Energy metering plugs and relays with wifi / ble - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 03:15:47 pm
content: There are many energy metering plugs / relays available these days. Ideal to sniff the house on what is the main consumer. Many have wifi which allows the use of a handy app to see consumption, control on/off or even set timers.After looking at many of these they all seem to have one thing in common ( as is the case with many of these iot things ... ) : they all bank on you setting up an account with a company 'somewhere'. The device then calls home to that server 'somewhere' to post its data and retrieve the timer information. The app interacts with that mystery 'server'. Timer events are driven from that 'mystery' server. There is no local timer clock.so- if the server goes down : doesn't work- they control devices in your home- if they go tits up : you sit on a pile of useless gizmos.That is mind-boggling ...Anyone know of energy monitors that do not 'call out' but only talk locally ? BLE would be a solution as that talks to your phone and your phone only. I want to retain the timer programmability so i can set certain things as 'operate only in this window' as well as the capability to read out the devices without having to walk over to them.

author: Gregg
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 04:54:36 pm
content: I'm not quite sure what you are looking for, maybe you can elaborate on your needs. There are many industrial power monitoring devices that can be monitored remotely. Many use RS485. In the past I have used a lot of Veris Industries monitors.https://www.veris.com/Most of the "smart home" stuff is pure junk with planned obsolescence and the need to be connected for continued corporate revenue.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 08:11:30 pm
content: Quote from: Gregg on January 28, 2020, 04:54:36 pmsimple thing i can plug in-line with a power cord for home use and can control through alexa. i don't need/want industrial stuff.i do NOT want a device that needs to use a third party service ( as in first going to some mystery server in china and then returning to amazon. ) . All the devices i find use an espxxx module and call some mystery machine that then uses iftttt that links to smartthings that then links to amazon. Way too many cooks in the pot. Way too many sniffer, way open for trouble. I would brefer bluetooth or zigbee or z-wave so it can connect to a hub under my control that is NOT going to mystery places, only to local on my network.This seems ot be a huge issue with many iot devices like sonoff and tuya and smart life. These device all need to connect to some service 'somewhere' (china) that then relays information. That means it opens your network. someone can remotely get into these simple devices ( that commonly have zip security ... ) and dswitch on/off thing or other stuff. I don't want that.please do not suggest homebrew with raspberry pi or whatever. i don;t have time are the deisre to do that. i want to buy a couple of plugs, put them on some of my power feeds and monitor consumption. my electricity bill is waaaay too high and i want to find out where the 'eaters' are. sinple plugs with display don;t work as i want logging during the day. Those wifi relay plugs with load metering can do that. i want a local version of that with bluetooth or without requiring a 3rd party server.Whole house monitoring ( a sin the fuse panel) is garbage. They claim smart learning and be able to identify what devices but in many cases it doesn't work and it can only discriminate fridge / ac and that's it. it can not detect a 15 or 30 watt load somewhere.I was on vacation and had everything in the house ( except fridge/refrigerator and some other essentials ) switched off. my load is 10kwh per week ... that is a lot of residual ... i want to find where the eaters are and see if i can find more energy efficient stuff. especially since my consumption when home is only double that ...

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 09:06:27 pm
content: It is very common for IoT type products to only work through a public server. For some products someone somewhere has set their router to intercept the requests to the public server, and created their own local fake server. This requires that they have also reverse engineering the protocol, and created some simple server software. Most of these protocols are very simple, with no encryption and little or no login security. So, creating suitable software may be surprisingly easy. Try Googling the products you are interested in, and you might find someone has done the work to be able to monitor the devices with your own local equipment.Which particular products are you looking at? There were quite a few in the product pipeline a while ago, but I haven't been following which have actually reached the market.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 09:33:31 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on January 28, 2020, 09:06:27 pmDon't want that. If i give an external machine access to my devices they can do whatever they want. switch em on , off or do anything their firmware allows. Nope. not in my home. not going to happen.Homebrew is also a no go route. i don't have the time or patience to learn all the coding and configuration.All i want is a couple of simple devices that i can plug in line with an existing power strip and they record power consumption. an application on my table tor smartphone shows me power consumption charts. vertical power, horizontal time.That way i can keep track of what outlet is drawing what, when.Note : i am NOT after switching devices on and off ! only power monitoring. ( come to think of it... that may be the way to go. simply hack the module using a wire strap to be always on ... then i don't care ... they can have my power consumption data)Home automation is handled through z-wave and a local controllerThe other solution would be something like Emporia Vue Energy monitor. this uses current clamps you simply clip on the wire after the fuse. it has whole house + 8 individual channels monitors. ( so 10 current clamps ) . chuck it in the fuse box and done. But then i need to muck with the fuse box ...Hmmm.. the wire strap hacked devices become interesting ... i can set up a sandboxed wifi SSD on my router , only connect them to that so they can't see anything else . and bob's your uncle ...

author: Gregg
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 10:10:59 pm
content: I have no recommendations that would fit your criteria for a plug in power monitoring solution. I see that there are dozens of candidates available. A quick search of wireless power monitors brings up many consumer grade devices which often lack details in their descriptions. The Emporia one you mentioned seems to be one of the more appropriate devices if you have room in your breaker panel to install separate CTs.A few years ago I bought a Hopi meter like Big Clive uses and am quite pleased with it and I don’t need remote monitoring. My refrigerator is the biggest power user that is continuously on, but things like cable modems can use more energy than you realize.My background is in data center power including monitoring is why I mentioned the industrial monitors.

author: Bud
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 10:52:58 pm
content: LED clocks in appliances and flip clocks in old kitchen stoves, door ringbell transformers, lighting timers in bathrooms, GFCI sockets with LEDs, audio/video gear on stanby, etc, all adds up to idle power consumption. 10kW a week perhaps is too much though.I looked at fuse box power monitoring also some time ago but could not find a suitable product, the best option to me was still a bunch of clamp current transformers fed into a homebrew ADC and transmitter.I however also have a Hopi meter and can recommend, it is inexpensive and can show the total power consumed, but it is not remotely accessible.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 11:00:52 pm
content: You need to take care with the configuration of some appliances, like TVs, or some minor function you don't care about that much keeps the appliance consuming 10's of watts at all times.

author: Gregg
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2020, 11:01:47 pm
content: Another possibility is your utility provided smart meter may not be calibrated properly. Would PG&E overcharge you?

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 01:38:57 am
content: Quote from: Bud on January 28, 2020, 10:52:58 pmthings like the Hopi meter are out of the question. i want to install multiple of these things at the same time ... Like have 8 or 9 of those. hence the wireless logging capability.

author: thm_w
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 01:51:35 am
content: Sonoff S31 claims to have 'LAN control':https://www.itead.cc/sonoff-s31.htmlQuotePeople write their own firmware for them as well (not sure how hard to program this model though).edit:https://github.com/mattsaxon/sonoff-lan-mode-homeassistanthttps://github.com/arendst/Tasmota

author: NiHaoMike
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 03:41:05 am
content: Just get smart plugs with energy monitoring and support for Tasmota.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 03:08:20 pm
content: homebrew is out of the question. i want something that just works and shows me nice power consumption data plots on a tablet or phone.soldering is ok. writing and mucking with code , linux, raspbi, arduino etc is out of the question.to give you an example : i went to that sonof lan page. i spent 5 minutes reading that page and learned NOTHING. ok, the firmware supports that, but you have to muck around to find the encryption key , then you have to write a config file. Then you need to block the devices from calling out on the router, then it take a few more minutes. and then what ? where is the front-end ? as in the pretty app that shows the graphs ? not a word about that. you can send websocket messages.Same with Tasmota ( i explored that yesterday ) . tons of stuff on how to flash that thing, compile it ..and then what ? where is the UI ?On a side note : many of these home control UI's are total crap. I'd like to see a UI where i can draw a floorplan ( or multiple plans , one per floor ) of the house , put actuator icons , and reporting icons in the location of the device. The UI should be able to display a 3d render of this virtual house so i can tap and slide. There was a swedish or danish company that had such a ui but i can't find the link anymore. It worked with a homeseer controller i believe. tap a floor, tap a room and it zooms in and out so you can tap devices. a sidebar on the left allows fast floor switching and scene control , camera view. You invariably see pictures like the one below on web pages, but the actual user experience is a lot different. it makes me think of the early days of video games. you'd get boxes with art like the one below, but on the actual computer screen you had thre moving pixels ...This is what irks me about all these iot projects. They are all half baked. It requires weeks of tinkering and mucking around. it would be faster to go buy some current clamps and hook em up to a 34790 over gpib and write a visual basic script in excel to plot consumption.im going to buy a few of the 10 $ powerplugs from some brand on amazon , strap the relay in the on position and just wing it. i will set up a sandboxed wifi for the devices . i dont care if they have my power consumption data, as long as they can not turn anything on/off remotely i am happy.I just want to find the power hungry devices in my home. once found this stuff will be decomissioned anyway.

author: Zucca
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 03:12:08 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on January 29, 2020, 03:08:20 pmthermal camera on the wire/cables?

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 03:17:20 pm
content: Quote from: Zucca on January 29, 2020, 03:12:08 pmyou find me a thermal camera that can find a 10 watt load ... i want graphs an plots so i can look at my tablet and see what happens when devices go to sleep , power up , and i can figure out where the big 'eaters' are. I just found out my lcd tv / soundbar eats more than 80 watts in standby. That one will get replaced by something less power hungry ...

author: FriedLogic
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 03:44:01 pm
content: Is an average of 60W a lot for what you have on?When I tried this years ago, the problem that I found was that a lot of the monitors did not work well with very small loads like a few watts.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 06:25:10 pm
content: Quote from: FriedLogic on January 29, 2020, 03:44:01 pmthat's my worry as well. i am after finding all the 'vampires' like power adapters , ups devices that eat power in standby etc.my power bricks are horrible in standby. laptop in power off , the brick eats 20 watts just sitting there ... newer style go down to 1 or 2 watts.i found out my older LG 27 inch monitor draws 29 watts in sleep position ( screen 'off' ) , just listening to video input from the computer to see if it should wake up. my newer HP 27 monitors draw 7 watt in sleep ... i just ordered another hp ...if i can cut my vampire drain in half i should be able to save 500$ or more a year. for 500$ i can buy plenty of more efficient power bricks , or some new monitor.i ordered a few different of those wifi smart plugs off amazon. we'll see which one can measure the best ...

author: Zucca
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 29, 2020, 09:01:45 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on January 29, 2020, 03:17:20 pmSorry power hungry for me is more than 10W.Now before to go with the Graph-Tablet-Apple solution, why do not get a power analyzer (used, you are in USA the gold country for used equipment), for example:https://www.rohde-schwarz.com/ph/product/hm8115-productstartpage_63493-44099.htmland check the all the power flowing in all the switches at your main panel at your home? Then, as second step, you check the single devices in the suspected branch?When you buy a new toy you can check with the power analyzer what are the performances in standby, and return it immediately if it does not pass your specification/taste.Also a current clamp with the cable wrapped more times could help to narrow down the problem.I do thank you for this post, appliance design eng do not give a crap about stand buy power.Others interesting stuff:https://blog.kroy.io/2017/12/19/monitoring-home-power-consumption-for-less-than-25/or this:https://hackaday.com/2019/07/27/building-a-safe-esp32-home-energy-monitor/and then you use one of yours 34970A Data acquisition system to log the output of the split trafos.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 30, 2020, 04:48:00 am
content: Quote from: Zucca on January 29, 2020, 09:01:45 pmi have about 60 of those little wall warts in the house (usb chargers, 12 volt power bricks for various desk lights etc.. if those all draw 10watt in standby ... see where this is headed ?One ikea desk light (like 10 years old with a big old school power brick) uses a halogen bulb . that light is on maybe 1 to 2 hours a day. 25 watt lightbulb. so 50wh. Wwhen off the power brick uses 4 watts .. so for the remaining 22 hours a day i am burning almost as much power as when the light is on ! That thing is going on an mechanical switch pre-adapter ! (till i find an efficient adapter)I bought a single channel power analyser to find out what adapters draw. Adapter makers really need to start making power adapters with milliwatt standby power ...There is actually regulation for that. up till certain power ratings the standby needs to be < 0.1watt ..I have many devices that use 12 volt , each with their own power brick. Each on has a 2 to 4 watt standby consumption... if i chuck those out and replace it with one really good modern supply and feed all devices off that ( they are all in the same rack ) there's a bunch of saving right there.

author: Zucca
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 30, 2020, 07:57:56 am
content: Got it...now imagine how many power plants are generating energy just to warm up the power bricks in standby.The good old main switch is laughing at us with a smile on his face: "I told youuuu".Insane.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 30, 2020, 10:37:12 am
content: Quote from: Zucca on January 30, 2020, 07:57:56 amIn a large country, like the US, there is more than one power station's worth of energy being consumed just by the electricity meters.

author: GeorgeOfTheJungle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 30, 2020, 12:08:36 pm
content: Don't put too many because each one eats about 12Wh per day (~100mA @5V), or 4.3kWh/year. I have one meter with a big green led display next to the GFCI next to the entrance door of my house, so that when I leave I can look at it and verify that I haven't left any big consumer on. In my case 50..70W is the base when everything is turned "off", except when the fridge compressor has kicked in, that's a hundred something watts more.

author: krish2487
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 01, 2020, 08:07:45 pm
content: @free_electronI am not sure if it falls into the homebrew category exactly.... but this is a Rpi, but a commercially available solution at that..https://openenergymonitor.orgAnd you can host the server yourself on your premises..There are two distinct drawbacks I see1. You might need to spend sometime to setup the system ( I am assuming so.. I havent any personal experience)2. The energy monitor is limited to 2 CTs. ( I am not sure if scaling up the number of energy monitors is viable for you or granular enough)Hope this helps a bit!! :-)Edit : Just realised they have a "emonTX" which has 4 CT inputs. I still am not sure if it fits your need / application.. but it seems like as good a candidate as any..

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 01, 2020, 09:37:16 pm
content: Quote from: krish2487 on February 01, 2020, 08:07:45 pmi am in NA , that thing doesnt really support split phase, you need to tinker with it and then lose some features.anyway i bought some of the wifi modules and am testing them for accuracy . most use a 0.001 ohm sense resistor with a diff amp to measure current. better than current transformers. most current transformers stop working at low levels.a 20 amp rated CT has trouble measuring 10 milli amps .. which is 1 watt. ...we'll see how accurate these really are. Keep in mind that i am looking for 'vampire drain' of devices in standby.