Frequency standard

[David L. Jones]

Yes, but I'm interested in going one better than the website, and actually
calibrating. That was the reason for my original post about dividing down
from crystal oscillators of eg 2 MHz

How do you plan on "calibrating" your crystal oscillator?
"Calibration" usually = "traceability".

What is the end purpose of all this measurement anyhow?

Dave.

 

[Suzy]

I'm afraid Phil is right. As the load increase beyond what can be supplied
by the machines already online, another unit is brought onto the grid.
Normally some units produce less than their full capacity to give what is
called "spinning reserve". The spinning reserve on the grid is normally at
least equal to the largest unit on the grid so that if a machine trips off
there is enough reserve capacity on the grid to cover it. When demand
exceeds the total capacity of the grid you get "brown outs". This is done
by a system controller switching off an area for a while to reduce grid
load. It's simply a matter of operating a switch which causes a huge
circuit breaker to open and cuts of power to a suburb or small town.
Brown-outs are rotated to different areas so as to reduce inconvenience to
customers, but power utitiltys usually have pre-arranged contracts in
place to cut off non-essential loads first.
When a unit does trip off accidently, the grid frequency may drop a few
hertz for a few seconds until the spinning reserve picks up the load, but
you wouldn't be able to forecast a problem in advance, you would only know
of the event afterwards when the frequency has dipped.
In general, bigger grids are more stable.

Elmo

Thanks Elmo. Makes perfect sense, and I was aware of the above. But can we
take this a stage further? Wouldn't monitoring frequency changes give some
idea of when the above routine is failing, and therefore to forecast rolling
blackouts (though not where they are of course)

 

[Suzy]

"RMD"


** Can be done very easily - if you have a stable sine generator with
fine tune and a basic CRO and frequency counter.

Just set up a lissajous pattern, with a ratio of 20 to 1, on the CRO
creen - then tweak the audio gen frequency to get the pattern
stationary. Read the generator frequency off the counter.

When it is 1000 Hz, the AC supply is 50 Hz.

When it is 1005Hz, the AC supply is 50.25 Hz.



** Ditto.

Bout as useful as reading tea leaves.

However, an AC voltmeter will tell you if the load in your local area is
unusually heavy or light at some given time.




...... Phil

Good Lord! Unadulterated sense! How erratic (down, Phil, I did not say
erotic). Yes, I can see that measuring voltage on a continuous basis might
be a help, but only as far as the variations go, as we are all at the end of
a finite line and must suffer not only from that but the seemingly random
supply system settings at the nearest sub or zone... Why, though is the UK
meter site irrelevant? Is that not showing one of the symptoms of overall
system imbalance? For example, how do you explain the meter showing a drop
at heavy load times (eg TV advert breaks)? I am really interested in this,
and was all agog waiting for the answer to put me straight in place of which
I got Phil's anti-women rantings... Sigh...

 

[Suzy]

" Suzy "


** Well, **** you - bitch face.




** It ain't true of the Australian AC supply system and its is as dumb as
dog shit to introduce such naive fallacies.



** ( snip more of Suzy's asinine abuse)




** Yawn - more dumb bitch abuse.




** **** OFF back to the moronic, narcissistic on line chat rooms you
normally infest !!

Where asinine, anonymous public masturbators put THEMSELVES at the
CENTRE of every topic.

Just like dumb TROLLS all do.



....... Phil

And by the way, I have never been to a chat room. Perhaps you googled Suzy
(as I have)? Well, the one that fills all the response pages is not me! A
bit simplistic to assume that there's only one Suzy on the internet! As
intelligent as (please pardon me any real Smith!) saying "Ah, you're Smith
are you. I know all about you!"

 

[Clifford Heath]

For once, I'll leave his vile foul mouth unedited. You have a problem

Suzy, just drop it. Once Phil decides a conversation isn't worth
pursuing he never returns to reason. Next time a technical question
is posed by someone who doesn't set him off, he'll be quite helpful
again - he does know a lot of useful stuff and it's best just to
drop any subject that gets to this stage. Oh, and BTW, it isn't
just women... or even especially women, it can be anyone equally.
So don't take it personally, we've all been where you are.

 

[Phil Allison]

" Suzy"


** **** OFF back to the moronic, narcissistic on line chat rooms you
normally infest !!

Where asinine, anonymous public masturbators put THEMSELVES at the
CENTRE of every topic.

Just like dumb TROLLS all do.




........ Phil

 

[Phil Allison]

"Suzy"


** **** OFF back to the moronic, narcissistic on line chat rooms you
normally infest !!

Where asinine, anonymous public masturbators put THEMSELVES at the
CENTRE of every topic.

Just like dumb TROLLS all do.



........ Phil

 

[Phil Allison]

"Suzy" <not@valid>


** **** OFF back to the moronic, narcissistic on line chat rooms you
normally infest !!

Where asinine, anonymous public masturbators put THEMSELVES at the
CENTRE of every topic.

Just like dumb TROLLS all do.




........ Phil

 

[Clifford Heath]

Thanks Elmo. Makes perfect sense, and I was aware of the above. But can we
take this a stage further? Wouldn't monitoring frequency changes give some
idea of when the above routine is failing, and therefore to forecast rolling
blackouts (though not where they are of course)

What Elmo is saying is...

There is a very complicated and potentially variable (may involve
human input) transfer function between the load change and the
frequency change.

You want to try to second-guess that, go ahead... you could use that
ability to predict the future to make a killing on the stock market.

Clifford Heath.

 

[Elmo]

Thanks Elmo. Makes perfect sense, and I was aware of the above. But can we
take this a stage further? Wouldn't monitoring frequency changes give some
idea of when the above routine is failing, and therefore to forecast rolling
blackouts (though not where they are of course)

Not really, even with the power station there can be load changes for
operational reasons, for example changing the coal mills from one to
another or starting up a feed-water pump. These operations will cause
small changes in generator output.
Living in a suburb with a hospital will reduce blackouts, living in a
suburb that has high air conditioner usage on hot days is asking for
trouble.

Elmo

 

[Phil Allison]

"Clifford Heath"

What Elmo is saying is...

There is a very complicated and potentially variable (may involve
human input) transfer function between the load change and the
frequency change.

You want to try to second-guess that, go ahead... you could use that
ability to predict the future to make a killing on the stock market.

** LOL - comparison with the often chaotic stock market is very apt here.

Both do go up and down, there seems to be some pattern to it all, but it has
long proved to be beyond rational prediction.

Appears to be characteristic of all complex, interacting, human driven
systems.

Same goes for land values etc.



........ Phil

 

[atec77]

public masturbators

that's you philthy

most every-time you post it's a rudeness undeserved...


now remind us how felating a staff member got you thrown out of uni ..

 

[atec77]

"Clifford Heath"


** LOL - comparison with the often chaotic stock market is very apt here.

Not that you have any personal experience in the area eh philthy ?

Both do go up and down,

just like your head when felating your speshul friend ?

there seems to be some pattern to it all, but it has

long proved to be beyond rational prediction.

rational ?
well you are excluded then eh philthy ?

Appears to be characteristic of all complex, interacting, human driven
systems.

not your area of expertise either old trout ?

Same goes for land values etc.

Well we can be sure you never having been a land owner operate purely
on "hearsay"

 

[Clifford Heath]

"Clifford Heath"

** LOL - comparison with the often chaotic stock market is very apt here.

Both do go up and down, there seems to be some pattern to it all, but it has
long proved to be beyond rational prediction.

More to the point, it positively responds to any newly-discovered accurate
prediction method by becoming just enough more complex that the method
doesn't work any more, since it's basically a fractal (self-referential)
system. It shares this characteristic with self-awareness. It isn't free
will or anything spiritual that creates intractable complexity, it's just
that self-reference guarantees that the complexity is always *just* out of
reach.

There, from electricity generation to agnosticism in three posts . QED.

 

[Phil Allison]

"Alan Peake"

No, the electricity supply company couldn't maintain 50 Hz acurately in
the short tern due to load variations and machine response times inter
alia. They supposedly guaranteed the correct number of cycles per day
however. This was in SA and wasn't connected to the national grid .....

** Yawn ........

So now the dopey ass finally tells us he was testing a diesel gene.




......... Phil

 

[Suzy]

"Suzy" <not@valid>


** **** OFF back to the moronic, narcissistic on line chat rooms you
normally infest !!

Where asinine, anonymous public masturbators put THEMSELVES at the
CENTRE of every topic.

Just like dumb TROLLS all do.




....... Phil
Amazing stuff! Vintage Phil...

 

[Suzy]

Suzy, just drop it. Once Phil decides a conversation isn't worth
pursuing he never returns to reason. Next time a technical question
is posed by someone who doesn't set him off, he'll be quite helpful
again - he does know a lot of useful stuff and it's best just to
drop any subject that gets to this stage. Oh, and BTW, it isn't
just women... or even especially women, it can be anyone equally.
So don't take it personally, we've all been where you are.

Thanks Cliff. Not problem with me, but can't we do something to help this
poor unhappy bloke? As you say, he can be quite helpful but he has a real
human interface problem. Worse than I've ever seen in a lifetime of working
with disadvantaged people with big chips on their shoulders and plenty of
reasons for having them.

And Phil, if you are still there, I have never been in a chat room. You are
assuming there's only one Suzy on the internet. A bit of a silly assumption
for an intelligent (?) person.

 

[Suzy]

What Elmo is saying is...

There is a very complicated and potentially variable (may involve
human input) transfer function between the load change and the
frequency change.

You want to try to second-guess that, go ahead... you could use that
ability to predict the future to make a killing on the stock market.

Clifford Heath.

I quite like the idea of monitoring frequency *and* voltage, the latter
being Phil's contribution when he accidentally made one...

 

[Suzy]

"Clifford Heath"


** LOL - comparison with the often chaotic stock market is very apt
here.

Both do go up and down, there seems to be some pattern to it all, but it
has long proved to be beyond rational prediction.

Appears to be characteristic of all complex, interacting, human driven
systems.

Same goes for land values etc.



....... Phil

Click! Someone threw a switch. I agree Phil. And have lost a lot of money on
the stockmarket too... until I woke up to the fact that it's pure gambling.

 

[Suzy]

More to the point, it positively responds to any newly-discovered accurate
prediction method by becoming just enough more complex that the method
doesn't work any more, since it's basically a fractal (self-referential)
system. It shares this characteristic with self-awareness. It isn't free
will or anything spiritual that creates intractable complexity, it's just
that self-reference guarantees that the complexity is always *just* out of
reach.

There, from electricity generation to agnosticism in three posts . QED.

Crikey Cliff! You've lost me there...