Under the Sense Monitor in the sense app, can we get amps (Amperage) and power factor quantities available for user to monitor? Similarly the way Voltage, frequency, etc. is appearing.
It is critical to see when some equipment draws more current during it’s use. Especially for an example when our keurig coffee maker starts, it sometimes trips circuit due to overload I believe, I need to know what else is there on the circuit and how much total amps it’s consuming while heating the water, serving coffee, etc processes.
In general, Ampere is really very useful quantity for all users.
These quantities are being measured anyways, so I really wanted to see them available. It should be just a matter of sense labs engineers to enable them in the app and minor modification into the sense app (I think).
Amps is a trivial calculation, but nice to have the ‘computer’ do it for us.
I will add, though, that having current on the dynamic real-time power meter display could help to differentiate issues due to sudden current draw (e.g. compressor turn-on) vs. utility voltage drop. The individual device’s power meter display ought to track pretty closely with the current used, but that’s not so clear in the aggregated (overall) power meter display.
Power factor does have to be a Sense-provided, though!
Yes, Amps info can help make sure Panel is balanced equally. It should help someone arrange circuit breakers accordingly in their home for perfect balanced circuit if they are not already. Amp can help achieve that.
Yes, Power factor can be easily calculated using ARM processor. It is a just matter of finding angle between real and apparent power. Its pure math calculation and I believe it can be easily achieved using existing hardware if Sense wanted.
What is usually the time frame for such WISHLIST to be approved and implemented, Does anyone know from your experience?
Sense uses the number of “Likes” for an Wishlist enhancement as guide as to which ones to investigate and tackle. Look at the number under the heart for the first posting in a Wishlist item to see the number of likes. Hard to speculate on timeframes, especially for items that aren’t in the top couple as far as Likes are concerned.
Sense already “sees” phase changes associated with on and off transitions. The real question is what would you be looking for in the as far as phase angle since it is continuously varying.
I would not use the phase directly as is. I would instead use (for example) the phase derivative (also called instantaneous frequency in some circles) as a ‘signature/feature’. I’ve done this in different areas (Machine diagnostics based on vibration data in bearings and gears), and it is often very promising/clean results.
I’m pretty sure Sense is already extracting that “feature”, the phase derivative or phase change for the phase leg experiencing the “transitions of interest” that I mentioned in another thread yesterday. If you fast forward to the Data Science part of this webinar, you’ll see Ghinwa talk about using power and phase as two “features” used to cluster signatures for categorization and detection.
The big question is where would Sense report these phase changes - the only real place that corresponds is the “transitions of interest” power usage tag in the power meter, only on the iOS and Android apps (below)
And those are non-persistent. I’m guessing Sense is none-too-eager to expose all the data that they use to do categorization and detection, though they are willing to give us a smallish view behind the curtain (the webinar and the tags) to help people understand how detection works.
I would love to see power factor for the whole house load as well. I assume most homes are around 95 to 97 percent PF but having real data to back this up would be nice!
Power (watts) is derived from amps x volts. Current clamps provide the sense with current measurements (amps). Amps are not calculated, they are directly measured.
