On 03/13/2015 08:24 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I live close to the exhibition grounds which is near to one of the city's major grid switches. For example, they were testing the new streetcars, the ones with three sections for navigating tight turns and they browned us down to (I assume) 50hz. This was visible as all the lights dimmed and the streetcar appeared to navigate the loop a short time later. As I don't have ups I had powered down my tower. The next time I powered up the breaker in the power supply tripped and when I reset it and booted, my 1.5v agp video card was toasted, at least I hope its the card and not elsewhere on the bus.
So that's not so bad, there's no enterprise stuff at risk, I just hack together another box and carry on. However, now I have a real problem and I'm in need of a solution. Yesterday I fired up the WiFi while my SO was drying her hair. I toasted her salon quality hair dryer. Not good. :-( There is no gfi outlet and at this point I'm wondering if I need UPS, for the hair dryer, if not the computer.
So my question is, does anyone on this list have similar problems and a low cost hack they have used to deal with Toronto's iffy grid. TIA Russell
Something seems wrong here. If that's actually happening, there's a problem with the power distribution network and you'd need a TTC power station nearby. Streetcars run on DC, not AC and those stations are used to convert 60 Hz (not 50) to DC. I suspect that power dip was caused by something else. If it was caused by streetcars, you'd see it happening frequently. A UPS is always a good idea, but I really doubt your WiFi damaged the dryer. A GFI outlet protects people against electrical leakage. It does not protect equipment. However, it's a good idea to have one for safety with outlets nears sinks etc.