential of supply and return by CFM and then multiply that by 1.08 and I get the BTUs. I will be honest I just multiply CFM and temperature differential, haha.
> ...
> ...
> 
> William McCormick


So basically you guess. Multiply a bit and dazzle the homeowner. At least we know your commissioning standards.

None of this is related to LED efficiency. Don't hijack other threads.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> So basically you guess. Multiply a bit and dazzle the homeowner. At least we know your commissioning standards.
> 
> None of this is related to LED efficiency. Don't hijack other threads.


Someone mentioned heat pumps and I wanted to explain just how much more efficient watt for watt they can be over strip heaters that are 100 percent efficient, My son's unit starts at over 600 percent efficiency in the low stage and then drops down to about 300 percent in very cold weather. Add the zone dampers and it is a pretty wild system. The surface area of the condenser is what makes it so efficient. A three-ton unit in the same class would not be as efficient. I have built systems and tested them so I know that to be true. 












Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## viper

Bill, I am just going to blow your mind here and tell you that strip heaters are NOT 100% efficient. Change my mind.....


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> Someone mentioned heat pumps and I wanted to explain just how much more efficient watt for watt they can be over strip heaters that are 100 percent efficient, My son's unit starts at over 600 percent efficiency in the low stage and then drops down to about 300 percent in very cold weather. Add the zone dampers and it is a pretty wild system. The surface area of the condenser is what makes it so efficient. A three-ton unit in the same class would not be as efficient. I have built systems and tested them so I know that to be true.
> 
> View attachment 669334
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


You posted to a dead thread with inaccurate info. It was contested, and now you're off on one of your tangents to avoid admitting that you were wrong. You're thread hijacking.


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> Bill, I am just going to blow your mind here and tell you that strip heaters are NOT 100% efficient. Change my mind.....


If you take the BTU output of a strip heater and divide it by 3.412 you will have the wattage drawn by the strip heater. So if you have a heat pump outputting 21,000 BTU’s that is the equivalent of 6,155 watts of strip heat outputting 21,000 BTUs while the heat pump may be drawing less than 1.000 watts to deliver the same 21,000 BTUs of heat. I hope I have not gotten too political or you may never read this.


Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## viper

Bill, I am just going to blow your mind here and tell you that strip heaters are NOT 100% efficient. Change my mind.....


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> Bill, I am just going to blow your mind here and tell you that strip heaters are NOT 100% efficient. Change my mind.....


Watts into a strip heater are the watts out of a strip heater. Nothing crazy or dramatic about it. It is a direct conversion. You do not expect to get more or less watts from a strip heater than you put in. So if you purchase a 8,000 watt strip heater you get 8,000 watts of heat. An 8,000 watt strip heater delivers 27,296 BTUs. While the 2 ton heat pump system it is attached to outputs over 21,000 BTUs at under 1,000 watts. So although the heat pump is six times or six hundred percent more efficient at higher temps and four times more efficient at lower temperatures the strip heater is 100 percent efficient at converting electric to heat. The heat pump is just moving heat not making it.

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## viper

So if I can prove to you ON PAPER that a strip heater is NOT 100% efficient, would you accept that? If we compare education and background, would that help? What is yours anyway?


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> So if I can prove to you ON PAPER that a strip heater is NOT 100% efficient, would you accept that? If we compare education and background, would that help? What is yours anyway?


I had a scholarship to C.W. Post for taking a first place at the Long Island science congress when I was 13. But I only entered because the science teacher said I had to. My previous teachers had told me that there would be no more science. I had already known that from what happened at Grumman Aero Space center. The government was covering up technology they did not want citizens to know about. I dropped out of school when I was 15 and started working full time as a cabinet maker. I already had a business making fishing tackle equipment since I was four. I also caught and sold fish and crabs. I bought my own television when I was 7. I learned to TIG weld at the age of 9 in the Grumman Aero Space plant. So After making cabinets I started making water cooled exhaust tips for racing boats. I also became a licensed insurance agent. Then I did dormers and built homes. Then I got into hazardous waste because the owner of the company that I made the pipes for won two world cups with those pipes that were pretty indescribable because they were a titanium alloy. While there I designed a hazardous waste reduction system that used single and three phase heating systems.I also built a Novel network and data base to track and report hazardous waste. The EPA asked me how I did it because other companies took a year to report but we did it in two weeks. I also wrote the accounts receivable program that allowed the undoing and redoing of invoices and accounts receivable journal which made the boss very happy. Later I worked as an iron worker. And I have almost always done ornamental iron work if only as a second job. I did HVAC my whole life and still install systems for friends and family. I have run a sheet metal shop I can make any fitting with common sheet metal hand tools and a piece of angle iron. I have done all types of construction. I draw in cadd and I program cadd to perform interesting things that would be extremely difficult to do otherwise. That and a million more things were my education.
I was receiving college level lectures when I was 10 years old and started programming on a mainframe that same year. I also install and maintain fire alarm systems in high rise buildings. 

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## viper

So if I can prove to you ON PAPER that a strip heater is NOT 100% efficient, would you accept that?


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> So if I can prove to you ON PAPER that a strip heater is NOT 100% efficient, would you accept that?


If you can prove it you can prove it. If you show me something repeatable in the real world then it is proven. 



Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## viper

Bill McC said:


> If you can prove it you can prove it. If you show me something repeatable in the real world then it is proven.
> 
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


What does that mean? So if I can prove it, it is proven to you? Would you accept it? Or would you like to provide your own math maybe?


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> What does that mean? So if I can prove it, it is proven to you? Would you accept it? Or would you like to provide your own math maybe?


This is not just about math, it is about reality. People have misapplied math more than they have applied it. And the culprit is, not applying it to the reality.
If you seemingly prove it on paper then you go check it out in the field and perhaps tweak the formula to the reality.
There are instances that the common formulas do not work. They happen during instances of ARCs, steam, and capacitance, they break the established rules of modern Lego land engineering. However they follow the actual unbreakable rules of the universe, that are no longer taught by law. At least here in the US.

But with straight up ohms law and conversions for self-inducting heating elements it is pretty straight forward.

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## viper

Bill, my question to you, as it stands, is if I prove to you that strip heaters are not 100% eff, will you accept that reality? Can't you accept the fact that strip heaters are not 100% eff?


----------



## Bill McC

viper said:


> What does that mean? So if I can prove it, it is proven to you? Would you accept it? Or would you like to provide your own math maybe?





viper said:


> Bill, my question to you, as it stands, is if I prove to you that strip heaters are not 100% eff, will you accept that reality? Can't you accept the fact that strip heaters are not 100% eff?


Current conventions state that non-self-inducting strip heaters output the same wattage that is put into them. And for the most part, non-self-inducting strip heater loads do that. So I would be pretty surprised if you have found a way around that because I have tested them and that is pretty much the case. There are always problems with loss and air. A cold metal duct can absorb a lot of heat from the air, so even though right at the heaters the temperature may be right it is quickly cooled by metal ductwork. Some of those kinds of losses are inevitable and might change up the numbers some but they will get you close. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> Current conventions state that non-self-inducting strip heaters output the same wattage that is put into them. And for the most part, non-self-inducting strip heater loads do that. So I would be pretty surprised if you have found a way around that because I have tested them and that is pretty much the case. There are always problems with loss and air. A cold metal duct can absorb a lot of heat from the air, so even though right at the heaters the temperature may be right it is quickly cooled by metal ductwork. Some of those kinds of losses are inevitable and might change up the numbers some but they will get you close.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


You still haven't answered his question.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> You still haven't answered his question.


I completely answered his question, he just does not like the answer. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> You still haven't answered his question.


There was a Models' sporting goods store many years ago that had no natural gas attached to their York rooftop units they were being heated by about 24,000 watts of high-pressure lighting up high. Which running 24/7 was enough to keep the store warm for all but the coldest days, for many years without complaint, until a very cold very windy winter.

They were getting energy management because they couldn't understand why they were running AC through the winter, haha. 

But the numbers were about right for the amount of wattage and the subsequent BTUs, that would be output. 

Sincerely. 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I completely answered his question, he just does not like the answer.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


If you understood so well, answer it.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> There was a Models' sporting goods store many years ago that had no natural gas attached to their York rooftop units they were being heated by about 24,000 watts of high-pressure lighting up high. Which running 24/7 was enough to keep the store warm for all but the coldest days, for many years without complaint, until a very cold very windy winter.
> 
> They were getting energy management because they couldn't understand why they were running AC through the winter, haha.
> 
> But the numbers were about right for the amount of wattage and the subsequent BTUs, that would be output.
> 
> Sincerely.
> 
> William McCormick


Another silly story that has nothing to do with the thread or the question posed to you.


----------



## roughneck

Bill McC said:


> There was a Models' sporting goods store many years ago that had no natural gas attached to their York rooftop units they were being heated by about 24,000 watts of high-pressure lighting up high. Which running 24/7 was enough to keep the store warm for all but the coldest days, for many years without complaint, until a very cold very windy winter.
> 
> They were getting energy management because they couldn't understand why they were running AC through the winter, haha.
> 
> But the numbers were about right for the amount of wattage and the subsequent BTUs, that would be output.
> 
> Sincerely.
> 
> William McCormick


Maybe you shouldn’t of unhooked their economizers. Like the other units you said you did. They could have run free cooling in the winter. Like many commercial and industrial buildings do. 
If someone needed a BAS system to tell them that, they may want to seek further schooling.


----------



## Bill McC

roughneck said:


> Maybe you shouldn’t of unhooked their economizers. Like the other units you said you did. They could have run free cooling in the winter. Like many commercial and industrial buildings do.
> If someone needed a BAS system to tell them that, they may want to seek further schooling.


I was there for satellite energy management. They frowned on us working on the system unless it allowed us to commission the new energy management units tied into it. Haha

if people from other states came here they would think the AC units were attacked by a top secret military weapon that blew the access panels off the units and melted the wiring, and contractors. And then filled the economizers with bird and rat ****. You have no idea of the state of AC systems here. I fix them when I can.

You need disposable gloves to work on the economizers here. They were using the heating mode to circulate the lighting heat, which would have killed their ability to heat the place with Lighting heat if the economizer was open. The indoor fan when turned on brought down the sauna heat at the ceiling when it was needed. It is hard to improve a high tech system like that, haha. The AC was running on days that got to 55 degrees.

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I was there for satellite energy management. They frowned on us working on the system unless it allowed us to commission the new energy management units tied into it. Haha
> 
> if people from other states came here they would think the AC units were attacked by a top secret military weapon that blew the access panels off the units and melted the wiring, and contractors. And then filled the economizers with bird and rat ****. You have no idea of the state of AC systems here. I fix them when I can.
> 
> You need disposable gloves to work on the economizers here. They were using the heating mode to circulate the lighting heat, which would have killed their ability to heat the place with Lighting heat if the economizer was open. The indoor fan when turned on brought down the sauna heat at the ceiling when it was needed. It is hard to improve a high tech system like that, haha. The AC was running on days that got to 55 degrees.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


WTF does that have to do with LED efficiency? Why is the economizer open if they need heat? You literally make no sense most of the time.


----------



## roughneck

Bill McC said:


> I was there for satellite energy management. They frowned on us working on the system unless it allowed us to commission the new energy management units tied into it. Haha
> 
> if people from other states came here they would think the AC units were attacked by a top secret military weapon that blew the access panels off the units and melted the wiring, and contractors. And then filled the economizers with bird and rat ****. You have no idea of the state of AC systems here. I fix them when I can.
> 
> You need disposable gloves to work on the economizers here. They were using the heating mode to circulate the lighting heat, which would have killed their ability to heat the place with Lighting heat if the economizer was open. The indoor fan when turned on brought down the sauna heat at the ceiling when it was needed. It is hard to improve a high tech system like that, haha. The AC was running on days that got to 55 degrees.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


This entire post makes zero sense. As said, why was the OA damper open if the customer wanted heat?
Commercial systems running in cooling in the winter is far from abnormal.


----------



## Bill McC

roughneck said:


> This entire post makes zero sense. As said, why was the OA damper open if the customer wanted heat?
> Commercial systems running in cooling in the winter is far from abnormal.





roughneck said:


> This entire post makes zero sense. As said, why was the OA damper open if the customer wanted heat?
> Commercial systems running in cooling in the winter is far from abnormal.


The units did not have economizers, and the cutout for the fresh air was not cut. If it had been the lights would not have been enough to heat the place. Do you guys troubleshoot units or just accuse the unit loudly of having a problem you want it to have? 

The lights were outputting 81,000 BTUs so if the temperature outside hit 55 in January they needed AC all day. I understood what was going on, but they ordered Satalite energy management systems to keep the AC from running most of December and into January. The thermostat when it made a heating call just turned on the indoor fan and it pulled in the sauna-like air at the lights and blew it down into the store. Someone here said that I should not have disabled the economizer like I always do. I do not disable economizers unless I am told to by the equipment manufacturer or boss. I went on to tell him that I was there installing Satalite energy management systems, CT (Current Transformer) coils, and sensors not working on the AC system. I was explaining if someone did cut in the fresh air vent it would kill the effect of heat at the ceiling from the lights when it got cold. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> The units did not have economizers, and the cutout for the fresh air was not cut. If it had been the lights would not have been enough to heat the place. Do you guys troubleshoot units or just accuse the unit loudly of having a problem you want it to have?
> 
> The lights were outputting 81,000 BTUs so if the temperature outside hit 55 in January they needed AC all day. I understood what was going on, but they ordered Satalite energy management systems to keep the AC from running most of December and into January. The thermostat when it made a heating call just turned on the indoor fan and it pulled in the sauna-like air at the lights and blew it down into the store. Someone here said that I should not have disabled the economizer like I always do. I do not disable economizers unless I am told to by the equipment manufacturer or boss. I went on to tell him that I was there installing Satalite energy management systems, CT (Current Transformer) coils, and sensors not working on the AC system. I was explaining if someone did cut in the fresh air vent it would kill the effect of heat at the ceiling from the lights when it got cold.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


If you call for heat, the heating should be on, unless you broke something else. You're not using just the lights to heat, but the actual unit. If the lights were doing so well, why was there even any call for heat, since you know, it's already warm.

You have mentioned before that you disconnect economizers because they bring in too much humidity. It's not our fault that you can't keep your stories straight.

I only confront people here that are blatantly wrong, and/or misleading, especially if they can't admit that they are wrong,.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> If you call for heat, the heating should be on, unless you broke something else. You're not using just the lights to heat, but the actual unit. If the lights were doing so well, why was there even any call for heat, since you know, it's already warm.
> 
> You have mentioned before that you disconnect economizers because they bring in too much humidity. It's not our fault that you can't keep your stories straight.
> 
> I only confront people here that are blatantly wrong, and/or misleading, especially if they can't admit that they are wrong,.


There was no gas hooked up to the York rooftop units so there is no other heat except for the lights. The heat from the lights without circulation stays at the ceiling which is like a sauna up there. I was running sensor and thermostat wires up there that is how I know. So when a call for heat came in the indoor fan would come on and grab the hot air at the ceiling from the lights and blow it down and around the store. I just thought it was pretty cool. Something for a new tech to check for, or to understand the magnitude of heat output from the older lights. 81,000 BTUs is an impressive amount of heat to overcome with an AC unit. Plus whatever the 6,000 sq foot building was letting in.

The problem was that I believe our winter average high temperature is around 43 and it was causing the AC unit to come on enough that the electric bills were extremely high throughout the winter. They thought it was one employee turning on the heat and another the AC, and cross-firing the units, which is the usual problem. Normally we would go to the store and find on a winter day some units firing gas and others running compressors, no more than twenty feet apart so once the Satalite energy management was installed that could not happen. Apparently, that costs thousands a month extra. I think on average with the Satalite energy management system they saved $1,700 - $3,400 a month, but over $5,000 on some stores just in heating and cooling, so they paid a lot per month for the systems happily. Once the system had control, the employees could make a call at the thermostat and it would weigh upon what the system did, but it would not really do anything. I would go back and find some of the thermostats set for 50 and others set for 90 just like it was the first time we got there, people are irresponsible. The systems also monitored current draw so they could tell if a fan or compressor was going bad and also if filters needed changing and send the technicians automatically. Apparently, this saved a lot of money too. The system also monitored supply and return air temperatures so they could tell if a compressor was low on refrigerant as well. 

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> There was no gas hooked up to the York rooftop units so there is no other heat except for the lights. The heat from the lights without circulation stays at the ceiling which is like a sauna up there. I was running sensor and thermostat wires up there that is how I know. So when a call for heat came in the indoor fan would come on and grab the hot air at the ceiling from the lights and blow it down and around the store. I just thought it was pretty cool. Something for a new tech to check for, or to understand the magnitude of heat output from the older lights. 81,000 BTUs is an impressive amount of heat to overcome with an AC unit. Plus whatever the 6,000 sq foot building was letting in.
> 
> The problem was that I believe our winter average high temperature is around 43 and it was causing the AC unit to come on enough that the electric bills were extremely high throughout the winter. They thought it was one employee turning on the heat and another the AC, and cross-firing the units, which is the usual problem. Normally we would go to the store and find on a winter day some units firing gas and others running compressors, no more than twenty feet apart so once the Satalite energy management was installed that could not happen. Apparently, that costs thousands a month extra. I think on average with the Satalite energy management system they saved $1,700 - $3,400 a month, but over $5,000 on some stores just in heating and cooling, so they paid a lot per month for the systems happily. Once the system had control, the employees could make a call at the thermostat and it would weigh upon what the system did, but it would not really do anything. I would go back and find some of the thermostats set for 50 and others set for 90 just like it was the first time we got there, people are irresponsible. The systems also monitored current draw so they could tell if a fan or compressor was going bad and also if filters needed changing and send the technicians automatically. Apparently, this saved a lot of money too. The system also monitored supply and return air temperatures so they could tell if a compressor was low on refrigerant as well.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


I guess you don't work on York's often. If they are locked out on heat, ac doesn't work.

That monthly savings sounds grossly inflated for that size of a store. A basic maintenance schedule, locked thermostats, and a few timers would have saved them just as much as the energy company did, without their monthly costs. Clearly you do not advocate on behalf of your customers, and /or just grossly under qualified to do so.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> I guess you don't work on York's often. If they are locked out on heat, ac doesn't work.
> 
> That monthly savings sounds grossly inflated for that size of a store. A basic maintenance schedule, locked thermostats, and a few timers would have saved them just as much as the energy company did, without their monthly costs. Clearly you do not advocate on behalf of your customers, and /or just grossly under qualified to do so.


There was no gas to the unit no natural gas is piped to the gas valve in the units. I nearly soiled myself when I saw it. I actually opened up the unit because once before I saw a unit that they piped the gas in from inside under the curb, which I am sure is not supposed to be done but you know reality. But there was no natural gas going to the gas valve. 

The AC was working just fine because we tested it as part of the commissioning. Not sure if the thermostat energized the fan when it made a call to heat or not I just do not remember. A lot of Yorks with gas-fired heat exchangers are not hooked up here because we can only get them with heat exchangers unless we special order them, that is all they stock here. Many buildings have a central heating system that feeds a steam coil or hydronic coil. I know there is no problem with them unless you get corrosion on connectors to safeties or the safeties themselves fail, which are easy enough to jump out, there is no danger because there is no gas available. Like I said I was there to install Satalite energy management, I looked for a heat source inside the building first and found none. When I saw no gas to the units I had to scratch my head a bit, until I did the math on the lightning. What helped in winter was the warm feeling the light itself gave off beside the actual temperature rise, almost like standing in the sun it helped a lot. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> I guess you don't work on York's often. If they are locked out on heat, ac doesn't work.
> 
> That monthly savings sounds grossly inflated for that size of a store. A basic maintenance schedule, locked thermostats, and a few timers would have saved them just as much as the energy company did, without their monthly costs. Clearly you do not advocate on behalf of your customers, and /or just grossly under qualified to do so.


There was no gas to the building as a matter of fact. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> I guess you don't work on York's often. If they are locked out on heat, ac doesn't work.
> 
> That monthly savings sounds grossly inflated for that size of a store. A basic maintenance schedule, locked thermostats, and a few timers would have saved them just as much as the energy company did, without their monthly costs. Clearly you do not advocate on behalf of your customers, and /or just grossly under qualified to do so.


They were paying about $2,000 a month for electricity, for the lights, and heat, which they ran 24/7

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

What they needed was a few more of the high-pressure lights in winter and then switch, to LEDs in summer or when it hit setpoint. With the smart lighting contactors that would be pretty easy. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> They were paying about $2,000 a month for electricity, for the lights, and heat, which they ran 24/7
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick






Bill McC said:


> .... I think on average with the Satalite energy management system they saved $1,700 - $3,400 a month, but over $5,000 on some stores just in heating and cooling,


Some interesting math there.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> There was no gas to the building as a matter of fact.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


And your point? And a York with the original simplicity board locks out ac when it locks out heat. So any RTU in the past 2 decades, maybe more. If you call for W¹ and it fails, you don't have ac.


----------



## roughneck

supers05 said:


> And your point? And a York with the original simplicity board locks out ac when it locks out heat. So any RTU in the past 2 decades, maybe more. If you call for W¹ and it fails, you don't have ac.


I will confirm this. Long standing programming logic with York. 
Also smart guy, the CTs are there to confirm devices are running. Not that anything is going bad. All of that BAS babble you went on about, is old news. We’ve been reading dirty filter switches and CTs forever. Nothing new there.


----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> I will confirm this. Long standing programming logic with York.
> Also smart guy, the CTs are there to confirm devices are running. Not that anything is going bad. All of that BAS babble you went on about, is old news. We’ve been reading dirty filter switches and CTs forever. Nothing new there.


They finally fixed that with v4.0 of the new SEC boards. Default is still to lockout cooling but at least there's an option now.


----------



## roughneck

supers05 said:


> They finally fixed that with v4.0 of the new SEC boards. Default is still to lockout cooling but at least there's an option now.


Yup, I’ve downloaded a ton of them. We have a longstanding joke that no matter what the issue is with the unit, upgrading the version will fix it. At least that’s what some of the factory guys will tell you.


----------



## roughneck

roughneck said:


> I will confirm this. Long standing programming logic with York.
> Also smart guy, the CTs are there to confirm devices are running. Not that anything is going bad. All of that BAS babble you went on about, is old news. We’ve been reading dirty filter switches and CTs forever. Nothing new there.


Heres a whole bunch of various BAS sensors, nothing at all new.
And the economizer works great on this unit. Saves the customer a bunch of money.








I wrote a lot of the logic on this unit.


----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> Yup, I’ve downloaded a ton of them. We have a longstanding joke that no matter what the issue is with the unit, upgrading the version will fix it. At least that’s what some of the factory guys will tell you.


Oh hell no. It's an option of last resort. There's a few nicer versions, and some terrible versions. v4.0.2.7 is currently the nicest if the hardware revision supports it.


----------



## roughneck

supers05 said:


> Oh hell no. It's an option of last resort. There's a few nicer versions, and some terrible versions. v4.0.2.7 is currently the nicest if the hardware revision supports it.


Did you ever work with the really early revisions? With the variable speed VAV units? They had no adjustable timer or static pressure fail setting. On a high demand day at startup they’d go down on supply fan failure. Took the factory a little while to fix that.


----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> Did you ever work with the really early revisions? With the variable speed VAV units? They had no adjustable timer or static pressure fail setting. On a high demand day at startup they’d go down on supply fan failure. Took the factory a little while to fix that.


Yes!, 

And tech support had the revision pushed out for me. It had more bugs then it solved. Ended up engaging the contactor constantly, and hoping the VFD could fill the ductwork before the timer expired. Ductwork was very oversized to reduce noise. With all the VAV boxes open, it could take over 5 min to pressure the ductwork enough to get the boxes to start to modulate back.


----------



## roughneck

supers05 said:


> Yes!,
> 
> And tech support had the revision pushed out for me. It had more bugs then it solved. Ended up engaging the contactor constantly, and hoping the VFD could fill the ductwork before the timer expired. Ductwork was very oversized to reduce noise. With all the VAV boxes open, it could take over 5 min to pressure the ductwork enough to get the boxes to start to modulate back.


The first generation units that came out, we sold 3 big jobs right back to back of those things. I was the commissioning agent on all of them. The first unit on the first building was a VAV unit. Spent a day and a half on that ONE unit getting the bugs fixed. And it still didn’t run right until they revised the firmware enough after about a year. 
One of the units was a 20 ton 2 stage split. The board was programmed for a single stage gas fired packaged unit with economizer. And apparently it had an economizer control connected at some point because it was very upset it had lost communication with the economizer control board. I had so many errors when I turned that thing on I couldn’t figure out where to start.


----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> The first generation units that came out, we sold 3 big jobs right back to back of those things. I was the commissioning agent on all of them. The first unit on the first building was a VAV unit. Spent a day and a half on that ONE unit getting the bugs fixed. And it still didn’t run right until they revised the firmware enough after about a year.
> One of the units was a 20 ton 2 stage split. The board was programmed for a single stage gas fired packaged unit with economizer. And apparently it had an economizer control connected at some point because it was very upset it had lost communication with the economizer control board. I had so many errors when I turned that thing on I couldn’t figure out where to start.


The developer forgot to remove all the extras before shipping the release. Every other version is like that, where it freaks out about missing sensors. Still has a ton of bugs. I'd change plenty of I ever got my hands on the source code. JC is absolutely terrible at software, and even worse at quality control when shipping new versions.


----------



## roughneck

Try their BAS stuff. It’s about the same. Oddball issues. Weird unexplainable problems. About the same as the simplicity stuff.
Have you ever had a chance to go to the factory training class?


----------



## viper

Damn, I think I'd be lighting up the OEMs to drag their own people in to deal with that mess! In a lot of automation stuff I work with, that would indeed happen. And to have no access to the software handicaps you quite a bit.


----------



## roughneck

viper said:


> Damn, I think I'd be lighting up the OEMs to drag their own people in to deal with that mess! In a lot of automation stuff I work with, that would indeed happen. And to have no access to the software handicaps you quite a bit.


JCIs new board isn’t terrible. I have the factory WiFi maintenance tool so I have a fair bit of adjustment. Most changes can be done via a joystick and button’s on the board. 
JCI has a long history of this. 
This is the board in question-


----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> Try their BAS stuff. It’s about the same. Oddball issues. Weird unexplainable problems. About the same as the simplicity stuff.
> Have you ever had a chance to go to the factory training class?


I'm fully aware of how much I hate their BAS. I hate how that division in Canada treats customers even more. (totally different from the US divisions) The union drags the manufacturers in for training sessions. I've been to a few. Although they aren't the most useful since it's all covered in regular trade school anyways.


----------



## supers05

viper said:


> Damn, I think I'd be lighting up the OEMs to drag their own people in to deal with that mess! In a lot of automation stuff I work with, that would indeed happen. And to have no access to the software handicaps you quite a bit.


We emptied the JC north American stockpile of a certain type of Condensor fan motor due to warranty claims. Extremely poor assembly of the motors causing the rotors to hit the stators. A few didn't even last a couple of hours. Talk about angry....


----------



## roughneck




----------



## supers05

roughneck said:


> View attachment 669643


We kept having the joystick fall out of the first hardware revisions.


----------



## roughneck

supers05 said:


> We kept having the joystick fall out of the first hardware revisions.


I never really used it. I usually used the MAP tool.


----------



## Bill McC

roughneck said:


> I will confirm this. Long standing programming logic with York.
> Also smart guy, the CTs are there to confirm devices are running. Not that anything is going bad. All of that BAS babble you went on about, is old news. We’ve been reading dirty filter switches and CTs forever. Nothing new there.


Ahhhh, no, the CTs were there to measure a lot of things like amperage, a drop might indicate a clogged filter. An increase in amperage would indicate a fan motor on its way out. The same with compressors a drop in amperage would mean it needed refrigerant based on combined return and supply sensor information, an increase meant failure was imminent or it was overcharged. Between the temperature sensors and CTs, they could see what was wrong 2,000 miles away better than regular maintenance crews did. And surely if there was no reading from the CTs it meant either the fan or compressor were out. 

That is one of the units. I had made a plexiglass cover for it for MPG, for the trade shows, I did that really quick so they could take it to the Jacob Javits Center. I used a string polishing wheel they do not melt the plexiglass or Lexan and you can even polish PVC with the string wheel and special blue polish. You can see from all the wires that there is a lot of information and sensors attached to the unit. This information was then sent by satellite to the computer center in California where they monitored the data and created algorithms to catch failure before it happened. This unit usually went on 7.5-ton units. During the final step of commissioning, they would send the packet-98, and eight running rooftop units that passed the previous tests would shut down 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, by a signal sent via satellite from california. Six minutes later they would fire up 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 to avoid a sudden heavy load on the panel. 










This was a typical install. My coworker installed this one actually. I had snapped the picture as part of the commissioning process. There were usually 5 to 8 units per site. The systems here because of the saltwater around the island take a beating like you would not believe. 










Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> And your point? And a York with the original simplicity board locks out ac when it locks out heat. So any RTU in the past 2 decades, maybe more. If you call for W¹ and it fails, you don't have ac.


I cannot remember wiring in the thermostat and unit, there is a good chance that one or the other just called for the fan when W on the thermostat was energized for heat. I do not remember if the wire at the thermostat or wire on the control board was powering the fan. 

A ton of our units here pun intended are without gas hooked up, because that is all you can get stocked from the distributors. Some distributors would not even order a unit without the gas-fired heat-exchanger. Some units today you can get without though. 


Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> Ahhhh, no, the CTs were there to measure a lot of things like amperage, a drop might indicate a clogged filter. An increase in amperage would indicate a fan motor on its way out. The same with compressors a drop in amperage would mean it needed refrigerant based on combined return and supply sensor information, an increase meant failure was imminent or it was overcharged. Between the temperature sensors and CTs, they could see what was wrong 2,000 miles away better than regular maintenance crews did. And surely if there was no reading from the CTs it meant either the fan or compressor were out.
> 
> That is one of the units. I had made a plexiglass cover for it for MPG, for the trade shows, I did that really quick so they could take it to the Jacob Javits Center. I used a string polishing wheel they do not melt the plexiglass or Lexan and you can even polish PVC with the string wheel and special blue polish. You can see from all the wires that there is a lot of information and sensors attached to the unit. This information was then sent by satellite to the computer center in California where they monitored the data and created algorithms to catch failure before it happened. This unit usually went on 7.5-ton units. During the final step of commissioning, they would send the packet-98, and eight running rooftop units that passed the previous tests would shut down 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, by a signal sent via satellite from california. Six minutes later they would fire up 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 to avoid a sudden heavy load on the panel.
> 
> View attachment 669647
> 
> 
> This was a typical install. My coworker installed this one actually. I had snapped the picture as part of the commissioning process. There were usually 5 to 8 units per site. The systems here because of the saltwater around the island take a beating like you would not believe.
> 
> View attachment 669651
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


That's probably not satellite. Nothing about that antenna looks right.

We remove remote monitoring services, and save the customers tons of money by actually doing our jobs.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I cannot remember wiring in the thermostat and unit, there is a good chance that one or the other just called for the fan when W on the thermostat was energized for heat. I do not remember if the wire at the thermostat or wire on the control board was powering the fan.
> 
> A ton of our units here pun intended are without gas hooked up, because that is all you can get stocked from the distributors. Some distributors would not even order a unit without the gas-fired heat-exchanger. Some units today you can get without though.
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


So you admit that you don't know what you're talking about.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> Some interesting math there.


I was saying on yearly average the stores were saving between $1,700 - 3,400 a month but a few larger buildings or complexes were up over $5,000, because units were no longer cross-firing, and the systems got repaired instead of running with just one compressor or running without refrigerant or with clogged filters. There were a lot of units that were not supplying heat so the other units ran 24/7. Part of our job was to inspect the entire system. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> So you admit that you don't know what you're talking about.


I know what I am talking about I just do not remember where the W swap was made, either at the unit or thermostat. It is not really relevant other than as a bit of information. As I stated the lighting system and York indoor fan kept the place warm for years. This was 15-16 years ago. 

Sincerely,

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I was saying on yearly average the stores were saving between $1,700 - 3,400 a month but a few larger buildings or complexes were up over $5,000, because units were no longer cross-firing, and the systems got repaired instead of running with just one compressor or running without refrigerant or with clogged filters. There were a lot of units that were not supplying heat so the other units ran 24/7. Part of our job was to inspect the entire system.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


So they were saving $1700-3400/ month in electricity but only spent $2000/month on that electricity? Again, your not making sense.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I know what I am talking about I just do not remember where the W swap was made, either at the unit or thermostat. It is not really relevant other than as a bit of information. As I stated the lighting system and York indoor fan kept the place warm for years. This was 15-16 years ago.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


And like I said, clearly you don't work on York units very often or you'd know that.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> That's probably not satellite. Nothing about that antenna looks right.
> 
> We remove remote monitoring services, and save the customers tons of money by actually doing our jobs.


Do you put locking plastic covers on the thermostats? So the employees cannot crossfire the units?

There was not very good cell service back then and these devices connected all the time every time. Part of our problem when troubleshooting was getting cell service to talk to California, but the units always connected. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> Do you put locking plastic covers on the thermostats? So the employees cannot crossfire the units?
> 
> There was not very good cell service back then and these devices connected all the time every time. Part of our problem when troubleshooting was getting cell service to talk to California, but the units always connected.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


If that's what the customer wants.


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> So they were saving $1700-3400/ month in electricity but only spent $2000/month on that electricity? Again, your not making sense.


That store's high bay high-pressure lighting was supplying all the heat, but the whole spring, summer, and fall, the AC units were running 24/7 fighting the 24/7 constant 81,000 BTU Load from the lights and the summer heat and humidity, the cost was probably about $7,500 a month. Other stores were easily doing that $7,500 a month cross-firing all year long or much more. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> If that's what the customer wants.


We know the employees open them or set them through the cover, and then crossfire the units if only by mistake. Once one or two of the units start blowing hot air against the other unit's AC systems, they tend to not shut off and exasperate the problem, and in turn, the heat just keeps running. Management wants it cool in summer and warm in winter, the cashiers that are just standing in the same spot get cold in summer, to the point they put the heat on. In the winter the cashiers get hot and put the AC on, haha. That is what the MPG system did so well. It did take into consideration what people set the thermostat to, and would try to keep that area a little cooler or warmer to satisfy the call from the thermostat more. But we would go back and the store was always a very even temperature, but still, the employees had messed with the thermostats. But now the system would not cross-fire.

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> That store's high bay high-pressure lighting was supplying all the heat, but the whole spring, summer, and fall, the AC units were running 24/7 fighting the 24/7 constant 81,000 BTU Load from the lights and the summer heat and humidity, the cost was probably about $7,500 a month. Other stores were easily doing that $7,500 a month cross-firing all year long or much more.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


Keep throwing numbers around. I'm sure that eventually you'll find a pair that makes sense. That's only 6 ¾ tons. Not exactly a lot of heat, especially since viable alternatives weren't readily availability until recently.

Did you at a dehumidifier there too?


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> And like I said, clearly you don't work on York units very often or you'd know that.


I worked for a company that was a York dealer. I serviced every brand though. Not sure why you think the unit would lockout without gas? Like I said I do not remember whether they used the W at the thermostat to power the fan. Or whether at the control board of the unit, they just powered the fan with the W from the thermostat, it was 15 years ago. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> Keep throwing numbers around. I'm sure that eventually you'll find a pair that makes sense. That's only 6 ¾ tons. Not exactly a lot of heat, especially since viable alternatives weren't readily availability until recently.
> 
> Did you at a dehumidifier there too?


The store with the lighting for the heat had two big Yorks I do not remember the tonnage probably 12 tons, most of the other stores ran five to eight 5-ton to 7.5-ton units in summer. The stores would have 10 to 50 people shopping in them. No double-door wind barrier to enter the store. 

81,000 BTUs of heat infiltration into a building is a bit extreme, the systems need to create 81,000 BTUs constantly not including any heat from the walls, roof, people, two-story wall of plate glass along the long side of the building, and extreme humidity, What would the right-sized unit be to do that? 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## Bill McC

I used to go to a hospital that had a fancy BMS system with software that claimed it was doing all kinds of stuff. Every time I went, the system was causing trouble or locking out the gigantic rack system on the roof. I was there adding insulation into the room incremental units, that were freezing the hydronic coils for a friend that had installed them. One day I walked in and the guy running the system was so mad because there was no AC in the hospital. He was trying to get the unit running through the software. The unit on the roof was running but evidently, the control valves were just routing refrigerant around in a circle in the unit and not letting it get to the building. The unit was under an incredible load. So I said you want I should fix this? And he said sure, do anything. So I threw the giant throw on this beast while it was under a load and let it sit for five minutes. Every alarm went off, I started it back up and it ran great for about three months. I told him you will probably have to do that every three months. They used to send techs that basically were doing that, and claiming they fixed this or that. He was pissed. They used to make him go through some crazy procedures in the software every time he called before they would send someone. It is the software trying to economize, once you resit it starts all over again analyzing and it takes months before it screws it up.

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> The store with the lighting for the heat had two big Yorks I do not remember the tonnage probably 12 tons, most of the other stores ran five to eight 5-ton to 7.5-ton units in summer. The stores would have 10 to 50 people shopping in them. No double-door wind barrier to enter the store.
> 
> 81,000 BTUs of heat infiltration into a building is a bit extreme, the systems need to create 81,000 BTUs constantly not including any heat from the walls, roof, people, two-story wall of plate glass along the long side of the building, and extreme humidity, What would the right-sized unit be to do that?
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> William McCormick


That building wouldn't meet even older building codes here. Thet would have never had their permits approved if they were here.

Since I don't know much about the building I'd be throwing a dart blindfolded trying to size it. That's what engineering is for. And that's our point, you don't size based on rules of thumb. 

Your use of terminology is quite terrible, especially considering that you're supposedly a contractor.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> I worked for a company that was a York dealer. I serviced every brand though. Not sure why you think the unit would lockout without gas?.. /QUOTE]
> 
> Proof that you don't work on York units much. Period. You clearly don't know their design flaws. Every product line from every brand has flaws, and if you worked with them regularly, you'd know them.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> We know the employees open them or set them through the cover,..


Then you've used the wrong covers for the thermostats. I only give a single key to the manager. If the want to hand it out, it's their problem. I've also password locked then as well as locked the temp range. I've even used thermostats without external adjustment. (or put a small screw to set the adjustment range on mechanical stats) I've used simple remote sensors so that no one has access to the temp except the manager, or in some cases only me.

Like I said, it all comes down to what they want to pay for. There's plenty if methods, and most of them don't require paying thousands per month. I can tell you we make good money on service calls due to the energy management company has messed up, and set the wrong temp or mode. You stand there, on the phone, waiting to get through to someone so they can make their adjustment.


----------



## supers05

Bill McC said:


> . The unit on the roof was running but evidently, the control valves were just routing refrigerant around in a circle in the unit and not letting it get to the building. The unit was under an incredible load. So I said you want I should fix this? And he said sure, do anything. So I threw the giant throw on this beast while it was under a load and let it sit for five minutes. Every alarm went off, I started it back up and it ran great for about three months.


Remove the fluff and you get this incoherent block of text. I have no idea what you're saying. You threw a giant throw?


----------



## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> Remove the fluff and you get this incoherent block of text. I have no idea what you're saying. You threw a giant throw?


A throw is a handle that moves the contacts, of an electric switching device. The one on this machine was so big I had to hang on it to get it to open. I had a friend who opened one while a compressor was banging, slugging, filled with liquid and he burnt his face and hands-off as the electrical panel melted down. So I was concerned about opening the switch and blowing the air capacitor. But I did a quick hard pull-up while swinging on it and it opened ok. The unit was drawing a lot of amps when I disconnected it so it was a gamble. 

Most of the terminology on switches and relays is incorrect today. Most relays are single throw, they may have two positions Normally Open, Normally Closed, they may also be single pole, double pole, triple pole, or more. But there is only one throw unless it is a special relay that has two or more coils which could give it the ability to work more than one set of contacts independently of another set in the same relay making it a double throw relay. You can have a two coil relay that has a neutral position two poles and still one throw that would be a two-pole three-position NO, NO with a neutral position relay. 

That is why I hate going in and ordering a fan relay as a double pole double throw relay even though everyone knows what I want. It is actually a two-position normally open normally closed two-pole relay operated by a single coil moving a single throw. A throw is a physical device that the contacts are moved by in an electrical switching device, it can be moved by electrical coil, mechanical power, or human power, so most have never seen much less used a double pole double throw relay. But I am not going to lose too much sleep over it, as you debase my understanding of it and argue over the terminology and send it further into the abyss. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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## Bill McC

supers05 said:


> That building wouldn't meet even older building codes here. Thet would have never had their permits approved if they were here.
> 
> Since I don't know much about the building I'd be throwing a dart blindfolded trying to size it. That's what engineering is for. And that's our point, you don't size based on rules of thumb.
> 
> Your use of terminology is quite terrible, especially considering that you're supposedly a contractor.


I am not arguing with you that the buildings wouldn't meet building codes here, that is why they keep changing the codes, lowering the bar, because most buildings are breaking the codes here. When you get to a building that a congressman or a senator owns then they lower the bar or reinterpret the code rather than have him tear it apart. The problem is that someone else tries it for profit and then sites the mayors, governors, congressmens, or senators building as an example. In all cases like that, it was done for the money, we all commit minor infractions when there really is no other way around something, and it will not pose any danger. But there are just gross engineering flaws planned into buildings today.

I mention these special cases because they had people talking for years about them. And we are still talking about it. 

Sincerely, 

William McCormick


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