Power line chokes

[tokind]

I was thinking about some frustrated posts about “noisy” devices like well pumps interfering with Sense. I have not seen anyone suggest power line chokes. I would think that one could hire an electrician to procure and install one of these. Assuming it it well away from the CT clamps (installed at the pump end) I do not see how it would hurt.

[pswired]

Unfortunately, when Sense employees and other users here refer to “noise” in this sense, they’re not referring to the typical high-frequency noise that is usually understood in power systems, but rather “usage noise” which is a slower and higher magnitude change in power consumption that adds a level of usage randomness that’s hard to filter out. Being able to discern changes in individual devices depends on some level of consistency in the usage of those devices. If there is a major load or set of loads that has a random usage pattern, it can mask the usage pattern of the known devices.

[samheidie]

Funny this is brought up, I have a VFD well pump that literally generates noise. It’ll make dimmer lights flicker and vary either my air exchanger or furnace fan when it kicks on. Now that I have a heat pump that uses my well pump it’s on quite a bit and it has to be hampering detections, either cause of the literal noise both audibly and electrically, or just the new wattage all the time. Anything that varies speed is known to be electrically ‘dirty’, especially poor quality components.

I just received my order yesterday in fact and will be installing shortly. Worth a shot

[andy]

It sure does. After two years I’ve got few devices detected and some of those not reliably, mostly due to my constant pressure deep well pump. It has a very distinctive pattern to the human eye, but apparently isn’t comprehensible to sense…and masks my other devices.

Since my home has geothermal heat and cooling, the pump runs frequently, particularly when it gets bitter cold outside (I live in NH), so it masks pretty much everything else.