1st Dec 2015, 1:29 pm | #141 |
Octode
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, UK.
Posts: 1,522
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Re: Pylons
There will always be a need for STOR, I imagine they will remain all the time they are profitable to the (private) operator.
The biggest benefit to the DNO's is that they do not have the liability of capital investment. Whilst there are several purpose built outfits such as Chris mentioned, a lot of the sets are existing standby sets with control mods to allow mains paralleling. This provides a subsidiary income and is quite a popular scheme (keeps me in gainful employment). Rob.
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1st Dec 2015, 2:43 pm | #142 |
Pentode
Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: Hucknall, Nottinghamshire, UK.
Posts: 223
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Re: Pylons
What an interesting subject, love reading about it. Thanks to all posters..
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1st Dec 2015, 5:01 pm | #143 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Ramsbottom (Nr Bury) Lancs or Bexhill (Nr Hastings) Sussex.
Posts: 5,817
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Re: Pylons
I agree especially for those of us with no direct experience. I've met Mr Capener who has a fascinating job. I did read about a scheme to bring in power from Norway? Iceland? via the Shetlands and into Scotland a year or so ago. Would that still be in the wrong place at the wrong time in terms of central loads?
I suppose electricity from solar generation, particularly in extra ordinarily hot countries, would be a "route" [via DC?] but [like oil] would not be independent of external events. David Attenborough was on News Night BBC2 yesterday, live from the Climate Change Con...ference. He said that i/500,000th of the Sun's energy that falls on the earth daily would be enough to meet our TOTAL planetary energy need. I thought that this was a very striking and clearly put observation. Let hope they were listening. Ironically, DC power distribution [of a quite different kind] is now in vogue again. Re Bill's comment p126* I think Edison was against AC because he didn't understand it and was already invested in his own cumbersome DC " A Power Station On Every Block" local generation system, improved and maintained by a new immigrant to New York called Tesla. Ironically again, it was Tesla to whom the vision of a 3 phase alternating current sytem came while he was reciting the poetry of Goethe to himself. I really can't imagine a poetic Edison, he was a slogger not a visionary [ok not everyone will agree]. I think Seans comment that things don't always proceed in a linear way but that there are socio/economic factors at play as well [p127*] chimes with the Edison story. Speaking of the community aspect anyone into "Pylon Power" might want to take a look at "Power To The People" Transmitted by AC and DC techniques on Tuesday 24/11/15 BBC4. It should be on the I-Player for another 3 weeks or so! Dave W Last edited by dave walsh; 1st Dec 2015 at 5:21 pm. |
9th Dec 2015, 5:02 am | #144 | |
Nonode
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Papamoa Beach, Bay of Plenty, New Zealand
Posts: 2,944
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Re: Pylons
Quote:
That reminds me that our high school physics teacher (mid-1960s) made a similar comment about Edison relative to Tesla. The latter really was a visionary. Whilst AC in and of itself may have been more difficult to understand, three-phase AC seemed to be particularly difficult in the early days. Apparently the initial set of alternators at the Niagara Falls hydro plant were two-phase, since with orthogonal vectors, it was relatively easy to assess the effects of uneven phase loading, but not so with three-phase. The two-phase was converted to three-phase for transmission, since three phase was the most efficient polyphase system for that purpose. It may have been converted back to two-phase at the destination, though. Anyway, as a result of Tesla's vision, the pylons that are the subject of this thread mostly carry triple wire sets. That was something that I found odd when I was very young, when we lived in the midst of a major hydro project, and none of the adults around me could provide a satisfactory answer. Cheers, Last edited by Synchrodyne; 9th Dec 2015 at 5:10 am. |
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10th Dec 2015, 10:45 am | #145 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: St. Frajou, l'Isle en Dodon, Haute Garonne, France.(Previously: Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, UK.)
Posts: 3,183
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Re: Pylons
Hi,
I explained to some friends years ago that the three wires strung up on poles across their land did NOT directly correspond to the three holes in their power sockets! Cheers, Pete.
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9th Feb 2016, 5:00 am | #146 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Worksop, Nottinghamshire, UK.
Posts: 5,553
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Re: Pylons
I have found some more different shapes for us to look at. They are in Derbyshire close to the boundary with south Yorkshire.
Last edited by Refugee; 9th Feb 2016 at 5:15 am. |
9th Feb 2016, 11:19 am | #147 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Oxford, UK.
Posts: 17,846
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Re: Pylons
Nice to see something a bit different. They almost look "foreign".
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9th Feb 2016, 12:54 pm | #148 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Worksop, Nottinghamshire, UK.
Posts: 5,553
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Re: Pylons
The odd thing is that they just appear to be linking several runs of cables on wooden poles.
I can't see any transformers. |
9th Feb 2016, 2:12 pm | #149 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Penrith, Cumbria, UK.
Posts: 3,687
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Re: Pylons
Is this not just a termination tower bringing the cables underground before they resurface elsewhere, such as the other side of another transmission line?
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9th Feb 2016, 3:33 pm | #150 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Worksop, Nottinghamshire, UK.
Posts: 5,553
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Re: Pylons
There are no other transmission lines about. It just looks like a switching station and there is an aerial for remote switching.
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9th Feb 2016, 3:59 pm | #151 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Penrith, Cumbria, UK.
Posts: 3,687
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Re: Pylons
The 33kV lines between Newton Gate, Penrith, and Hutton End transfer at places between towers and poles. Perhaps they were once all towers and just the down-bound termination towers remain?
I understand there is a deliberate change of cabling as the lines enter the sub, i.e: open copper is terminated some distance beyond the sub, which goes on PICAS or XLPE or whatever, so that there is a change in the characteristic impedance. If the line gets struck by lightning, the surge will be reflected (that which isn't handled by the surge-diverters, that is) back and forth between deliberately-mismatched terminations util the surge is dissipated, rather than be carried into the switchgear.
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