Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Astron power supply hum solved
On Sunday afternoon it was now time to figure out why the lights in two rooms were flickering. Also along with the lights my two Astron power supplies would let out a deep hum now and then as well. I began by turning off the circuit breaker to the upper rooms to see what all this circuit breaker fed. I then went to each outlet to see if there were any loose wires. I came across a box that had many neutrals tied together and another group of hots tied together. They seemed to have no evidence of burning or overheating and all seemed to be very tight with the wire nut holding each set together. I still gave both wire nuts a few good turns and put all the wires back into the box. I then went down again to turn on the circuit breaker and see if the problem was fix....low and behold the problem was gone and has never returned since. So even though the wires did not seem loose they must had been just enough to cause the lights to flicker. It's time to go back to radio fun!!!
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6 comments:
Hello Mike, nice to read you found the problem. I actually missed your previous post. It's a pity you didn't make photos from how those wires are tied together as the whole system in Canada is so different from ours. One of our customers does work in Canada once and a while and he's telling me what he encounters when renovating houses. We use these kind of "connectors" to tie the wires togheter. You probabely never seen those in Canada, but they are very reliable. By the way I got a Astron RS-50A supply....what a beast. 73, Bas
Mike,
Glad you found that problem. It can be dangerous to have loose connections like that, so you killed two birds with one stone.
Bas, those are very cool connectors!
With the resistance of a loose connection, there was likely also heat being generated. You ought to check the others as well, if accessible.
Good evening John, I did go around to all the outlets and octagon boxes on the troubled circuit and checked this out.
Good evening Casey, yes these things can be a fire hazard and that's why I wanted to make sure I found the source.
Good evening Bas yes we are a little differant here in North America with out electric system. We have 120 and 240 volts in our homes here. The 240 run's most large items such as stove, central air and if you have electric heat. The 120 is for everything else. As for some pictures here is a link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twist-on_wire_connector It gives you a picture is the wire nuts we use here and also a picture of them in a switch box. (Sorry don't know how to make the link into a hyper link....you will have to cut and paste it.
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