Did I find the limit of a 200 Amp residential service?

[growhard]

Electrical problem:
It may have been the wind storms, but just to be sure, I thought I'd ask your opinion... I just had the service wires to my property blow off the pole in a shower of fireworks!
I am running 20 lamps with two 5 ton AC's in a sealed room with associated water chiller, fans, air/water pumps, etc. Everything I have designed has been done by a qualified electrician to standards well exceeding the local codes. He tells me that I could run almost twice the load because of the two legs from my service. Is this true?
Even though everything I am doing is totally compliant with the law, I would like to avoid the possible headache by making sure this does not happen again... provided what happened is my fault. The sparks caused someone to call 911, which had the fire and police dep. to come hang out with me (great!).
The guy from the power company said that if I was pulling more than 200 amps, that the entire power line (from meter to pole) would be uniformly melted. There was a previous patch to the line near the pole, and the line was somewhat melted between the patch and the pole. Any ideas?

 

[hiboy]

Resistance creates heat, so it is possible that the patch on the service line had resistance, meaning a loose connection and then some arking going on at that exact location. It would then burn, especially with the load you got going on.
hiboy

 

[UCtestn]

Sounds like you had a patch that wasn't up to par for your service.

Do you run the 20k and 10 tons all at the same time? I've seen 30k and 10 tons (+ support stuff like fans) run on a flip and normal household use on a 200 AMP setup no problem. If they were to run both rooms on 18 hour veg, the 6 hours overlap might create a problem.

 

[convex]

If you were previously overloading your service, I am sure you would have been experiencing mains flipping with some regularity - were you?

Cheers

 

[growhard]

Thanks everyone...
Yes, I run everything at once. I used to run a flip, but with my new 'time of use' meter plan, my bill has been nearly halved. There is also the much cooler outdoor temps at night.
I had one of my guys come out and assess the situation. I was pulling 145A off one pole 165A on the other.... so I'm not adding another thing.
To my surprise they upgraded my service line to a much beefier one. Just goes to prove that I am one of my power company's most valued customers!
As for the breakers... each light and major accessory has it's own breaker, that power panel has a breaker, which leads to another two 100A breakers at the main panel which has another 200A breaker... so yeah, I was thinking the same thing,"Why aren't breakers popping all over the place?"
In conclusion, it was not my fault. What I find crazy is that the new oversize service line is still rubbing against the same tree!
Now I wonder what they would say (or what I would need to say) if I ask for a 440A service?

 

[RMCG]

Say you're running a pottery kiln...

:) :) :) :)

 

[Snowblind]

Please explain the "time of use meter plan" a little better for me if possible......

 

[RMCG]

They charge more/less depending on time of day(peak) usage.

 

[wobbly goblin]

20 amps dif between legs?
you need to put a big ass beer fridge on that weak one to balance shit out

fwiw

btw: it figures it would be you that blows the lines off the house

 

[growhard]

Wobbly: There is another 20A that reads off the ground wire, although I don't quite understand how that works.
Snowblind:
11am - 5pm = expensive
8am - 11am and 5pm - 8pm = moderate
8pm - 8am and all weekends = Cheap!
I had to get the power company out to install smart meters that can calculate the difference in time intervals, but it saves me a ton of $$$.

 

[wobbly goblin]

3 wires come into your house
hot leg 1
hot leg 2
neutral

at the main box, neutral and ground are basically the same

hot leg 1 to neutral is 120 volts
hot leg 2 to neutral is 120 volts
hot leg 1 to hot leg 2 is 240 volts

most folks get this part
but where it gets fun is that hot leg 1 and hot leg 2 are 180 degrees out of phase
so? what this means in lay mans terms is that the load on the wire between hot leg 1 and hot leg 2 is canceled out and the difference between these two legs is equal to the load on the neutral line

so?
if you run stuff 240 volt? don't worry about it till you go over 80% of your breaker box
if you run 120 stuff? make sure your load is balanced between the two hot legs, max 80% on each leg

btw, you might remember me as grasshopper from that other site
remember the $1702 sugenite beans :)

fwiw

 

[growhard]

Sweet. Thanks for the info. That makes sense, but what makes the line vibrate? It's like you can feel the juice coming through, and if you touch it lightly you can feel a pulse in the line. I am stoked my new supply line is cool as a cucumber. Sad part is, I can't even expand my 'baby nursery'. With 165/145/20A on my line, I think I'll just be happy with what I've got for now.
I remember a grasshopper... but no $1,702 beans! WTF?

 

[hiboy]

Sweet. Thanks for the info. That makes sense, but what makes the line vibrate? It's like you can feel the juice coming through, and if you touch it lightly you can feel a pulse in the line. I am stoked my new supply line is cool as a cucumber. Sad part is, I can't even expand my 'baby nursery'. With 165/145/20A on my line, I think I'll just be happy with what I've got for now.
I remember a grasshopper... but no $1,702 beans! WTF?

Lines vibrating are from a large power draw, with possibilities of too small a wire ran, an extensive long wire run, and or overloading of the wire.
hiboy

 

[wobbly goblin]

Sweet. Thanks for the info. That makes sense, but what makes the line vibrate? It's like you can feel the juice coming through, and if you touch it lightly you can feel a pulse in the line. I am stoked my new supply line is cool as a cucumber. Sad part is, I can't even expand my 'baby nursery'. With 165/145/20A on my line, I think I'll just be happy with what I've got for now.
I remember a grasshopper... but no $1,702 beans! WTF?

when electricity passes thru a line it creates a magnetic field around the line at 90 degrees perpendicular to plane which vibrates the wires a bit and that is why you hear a 60 hertz buzz from transformers, ballasts, etc
the reverse is also true
when you pass a line thru a magnetic field that is perpendicular to the field a electric current is created, hence a generator

the magnetic field is what you feel similar to how it makes the armature in a motor spin or a dildo vibrate

if that makes any sense?


$1702 beans? iirc you paid $800 for the first pack from suge on c-bay and the second pack was purchased by my proxy while i was at work
piss kush /pure kush by sensi nl
anyhow, that's been awhile back

fwiw

 

[Bud Spleefman]

Are you sure you didn't blow the transformer on the pole and when it fried it released the lines? I'm in Colorado, and I've been running 14,000 in bloom, plus another couple thousand in heating, a/c, veg, etc... and when I went to from 9,000 to 14,000 on my bloom a little over a year ago I started flipping the breaker ON THE TRANSFORMER! They came out three seperate times, and each time they grilled me (the line crew, but who the fuck are they?) about why am I using so much power and each time I just shrugged and said "I dunno, my wife has a bunch of animals in the barn" and finally they came out and upgrade the transformer from a 10,000 watt (no wonder it was blowing!) to a 50,000 watt!!!!! Wooo hooo! I still have the same size garden, but I'm pretty sure I could double it on a flipper......

edit: I have 200 amp service at my house and then a sub feeds my barn, the sub is 150 amps, when I bought this house it had an ELECTRIC FORCED AIR FURNACE, ELECTRIC HOT TUB... I pulled Natural Gas up here, and switched that stuff out.... we don't use much electric at the house anymore...

 

[growhard]

Didn't blow any transformers. All the fireworks were from the bare ends of the wire swinging in the wind, occasionally contacting. None of the plastic was melted on the line, except near where it blew apart. The lineman said it definitely wasn't me. The second time they sent out one guy who seemed to be the 'experienced one' who simply assessed the situation and called for the usual workers to replace the line entirely... which is what killed me, as they took four hours to turn up from a major transformer blow out nearby.
I have a large flip system, but if I doubled my system on a flip to run 24/7 my electric bill would quadruple because of my 'time of use meter'. While doable, I think my bill is healthy enough as it is.

Wobbly: Although I am one of the few people who would not blink at paying those prices for a few good beans, it wasn't me.... but I wish it was with those names!

 

[wobbly goblin]

Wobbly: Although I am one of the few people who would not blink at paying those prices for a few good beans, it wasn't me.... but I wish it was with those names!

ok, i thought you were someone else
there is another grower with the handle growhard that has been around at least 7 years on sites like cannabis world/c-bay and the canna cabana after that
i apologize for assuming you were him

fwiw