Weak power at new place

[cinergi]

NStar has a well-deserved reputation for lousy customer service. As I shift my household up to Maine, it's been a delightful contrast working with Central Maine Power.

FWIW, 4 out of the 5 "tier 1" people I spoke to were great to talk to (5th wasn't bad, just a little rough around the edges) -- they're just having trouble routing my call and the tech isn't paying attention to the case notes (or can't see them). The service engineer I spoke to today was also great to talk to and wanted to help, but had to route me to the paperwork ... so I think their system may be to blame here; the people on the phone have been pretty good.

My electrician will be filling out the paperwork and all that jazz -- dunno how long this process will take...

 

[mitch672]

My electrician will be filling out the paperwork and all that jazz -- dunno how long this process will take...

National Grid took months to fix up my service, they have a "process", and you can't really speed it up at all.

1. Your electrician needs to get your towns electrical inspector to approve the work/permit
2. The inspector then fills out paperwork with the utility advising them of the upgraded service
3. The utility arrives to inspect the transformers and overhead feeder cables, to see if upgrades are needed
4. You've notified them if a new significant load, so once they've done their "dance", you'll be able to get a lineman out who can take measurements at the meter while you turn on the load
5. Now it goes back to engineering where they try to figure out what to do, they'll try upsizing the conductors to your house, that probably won't help, then they'll decide to place a new transformer (most likely), now they have to evaluate the poles, if they are comming due for replacement, they'll probably set a new pole ( or replace one ), to place the new transformer on

All of the above events happened in my case, took months...

 

[cinergi]

National Grid took months to fix up my service, they have a "process", and you can't really speed it up at all.

1. Your electrician needs to get your towns electrical inspector to approve the work/permit
2. The inspector then fills out paperwork with the utility advising them of the upgraded service
3. The utility arrives to inspect the transformers and overhead feeder cables, to see if upgrades are needed
4. You've notified them if a new significant load, so once they've done their "dance", you'll be able to get a lineman out who can take measurements at the meter while you turn on the load
5. Now it goes back to engineering where they try to figure out what to do, they'll try upsizing the conductors to your house, that probably won't help, then they'll decide to place a new transformer (most likely), now they have to evaluate the poles, if they are comming due for replacement, they'll probably set a new pole ( or replace one ), to place the new transformer on

All of the above events happened in my case, took months...

Sweet. Hopefully before summer when everyone's running A/C, otherwise it'll turn into an outage situation when the transformer blows
Inspection is this week ...

 

[yobigd20]

Suggestions?

yea, go ahead and pull 80A and blow their transformer. That'll force them to come out and upgrade it to a bigger one.

 

[cinergi]

yea, go ahead and pull 80A and blow their transformer. That'll force them to come out and upgrade it to a bigger one.

:smile:
I keep joking with my electrician about doing that. Although that's pretty mean to my neighbors! At least I have a generator and whole-home generator hookup haha.
*cough*

 

[hcsharp]

Boy am I glad i live in VT. I called Central VT Public Service and said I have two 70A chargers installed and both will be used simultaneously on occasion. In less than a week I had a dedicated 25kVA transformer installed. They called and said "If that doesn't do it, let us know and we'll replace it with a 35kVA." I have 200A service. No inspections were required.

 

[cinergi]

Thought I'd update this with the resolution. It only took 7 months but I called NSTAR once again and said WTF -- to which they replied they'd put a voltage monitor on the line ... so I'm thinking "oh great, here we go ... this will go on another 7 months" ...
Shortly after I got home I was doing some yard work and saw an NSTAR car parked on the street across from my house so I went to chat. He didn't know about a voltage monitor request but he said that there were WAY too many homes on the transformer (23 homes on a 50kVA) and he couldn't believe it etc etc ... I'm like "yeah that's what I've been trying to tell you guys for 7 months now" and he was horrified it'd been going on this long. TWO DAYS LATER they'd split the run (into 3 pieces) and put a new transformer on my pole ... so my starting voltage is 242-246 and I'll drop to maybe 235-240 (most of that loss is in my house). And now I always charge at 80 amps -- it never drops to 60.
Sheesh!

 

[mitch672]

Nice, told you it would take them a while, they move at glacial speed.
I called them for my Stoughton house I am moving to, nice starting voltage at 241 usually, buts it's a 25KVA transformer shared with 3 houses total. I suggested to them when I place my 18KVA EV charging load on it, and any neighbors happen to be using their Air Conditioners (30A central units) or electric ovens (50A usually max), we could have an issue. response: "it's under loaded at the moment, we can't do anything until we see it change."

At least I have his name and number, I have only been charging at 40A so far, I have not moved the 75A OpenEVSE over yet, that's when I'll be able to draw the 18KVA (75A * 240V)

 

[Robert.Boston]

Nice, told you it would take them a while, they move at glacial speed.
I called them for my Stoughton house I am moving to, nice starting voltage at 241 usually, buts it's a 25KVA transformer shared with 3 houses total. I suggested to them when I place my 18KVA EV charging load on it, and any neighbors happen to be using their Air Conditioners (30A central units) or electric ovens (50A usually max), we could have an issue. response: "it's under loaded at the moment, we can't do anything until we see it change."

This is a really amazingly stupid response. Customer: "I'm adding load this is likely to blow up your equipment." Utility: "When you do, we'll upgrade it."

Wow. Just wow. When I moved into my summer place in Maine, I called up Central Maine Power and had a discussion with a very intelligent young man. He brought up the equipment records, added a 10kW load, and concluded that all would be fine even with the extra load. (This sort of interaction is the thing we've enjoyed most about moving to Maine from Massachusetts: the level of competence is SO much higher.)

 

[Cottonwood]

This is a really amazingly stupid response. Customer: "I'm adding load this is likely to blow up your equipment." Utility: "When you do, we'll upgrade it."

Wow. Just wow. When I moved into my summer place in Maine, I called up Central Maine Power and had a discussion with a very intelligent young man. He brought up the equipment records, added a 10kW load, and concluded that all would be fine even with the extra load. (This sort of interaction is the thing we've enjoyed most about moving to Maine from Massachusetts: the level of competence is SO much higher.)

Maybe it is a little better away from the city! :biggrin:

In Pagosa, when I did my addition a couple of years ago, my electrician and I did the load calcs. Because the place has Electro Thermal Storage (ETS) Space and Water heating, if it's a cold winter day and everyone has used a lot of hot water taking showers after skiing, then 252 Amps at 240 Volts can kick in when the low rate power becomes available; that's 60 kVA just for the ETS stuff. Add to that, two electric steam showers (60 and 70 Amp breakers), an HPWC on a 100 Amp breaker, 3 14-50's sprinkled around the garage for friends, testing, and just because, each on their own 50 Amp breaker, and all the normal loads for a few thousand square feet of house, and the local co-op engineer did not blink, then immediately approved a 100 kVA transformer. BTW, this transformer is only for my house. The next closest house to me is a mile away by road.

I'm spoiled with 600 Amp service on my own, private 100 kVA transformer. Needless to say, I don't see much Voltage drop when charging at 80 Amps, about 2-3 Volts.