Washing machine

Re: Washing machine

You can still buy a gasoline powered ringer machine from Lehmans. http://www.lehmans.com/store/Appliances___Practical_Appliances___Electric_Appliances___Home_Queen_Wringer_Washer___32901100?Args=

Uses no electricity at all.

Tony

Re: Washing machine

I have a pretty basic model top-loader that's six years old, and I couldn't find any notes in my "power book" from when I measured everything else. But I know I put the washer on the KaW and it wasn't very high overall. I also have a Fluke clamp-on meter, if I can remember that long I'll run the washer tonight and see what that says. I'm now curious to find out myself...

Re: Washing machine

Okay, made some measurements. This is a GE basic unit, has electromechanical controls instead of fancy electronics. Washed some towels with "large" load setting. Current measurements were with a Fluke clamp meter, everything else from the KaW.

Off draw is zero, let's hear it for old fashioned controls!

The timer and whatever other controls pulled 0.01A. With the fill valve open, total draw was 0.05A, or 3W/5VA 0.67PF on the KaW.

Agitating - peak startup surge (stopped/started a few times) was around 8.5A, running fluctuated between 2.8 and 4.2A. KaW said 420-480W, 0.96PF.

The drain / spin cycle is two steps.

First step, just pumping out water, had no noticeable surge and pulled only 1.23A, dropping to 1.1A once most of the water was gone. PF stank - KaW said 71W/156VA and 0.45PF!

Second step, spin, surged all the way to 12.8A and held there for several seconds while the drum got moving. Then the current settled down to 3.33A the rest of the run. KaW said 374W/431VA 0.86PF.

So, at least with mine, I'd need an inverter to be able to deliver 1548W for several seconds - twice per wash too, two drain cycles.

Re: Washing machine

JeffMilo wrote: »

Speed Queen has a 1/2 hp motor and doubt it's slow start type. Can you tell me what size motor your GE model had and what model it was as well as any other relevent info and or opinion? Possibly yours was a 1/3 hp. Many were I think.

Haven't been to the forum for a few days...

My washer is (still using it!) a GE WDSR2080. No idea on the motor size, it's crammed into a tiny nook and a pain to pull out!

The capacitor you are talking about is called a "hard start capacitor" or "hard start kit". At one time I talked with some of the HVAC techs I work with about them, considering one for the fridge. I never really got a clear understanding of just what happens with them, the name alone makes me think I'm "hurting" the motor! Not sure that's true though. I wound up not bothering, as I went with an inverter that was plenty big enough to start the fridge.

I don't think a hard-start cap would do the job for the washer though, as it isn't a momentary / couple seconds surge. The very high current for the washer is the motor getting the drum to spin up from a standstill to extraction speed as fast as possible, which simply takes a lot of energy and takes many seconds. I've been running the washer on my inverter lately, even drawing from battery (a new bank of 8 L16s) with little/no sun input the system has no problem at all with the washer. Never tried it with the EU2000i, had no need.

Re: Washing machine

RandomJoe wrote: »

My washer is (still using it!) a GE WDSR2080.
<snip>
I don't think a hard-start cap would do the job for the washer though, as it isn't a momentary / couple seconds surge. The very high current for the washer is the motor getting the drum to spin up from a standstill to extraction speed as fast as possible, which simply takes a lot of energy and takes many seconds.

I can't speak for your GE washer, but regarding the Speed Queen the current draw while the drum gets up to speed is indeed greater than when it is up to extraction speed, but only by a couple of hundred watts. However there is a momentary (fraction of a second) startup surge that is much larger (too large for the Honda to handle if its eco-throttle is turned on).

Here's what I do about it: (file this under stupid eco-throttle tricks)

1) start generator with eco-throttle on.

2) start washer, with lid up. It will fill with the lid up, but it will not start the agitation cycle with lid up.

3) when washer is full, use the Mate (conveniently located in laundry room) to drop the AC (generator), and then immediately use the AC. There is a 10 second delay while the inverter qualifies the AC. At nine seconds I close the lid on the washer and it begins to agitate (on battery-inverter power). One second later the AC is qualified and the generator picks up the load.

The generator has no trouble picking up the several hundred watt load with its eco-throttle turned on. This process must be repeated for each agitation and spin cycle. You are correct that the spin cycle draws more current while it is getting up to speed, but this is not the same as the momentary startup surge

By the way, I usually run the washer on the inverter as an opportunity load (batteries full, sun shining). In the event that I need to run the generator to bulk up the batteries, I will often do a laundry while the generator is running, and that's when I do the eco-throttle trick. If I knew how to put in a starting capacitor, perhaps I could run the laundry unattended with the eco-throttle on.

--vtMaps

Re: Washing machine

My current washer is a Whirlpool WTW4800XQ1. My Kill-A-Watt clone shows a peak draw of 780 watts during the oscillation cycle. This washer also seems to hit that peak right when the "start" button is pushed; I think this might be part of the load balance test when the motor is very briefly engaged.

We used to have a GE energy star washer with a "clutchless" direct drive motor that I could run off of a Sure Sine 300. I think the model of that GE was WPSR3090V0WW although I'm not sure; it would have been made about ten years ago. Unfortunately, these models had reliability problems, which was too bad because it seemed to be an efficient washer.

Re: Washing machine

I realize this is an old thread, but if anyone is still looking for low power washing machines...

We swapped to an LG high efficiency washer and Dryer a few yeqars back and earlier this year I installed a whole house energy monitoring system that can measure loads on individual circuit breakers.

Here is a graph of the electric power used to run one load of laundry through the washer and then the dryer:
Attachment not found.

The max power drawn by the washing machine was ~320 watts, total energy was 130 wh

FWIW the LG high efficiency front load washer supposedly uses less than 14 gallons of water per wash, I haven't measured this yet.

Re: Washing machine

BB. wrote: »

What is your power logging system--Looks interesting. How is it working out for you?

-Bill

Brultech ECM-1240, although the new GEM looks even better.

The ECM-1240 can monitor 7 different loads. The first 2 channels can even tell which direction the power is going, so I use them on my solar array and main breaker, that way I can tell if I'm pushing power to the grid or pulling it. The last channel can be configured to count pulses, so you can use it to monitor a water or gas meter.
I have a webpage up at:
http://www.vanderwal.us/energy/ showing the different things I monitor.

The new GEM by Brultech can monitor 32 channels. Either power, pulses, temperature probes, etc. Pretty cool toys.

FWIW I use an opensource application called btmon.py to pull the data from the ECM-1240 and put it into an RRDtool database (also open source). RRDtool has a lot of neat features including the ability to create the graphs I use.