recording from gas water and electricity meters

A

Andrew Vevers

Guest
My electronic knowledge is stuck somewhere back in the 1960's so please bear
with me.

I'd like to monitor my household gas, water and electricity to a more
sophisticated level than just occasionally going and reading the meter.

Meters are available which emit a pulse every time a certain quantity of
gas, water etc passes. I think I can handle this bit - either I persuade the
utility company to fit them or I have my own downstream of the main meter.

I want to capture the signal and store it in a device which can then
download to a computer for processing with tables and graphs showing
consumption figures.

What do I need to do this?
 
"Andrew Vevers" <http://www.environmentalconsultants.co.uk> wrote in message
news:429c2958$0$342$cc9e4d1f@news.dial.pipex.com...
My electronic knowledge is stuck somewhere back in the 1960's so please
bear
with me.

I'd like to monitor my household gas, water and electricity to a more
sophisticated level than just occasionally going and reading the meter.

Meters are available which emit a pulse every time a certain quantity of
gas, water etc passes. I think I can handle this bit - either I persuade
the
utility company to fit them or I have my own downstream of the main meter.

I want to capture the signal and store it in a device which can then
download to a computer for processing with tables and graphs showing
consumption figures.

What do I need to do this?
Click to expand...
You need flow meters and a software program, both of which there are
hundreds.
 
Andrew Vevers wrote:
My electronic knowledge is stuck somewhere back in the 1960's so please bear
with me.

I'd like to monitor my household gas, water and electricity to a more
sophisticated level than just occasionally going and reading the meter.

Meters are available which emit a pulse every time a certain quantity of
gas, water etc passes. I think I can handle this bit - either I persuade the
utility company to fit them or I have my own downstream of the main meter.

I want to capture the signal and store it in a device which can then
download to a computer for processing with tables and graphs showing
consumption figures.

What do I need to do this?
Click to expand...
I did this a while back to monitor the electric water heater.
Used a clamp-on AC current probe into a Radio Shack DVM with RS-232
Interface into a laptop computer.
Was interesting for about 20 minutes.
If I were to do it over, I'd probably use a PIC processor on the current
probe to log the data.
But for cost, you can't beat a laptop. On a bad day, 386 laptops are a
dime a dozen. On a good day, they're free.

What is your objective?
Collecting data is useless unless you're gonna change something based on
the data. If you want to save money, use less. You don't need a
computer to tell you that your hot shower costs money. Shorter showers
means less cost.

Here are some examples. I worried about the cost of the water heater.
So I instrumented it. Then I discovered that the thermal time constant
of a hot water heater is so long that there ain't much you can do by
turning it on/off. Unless you're on time-based electricity cost...and
you still don't need instrumentation to tell you when to turn it on/off.
All you need is a cost/price/schedule list from the utility and a clock.

Another interesting thing I learned was that the computer I was running
all the time to play mp3s was costing me several bucks a month in
electricity. Didn't need instrumentation to figure that out, but the
instrumentation did give me cause to think about such things. You might
spend more in instrumenting it than you can save.

So I learned that thinking about energy use and minimizing it everywhere
all the time was more important than trying to monitor it.

"Sorry kids, you've used up your hot water allocation for today. Shower
is off 'till tomorrow" just ain't gonna cut it.
mike

--
Return address is VALID but some sites block emails
with links. Delete this sig when replying.
..
Wanted, PCMCIA SCSI Card for HP m820 CDRW.
FS 500MHz Tek DSOscilloscope TDS540 Make Offer
Wanted 12" LCD for Compaq Armada 7770MT.
Bunch of stuff For Sale and Wanted at the link below.
MAKE THE OBVIOUS CHANGES TO THE LINK
ht<removethis>tp://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Monitor/4710/
 
"mike" <spamme0@netscape.net> wrote in message
news:429CC4BE.7000808@netscape.net...
Andrew Vevers wrote:
My electronic knowledge is stuck somewhere back in the 1960's so please
bear
with me.

I'd like to monitor my household gas, water and electricity to a more
sophisticated level than just occasionally going and reading the meter.

Meters are available which emit a pulse every time a certain quantity of
gas, water etc passes. I think I can handle this bit - either I persuade
the
utility company to fit them or I have my own downstream of the main
meter.

I want to capture the signal and store it in a device which can then
download to a computer for processing with tables and graphs showing
consumption figures.

What do I need to do this?



I did this a while back to monitor the electric water heater.
Used a clamp-on AC current probe into a Radio Shack DVM with RS-232
Interface into a laptop computer.
Was interesting for about 20 minutes.
If I were to do it over, I'd probably use a PIC processor on the current
probe to log the data.
But for cost, you can't beat a laptop. On a bad day, 386 laptops are a
dime a dozen. On a good day, they're free.

What is your objective?
Collecting data is useless unless you're gonna change something based on
the data. If you want to save money, use less. You don't need a
computer to tell you that your hot shower costs money. Shorter showers
means less cost.

Here are some examples. I worried about the cost of the water heater.
So I instrumented it. Then I discovered that the thermal time constant
of a hot water heater is so long that there ain't much you can do by
turning it on/off. Unless you're on time-based electricity cost...and
you still don't need instrumentation to tell you when to turn it on/off.
All you need is a cost/price/schedule list from the utility and a clock.

Another interesting thing I learned was that the computer I was running
all the time to play mp3s was costing me several bucks a month in
electricity. Didn't need instrumentation to figure that out, but the
instrumentation did give me cause to think about such things. You might
spend more in instrumenting it than you can save.

So I learned that thinking about energy use and minimizing it everywhere
all the time was more important than trying to monitor it.

"Sorry kids, you've used up your hot water allocation for today. Shower
is off 'till tomorrow" just ain't gonna cut it.
mike

--
Return address is VALID but some sites block emails
with links. Delete this sig when replying.
.
Wanted, PCMCIA SCSI Card for HP m820 CDRW.
FS 500MHz Tek DSOscilloscope TDS540 Make Offer
Wanted 12" LCD for Compaq Armada 7770MT.
Bunch of stuff For Sale and Wanted at the link below.
MAKE THE OBVIOUS CHANGES TO THE LINK
ht<removethis>tp://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Monitor/4710/
Click to expand...
Many thanks for the replies. I know that this might not ultimately make
economic sense for home use, but I'm an environmental consultant. Mostly I
advise industry on pollution problems. Sometimes I do water audits involving
reading various meters around the works. I want to understand the technology
involved in remote monitoring, without making expensive mistakes.
 
On Wed, 01 Jun 2005 10:18:15 +0100, Andrew Vevers wrote:
"mike" <spamme0@netscape.net> wrote in message
....
So I learned that thinking about energy use and minimizing it
everywhere all the time was more important than trying to monitor it.

"Sorry kids, you've used up your hot water allocation for today.
Shower is off 'till tomorrow" just ain't gonna cut it. mike

Many thanks for the replies. I know that this might not ultimately make
economic sense for home use, but I'm an environmental consultant. Mostly
I advise industry on pollution problems. Sometimes I do water audits
involving reading various meters around the works. I want to understand
the technology involved in remote monitoring, without making expensive
mistakes.
Click to expand...
Then it would probably make sense to contact the utility companies, and
see if they have any ideas on it. They might even already have something
that does exactly what you're looking for, and they've almose certainly
got many years' experience in the conservation department (pum unintended,
but noted. :) )

Good Luck!
Rich
 
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