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From: kwgst@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Filip Gieszczykiewicz)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: central power
Summary: fuses and relays...
Message-ID: <80810@unix.cis.pitt.edu>
Date: 18 Jan 91 06:30:43 GMT
Reply-To: kwgst@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Filip Gieszczykiewicz)
Followup-To: sci.electronics
Organization: pre-med
Lines: 42


	Greetings. I have been reading all these posts about "Home
	Control Systems" (HCS) and how (possibly) dangerous electric
	fileds are (If it's true, I should be dead by now :-)
	Anyways, I was wondering:

	Can I re-wire the house in such a way as to be able to shut
	down unneeded sections of electric outlets, say, for the night.
	We have a decently sane central fuse-box, ie. lots of fuses
	for a lot of circuits. Most of them are used to power things
	like wall clocks, night-lights, etc. 

	Now, my question is:

	Can I put some relays in series with the fuses (most probably
	mount them on a wall, in the cellar) so that I can safely
	control the power in the house? I realize that a relay has to
	be tested under load. I was also thinking of putting in 2
	ralays, in series, for each load - in case one "fuses" up,
	the other can be shut off. 

	This does not mean that I want to shut down all of the house.
	It helps if a refrigirator is left running. Also, how safe
	would this be? I would plan to use 30-40AMP 250V relays
	(probably solid-state) even if the fuse for that circuit
	would be ~10AMPS (we have the resettable variety) We already
	wired the house for intercom as well as stereo-audio, so
	these matters are not above our heads... ;-)

	Any comments?

	I think that the BYTE Home Control System used a similar scheme,
	although I think that the guy used pre-assembled-tested "modules"
	to do the job. 

	Take care. Please use e-mail to reply. Please give a few
	days before sending me a "Me too!" reply :-)
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