Rick's b.log - entry 2022/07/13

Holy crap!

Scorchio!

It wasn't actually that hot, it was "only" 36°C. The car's sensor seems to be able two degrees over. It was the same in the freezing weather. -2 outside and my car said it was zero.

The forecast is for it to be epically colder tomorrow, according to AccuWeather. "A mere 29°C". It's supposed to be 15°C tonight, and 13°C tomorrow night, so yay, I can leave the window open to cool the bedroom a little. It's kind of hard to sleep with too much heat.
According to Météo France, which mostly agrees with Accu up to this point, it's supposed to be milder (say, 28-32) until Monday which will be scorchio like today, and then breaking on Tuesday with thunderstorms.
Accu, on the other hand, currently thinks that it'll continue in the high 20s to mid 30s until nearly the end of the month, and then come down. But, then, they did also forecast a few days ago that Saturday would be 37°C and Sunday 39...

Impulse buy

I now have a fan!

It was something like €25 and flying off the shelves. Actually, people were opting to pay slightly less for the 23cm model, but I knew the amount of air shifted depends upon the size of the blades, so I decided to go for the 30cm model.
It doesn't cool the air, but it should help cool you by pushing air over you in order to assist perspiration. If you're sitting there grumbling in still air, sweat pouring off of you, of course you're going to feel bad.
But if you can get all of that to evaporate, then you'll feel cooler and better even though the air temperature hasn't actually changed.

It's on the desk behind the Pi blasting mid-speed air at me. I was on high setting, but started to get goosebumps.
Yes. I sat down half an hour ago and wolfed down an entire tub of ice cream because it was so hot. And in the same room, I have goosebumps. All because I took the air and flung it at myself.

Given how these things were flying off the shelves, I think loads of other people saw the forecast and were like "sod it, I'm having one of those". That was pretty much my thinking too. Well, I'll have to be honest, my first thought was in French - Tabarnak! C'est trop chaud!.

Fridge - the next day

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Zerosquare, 13th July 2022, 21:18

> Tabarnak!    Did you learn French in Québec? :)

Rick, 13th July 2022, 21:22

Mom was from the other side of the ocean.    So, I'm a Brit who learned French by *reading* it and talking with somebody who originally learnt Québécois.    It's a wonder any of the Frenchies understand a word I say! Moi, je parle comme une vache espagnol...

J.G.Harston, 14th July 2022, 00:19

I'm told I speak Japanese with a noticable Yorkshire accent.... ee bai gum des ka?

C Ferrls, 14th July 2022, 12:41

With Ref to Fridge Freezer controllers - how does Rick's timer compare with the Temp controller for energy usage?

Rick, 14th July 2022, 14:07

For me, that is an irrelevant question. The primary goal of a temperature controller, mechanical or electronic, is to regulate the fridge (or freezer) to a specific temperature to prevent the food within from perishing or becoming bacterially contaminated to an unhealthy degree.  Assuming they both regulate within roughly the same parameters, electricity consumption should be more or less equal, though this will be near impossible to practically measure as, for instance, my fridge is running a lot more at the moment when it is 22.7°C in the kitchen, as opposed to the winter when it might be a mere 5°C in here.    The way to reduce energy consumption of a fridge or freezer is not to change the controller, but to change the unit itself. For one that is better insulted, more efficient, etc etc.  When the fridge is on, it draws about 180VA. It is rated B on the efficiency scale (the older one with all the A+++ and such) and it is quoted as using 190kWh in a year (which means ~€45ish per year, or ~€3,75 a month).    For me, the way to "save money" is to buy a new fridge with a better rating, but then is it better to pay something upwards of €300 for a new model, or just carry on paying a hundredth of that per month for the current unit, bearing in mind any new fridge will also be using electricity...?

Rick, 14th July 2022, 14:22

If you're asking about the electronic controller itself, probably near negligible if using something like an ESP8266-01 module, where the maximum power consumption is 170mA for a 802.11b transmission (less for more modern standards). Light sleep with WiFi active can be 15mA, and light sleep without any WiFi can go as low as 0.9mA. There's also a 10µA deep sleep...  All in all, when matched to a low power 3.3V power supply, whatever it adds is going to be barely noticed over the noise (changes in ambient temperature, the internal light, etc).

David Pilling, 14th July 2022, 15:16

A full fridge uses less energy than an empty one... put your fridge somewhere cold, down in the cellar, out in the barn. I can't work it out, but how much the temperature goes up and down may translate to efficiency, so the trigger points of the thermostat may matter.

David Pilling, 14th July 2022, 16:17

Between the last comment and now, I have found myself in a small room with an "air conditioner" running - that's a small room with no open windows and no external vent for the air con. The Thermodynamics 101 point about a fridge with an open door not making the room colder not got.

Rick, 14th July 2022, 17:16

The problem with the open door example is that the cold part and the hot part are in the same location, that room.  If it were possible to add a longer pipe and put the compressor and radiator elsewhere... you'll have just invented air conditioning. That's why the box is outside. ;)

J.G.Harston, 14th July 2022, 21:03

The best fridge thermodynamically is a box with a lid on it, so when you open the lid the cold air doesn't fall out. Unfortunately, that means you need to keep an infinitely tall column of space unoccupied above it so you can open the lid. I prefer to absorb the reduced efficency of the cold air falling out of the front door when I open it for the convenience of being able to use the space above the fridge.

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