Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

From the department of vague notions and half baked ideas...

I think some data is sent over the power system. Perhaps it's got something to do with that.

I seem to remember a thread from a different life to do with people's modems getting upset by the switching from peak to off peak power.

Or something.

And...

Wouldn't any power supply for LEDs have a capacitor in place as part of a rectifier to smooth out the transition from AC to DC?

Keep in mind I have no idea what I'm talking about.

Thanks BullwinkleII, your idea is more than likely correct. It must have something to do with switching from off peak to peak because it always happens at around the same time when it switches from off peak to peak or the other way around.

Just make sure you re-read that last line

Hey that's coming back to my idea except the high frequency signal is travelling down the power line from the power company. A might figure this out yet !

Mac, is it just a bulb or a hard-wired unit of some sort? If a bulb, swap it with another and see if it acts the same in the new location... At least then you may narrow down to a single unit and/or bulb issue or a whole house power conditioning issue.

If you have one of those plug in ?power meters (the ones that show volts amps and hertz) Check what your household power is doing at the time it starts to flicker.

I love the electronics section.

Among normal people, the story might end something like "I have no idea, just put a bucket under the drip, or empty a tube of silicon onto it. Anyway drips are our friend, drips are for planting mint under."

Everyone here seems to enjoy problems more than healthy folk

I planted nasturtiums under my drips. I have had led tubes in my fluorescent fixture for bout 27 hours now. I wonder what old happen if you installed one of those power conditioners that are used for high end av equipment was installed to filter out the noise?

That's a good idea Fishbits... only trouble is that it's a LED tube that is quite expensive and I only have one. Plus it's the only fitting in the house so I can't test the tube somewhere else or swap it.

But that it a good point you have made... it could be a faulty LED light but it still raises the question of why only at a specific time does it flicker.

Like a voltmeter? I have one but I'm worried about mucking around with the power box.

This is an interesting idea.

I think Sleepe is talking about something different.

Sticking things into power sockets tends to make you get all dead.

You Aussies and your 220v power... 110 is so much less deadly. That is not to say I have not fixed 220 issues in my house. But it is nice to not have to have a paid electrician do everything short of pluging in appliances and vacuum cleaners.

One of these http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=MS6115

Edit although I don't have real concerns about sticking the multimeter probes in a socket

You can buy those in Coles too.
That's where I got mine.
They are in with the light bulbs etc.


Ahhh, you Americans and your inferior, lossy, inefficient power distribution. Thinking you are better.
Lower voltage means higher current to get the same power.
I would prefer lower current any day.
110v is just as deadly.
And we use 230v by the way, used to be 240v but we dropped 10v for the fun of it.

Next you'll try telling us NTSC is better than PAL