[asterisk-biz] backup power requirements for emergency calling

[alex at pilosoft.com]

On Fri, 14 Apr 2006, Andrew Kohlsmith wrote:

> On Friday 14 April 2006 18:20, alex at pilosoft.com wrote:
> > In words of Randy Bush, I encourage my competitors to use you for the
> > electrical engineering. *plonk*
> 
> I'm sure they already do.  :-)
:))

> > I don't know about squirrels in your neck of woods, but over here in
> > New York, I've had my genset start exactly once in 5 years that wasn't
> > a "major power outage". (Major power outage = 9/11 and 2003 blackout).
> 
> If your genset starts up within 20 seconds of an outage and it hasn't
> been started up in 5 years then you either have no clue as to what your
> genset's doing or you're outright lying.  New York's power quality ain't
> that great that they haven't had an outage longer than 20 seconds in 5
> years.
I meant obviously the 'unscheduled' maintenance. Genset is running every
month for 1 hour to test. :)

What I am saying is power outage is either >10 minutes or less than 5
seconds. In case of power brownouts/spikes - genset won't start even if
its >5 seconds. 

> > Starting genset is a minor price to pay for assurance that your stuff
> > is operating properly *at the moment of the outage* and UPS batteries
> > won't be unnecessarily drained.
> 
> That very well may be, but it's also unnecessary wear on the engine and
> starter if you're starting it every time the grid blips.
If you are testing it every month anyway, what's another (say) once a year
squirrel-tripped startup on your wear & tear?

> > Besides, no ATS will run genset for 2-3 minutes, they all have "30
> > minute minimum" and then "spindown" time.
> 
> I typically have the minimum around half that time.  Either way, it's
> hysteresis; you flip on the genset after every blip, I tend to wait and
> make reasonably sure it'll be out for a while.  You run it for a half
> hour after starting it, I run it for about 15.
> 
> *plonk* me if you like, I am willing to bet my gensets require far less
> maintenance than yours, based simply on the assumption that mine start
> up far less often than yours.
Possibly. Better to pay maintenance than risk anything :) Here, "minor
maintenance" is done every 3 months.


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