Marc.
Hmmm they just put NBN in this street!

Marc.
Hmmm they just put NBN in this street!

Just to highlight how bad the power factor is on Chinese switchmode power supplies.
I was having a large party at my house to celebrate a significant birthday and set up my laptop as a music source feeding a Playmaster amp which I built over 20 years ago.
I had all sorts of annoying digital noise underneath the music so I came up with the bright idea of feeding the Laptop power supply with my isolation transformer to break the earth loop.
This worked a treat and all the whistles and birdies disappeared.
I then attended to matters outside but was interrupted by my wife screaming from the house.
When I looked at the back room where the Laptop was all I could see was white smoke.
The isolation transformer was spewing out acrid smoke and black ooze all over the window ledge where I had placed it.
I shut it off and picked it up by it's leads and dumped it into a bucket and left it outside.
The house stank of it for days.
As each guest turned they asked "What's burning?"
The switch mode was obviously slicing chunks out of the 50HZ waveform and the isolation transformer didn't like it one bit!!
It was lucky that it didn't set fire to the timber window ledge which is now permanently stained.
Beware of Chinese power supplies of any kind.
No wonder there's a lot of noise on our mains.

The only thing I've ever found any good the Chinese make were crackers!
Every thing else is rubbish....I don't buy it!

Trouble is these days you often have no choice but to buy Chinese as they have put all our local manufacturing out of business.
It's ironic that that you could buy crackers to blow up now their power supplies do the same!!

Well, I'm not very good at electronics so I can't really say much about Chinese components,,,but I can say that any motor or motor part that comes from China is rubbish. Tools are all crap! Smaller engines last a few months .
One only has to look on street throw out to see newish mowers , fridges, washing machines, whipper snippers ...piles of kids toys all not working and bicycles by the thousands.
I buy things differently, let's say I need a new drill? I watch eBay until a old one comes up made in Japan or Germany or the USA and I buy it.
Mostly I get them still with the box or little use.
I do this with everything I want rather than buy Chinese rubbish.
But there was a time when Australia had industry and we also made many great things ,,, pete

The RFI is bad on HF and mw unless you have a good triple conversion radio , most house hold items now have inverter power supply,s

Just beware that the No Blasted Nouse that is going to cost around $30M+ to fix. It in two forms.

Here it cannot be put into the cables as it is in huge runs (mine is 600m from the main cable & 800m to the vintage RAX that has old Ericsson stuff you can't get parts for. The main cables cannot handle the data.

I have wireless & the unit is actually Vietnamese (probably with cheap parts) had a member of the radio club get caught with some of those parts. The last "No break" for the radio area is not switch mode. This NBN technology is the problem here. Not cable.

Since Feb they have been doing "Upgrading & Maintenance" on it, obviously still haven't come to grips with it & having it break down. or be off for hours is the norm.

If you are walking in the evening or early morning, keep an eye on power poles. Aside from the odd bit of flora & fauna decorating the lines, aerials fall off insulators & termites eat the wooden cross arms & poles.

When there is dust, moisture & cocky: The flash overs & tracking become obvious.

A good example not believed until it was removed for safety paranoia; was a 22kV fuse arcing to ground with moisture. When removed the track was obvious. Some insulators go off like a rifle when they flash.

Update !
well , Ya wouldn't guess what now gives me very good Reception ! Reception is a funny thing where you can buy antenna and not good a good Reception and so I tried a long wire and that was not great either ! Than in was a Coax cable connection in the wall socket and a wire up in the ceiling ,, Then it was a Antenna inside the house ! Then I finally I gave up with wires running all over the house and I clipped a thick speaker wire to the Gutter of the House with a pair of Vise grips and I thought ,,Stuff it ! thats going to have be good enough ! I walked into the house turned on the Radiogram and the Reception was Great !!!! so there ya go! GOD ! wish I had done that weeks ago !

Pete

The electricians that were sent to wire my house were a bit of a worry. One I accidently hired was a sanger to life & limb.

I did make a couple of amendments, but the warning is that TV & Data cables run anywhere should perhaps be run in shielded conduit.

One TV cable was run parallel but crossed a mains cable inductively. That got nobbled before the walls were clad.

One wire went through the hole the septic vent pipe went. Another was run from the kitchen sink drain up through that same vent hole, but at floor level. They got told to sort that. Plus the clown who drew the plans & put a light in the middle of the manhole cover, into the ceiling? Before house was wired, I went over the plans whilst standing in the house and several other things got moved, added or amended.

AC wires run parallel always induct, causing some CFL's to form relaxation oscillators: Only takes 30V for some. I did establish that with a slide regulator.

I don't know if conduit (there is one that is conductive & not metal). But I often think that some cable should be around something like that to stop it inducting into an adjacent wire, much as we do in a metal chassis. Bundling AC wiring together in my book is a recipe for disaster, like putting a loop in an extension cable.

However, the capacitor arrangement may work? That triangle is very similar to that was used in brush drills etc for ages.

Note that when the house faults were noted, the house was not connected to mains: Nor was there a fuse box.

Marc

The isolation transformer was spewing out acrid smoke and black ooze all over the window ledge where I had placed it.

Good grief! Once you smell burned transformer you never forget it.

No wonder there's a lot of noise on our mains.

Yep, devices like those and some solar systems have turned the mains supply into an electric sewer.