alternative power cources? electricity!

[kushmaster5000]

whats up..

hey, is there anything else out there.. withou effecting my electricity bill? solar power? generators? anything!

short cicuits have been an issue as well!

hps 1000, and a 500 floro.. as well as fans and an ac!

letme know.. any ideas?

thanks

 

[Exile06]

r u on a single 15 amp ??? if ur on a 30 amp circut u shouldnt have problems, i have herd something called a "bypass" and i hear there very illegal and somewhat dangerous if u dont be careful but i guess they bypass the electricty that u pull thru the bypass unit which equals free power , but ive never seen 1 , also last summer i was at my buddys dads place helping them harvest a shitload of buds and he said that he steals some of his power thru his cables lines which i thought was a load of ** but ive herd its also possible , generators r a pain in the butt to maintain and they cost more to run and there noisy

 

[northernlightssmokn]

I just wanted to say that your playing with fire when your playing with electricity. There is a realy affective way to get "free" power and natural gas..you excavate the line underground before the meter. with power, you de-energize the line at the transformer or power pedistal, dig it up by the power meter and splice into it, running 220 volts into your basement and terminating in a new secret breaker box. with gas you pinch the line (service line by the meter base) and "t" it underground and run it to a garage or shop and regulate it there. Upside: free gas and power for ever as long as you dont abuse it. DOWNSIDE: bolth of these utilities are federaly regulated and when/if discovered, will result in an indictment by a federal grand jury, your grow will be charged federal as well. The gas is realy simple to do and the power is deadly, it will also require a lineman or journyman wireman to open the transformer and re codelock broken seal. I saw this done about 15 years ago in Arizona and I dont believe I would ever try it or reccomend it. Besides that pot growing is a victomless crime and by steeling power and gas, your affecting the rates of everyone else, making it theft. Theres the carme thing also, keep it simple and pay your power bill. By the way, a generator works fine, but they are noisy, also the cheep ones at napa for $500 ****. You need a good generator, so it will cost you a good $1200. The best way is to pay the powerbill. As far as the flipping of breakers goes, you need to find out if your on a 15 or 30 amp breaker...than consider the wear of the wireing. pull the outlets and check for a loose wire..(with the breaker off of course) Go to ALL of the items you use on that breaker, read the labels and count the amps. total the amps and stay under 80% capacity. for instance:

Ballast... 5 amps
c. filter.. 2 amps
o. fan.... 2 amps
blower.. 3 amps
radio.... 1 amps
------------------
total..... 13 amps


13 amps on a 15 amp breaker is ok as long as the house wiring is up to code and grounded well. Now lets say you go into the room and plug in a 2nd ballast that is 3 amp...13+3=16 and now your flipping a breaker. DO NOT upgrade to a 30 amp if the wiring is rated for 15!!

By the way, a product has an amp rating based on a direct plug in. When you use extention cords and/or powerstrips this requires more pull on amps, increasing the amperage ratio. A good rule of thumb is to figure 1/5 amp per foot of extention cord and 1/2 amp per power strip. Make sure your power strip and extention cords are actualy needed. The extention cord should be a 3 prong and capable of holding the proper amperage plus 1/3rd.

I hope this helps.

 

[northernlightssmokn]

I forgot to mention that your problem may lie in your a/c unit...there are two amperage raitings on an a/c unit. the blower motor and the the a/c motor...Most a/c units will run about 8 amps themselves and it is a bad idea to put an a/c unit on a powerstrip or extention cord. Also, flip the breaker in your grow room and see if everything else is working in the rest of the house. If not, than you need to count those amps as well.

 

[WrEkkED]

First off, I'm an electrician. Don't go changing the breaker. It's 15 amps for a reason. That's all the wiring is meant for, or else you may have a fire hazzard. Most recepticles, switches etc. are only made for 15 amps. (note, 15amp breakers are actually 12 amp due to derating purposes, and so is the wire.)

Watts=voltage*amperage.. you need 1000 watts on 120v means your drawing 8.33 amps. So your breaker should be fine. As far as cutting off your metering device, you can. But they aren't stupid. They can tell. Plus you will get yourself killed if you don;t know what you're doing. There's a reason why we turn off power before working on it. Because it kills.

Easiest way for you to make cheap power is by DC batteries. You can buy car batteries, buy a trickle charger, and buy an inverter. The trickle charger you plug into your regular recepticle and what it does it keep your battery charged. The inverter is needed to convert the DC power to AC for your lights. Then your done. Of course you can use generators, but gas will be way too expensive, and solor is very expensive too. The only other one that isn't too pricey is wind. But you're still looking at around 1000$ and if your in an area that doesn't get much wind you could be in trouble.

Hope this helps, thats my simple solution. If you want more info on it, I can go into further detail or more ideas.

 

[bombbudpuffa]

Why don't you just use power from another room instead of just one? That would be your simplest solution IMO. NLS and Wrekked are correct about electricity kills and using power from another room sounds safer than any other option.

 

[WrEkkED]

I didn't even notice you said you had all those one one circuit. Yea, that's going to trip your breaker for sure. If you want to use plain electricity from your building you can buy some 3 conductor #10AWG (will have a black, blue, white and bare copper wire) wire (good for 30 amps). Turn off the main breaker to your house, put the white wire on the neutral bar. but the bare wire on the ground. Hook the black wire to one 30 amp breaker and hook the blue to another 30 amp breaker. Install a duplex recepticle (make sure to break the tab) and hook the black to one side, and blue to the other. Then you can put a power bar in each side of the recepticle and they will both have 30 amps for a total of 60 usable amps.

Yet again if you want to do that, let me know and ill find you pictures of how to do it step by step. A roll of #10 3 conductor will probably cost you around 300$ for 100 feet.

 

[WrEkkED]

yep, you can just get it from another room too. But if your drawing a lot you may have extension cords going all over and may cost more than just running a new wire.

Do you know the amperage each unit needs, or the wattage it is saying it uses. Also, do you ctually use 120v or 220v?

 

[Greenfinger]

Very good advise there wrekked, i made the mistake of trying to have free electric... and it is possible ,,,but hence they can run checks so we are stuck with paying our ways
There is such a device in our world called meter beaters.... i have had one before it can slow down your consumption rate ...but i gave mine away due to having a massive shock and neally killed myself... .
At the time this bit of kit was wicked i had in the flower room 3,500 watts
the veg room was pulling 600watts and the cloning room was 200watts in all the meter was clocking over at some rate untill the MB was put on then the clocking rate was allmost stopped....
But the second degree burns on my hand was the time i decided to get rid of the very rare bit of kit...
Having contact switches for all your heavy consumer units helps with overloading your setup.

 

[Stoney Bud]

And last but not least, if the power company even THINKS you're stealing power, they can bring a cop with them and enter your house any time they want to. If they discover your grow in the process, you're busted.

I don't think it's worth the risk.

Let's see, 10 years in prison for stealing a few hundred bucks worth of power?

Nope, it's not worth it.

 

[northernlightssmokn]

wow, this is realy cool to see that there are people out there who can give realy good advice in accordance to law and morals! This shows right here that the common misconception that pot growers are bad people is just plain wrong. We secure our grow and respect the laws. It's way better to pay your power bill than it is to pay your bail and loose your house!! Oh yeah, the reason for my reply: Check this out, The utility companies can and do make a list of accessive power consumers and make it available to local athourities, but here is the good part!! It is NOT enough of a reason to bust you!!! If the police used power consumption as a basis for a warrent and raid you and find a tanning bed, electric basebord heaters, or some high energy item that is legal and your powerbill is paid, than they can be sued by you for violating your right to privacy. If you live in an apartment, the police can gain entrance through your landlord with 24 hours notice to you, but still it is not practical...Your powerbill can put you ahead on the watch list, but if your in tune and 100% low key, all is good. In my opinion the cosumption is not even noticed till your bill is not paid and evaluated for disconnection. Dont let it get behind and your not even noticed.

 

[WrEkkED]

electric providers don't actually even need a warrant. They can tell how much each line is drawing right from the transformer and they have every right to go on your property to check the meter. There is a way to steal power legally, but you really need to be an electrician so you have access to enough wire. So we won't go into that

ps. If you own a house, put in a hottub. If they question your bill, say you have the heater on 24/7 Those suckers will draw a hell of a lot of power. Though, putting in a wind generator would be about the same price LoL