How to choose the correct voltage regulator? How to choose a voltage regulator for a refrigerator, gas boiler, computer?

Analyzing the current state of electric grids in Russia, you can understand that they have one common parameter. It concerns the deviation from the nominal voltage figure of 220 volts. Sometimes this value deviates by 10-15 percent, both in the positive and in the negative direction. Of course, electrical appliances, and especially expensive refrigerators and computers, are at risk of failing. But how to be? There is an exit. In order to protect the devices from emergency loads, a voltage regulator 220V for the house is purchased. How to choose it, and what it is - read on in our article.

Appointment

Before choosing a voltage regulator, you need to understand what it is for. And this device serves to protect household electric appliances from various kinds of current surges, as well as other disturbances, including impulse ones. That is, a device like a voltage regulator (we will help you choose it right now), is a reliable defender, a kind of "iron shield" for your home or dacha. Thanks to the normalization of the current, it will protect electrical appliances from fluctuations, thereby prolonging their life.

On the need to purchase a device

Before installing this unit, you should take measurements of your work network and determine the need to purchase such a device. Before choosing a voltage regulator for a private house, it is recommended to make several measurements of the maximum current consumption throughout the day. Perhaps you do not need to buy such a device.

But how do you determine how much current is consumed in the house right now? To do this, use measuring devices such as True RMS. Due to the received data, you can determine with high accuracy what voltage is applied at any given time.

Now about the results. If the unit showed a value between zero and phase on the order of 205-235 volts, the stabilizer setting is only required for added safety (for example, to protect highly sensitive devices). That is, these values are normal for all modern electrical appliances.

The situation with deviations of about 10 percent in the positive and negative side is a little different. When the instrument shows values from 198 to 235 Volts, the stabilizer setting is recommended for all current consumers.

Critical Deviations

The critical value is from 187 to 242 and more volts. In this case, the devices are seriously at risk, respectively, to protect them should use a voltage regulator 220V for the house. How to choose this device, we will consider below.

Single-phase or three-phase?

First of all, we note that all devices are divided into two groups and can be:

• Single-phase;
• Three-phase.

How to choose a voltage regulator for a private house of the right type? Everything is very simple. For example, if the apartment uses only 1-phase voltage, hence, here it is necessary to buy 1-phase devices.

In the case where the house has 3-phase input, and there is air conditioning or other equipment with electric motors (pumps including), the best for such a room will be a 3-phase stabilizer.

Let's consider one more situation. For example, when 3-phase voltage is applied to the house, but you do not have the use of such devices (they are all 1-phase, that is, household ones), there is an opportunity for optimization. Here it is necessary to analyze how the load is distributed between phases.

What if each of the three is loaded equally and has important consumers of current? Then it is necessary to install three 1-phase stabilizers with the same power. You can go another way. If it is possible to concentrate the main current consumers in 1 or 2 phases, the remaining groups of electrical appliances are connected directly to the network.

Types

Before choosing a voltage regulator, consider its types. All these devices can be divided into several types:

• Relay.
• Electromechanical (they are also called servo motors).
• Triac.
• Thyristor.
• Double conversion.

Relay

The first type is a product, the algorithm of which is to switch windings of a step-type transformer type by means of a relay. This is probably the cheapest option for equipment with an input current range of about 100-290 volts and high speed. However, the contact group of the relay can be considered as a significant drawback of this. It is this part that most often breaks down and thus can give an error when switching windings to 20 volts. In addition, if a welding machine is connected to the line, the probability of failure of the relay significantly increases. For a general purpose (one appliance for the whole house) they are hardly suitable. However, as an individual stabilizer (only for a TV, for example) - a very good option.

Electromechanical

The second type of equipment works by moving special brushes along the winding of the transformer. At cost, they refer to the budget option. Also electromechanical stabilizers work on the motor without distortion of the sinusoid. This allows you to maintain simple maintenance, accurate output voltage, as well as smooth tuning. The main disadvantage of this equipment is the need for frequent replacement of carbon brushes and cleaning of the transformer. However, you can do all these operations without the help of specialists.

Triacs

Thyristors, like triac products, operate by automatically switching sections of the transformer through power switches. Such equipment is somewhat reminiscent of relay design. However, unlike their counterparts, triac stabilizers have a small error in tuning (no more than 5 percent) and a large number of stabilization steps.

The disadvantage of this type of device is the sensitivity to heat transfer, which requires forced cooling of power switches. Also a significant disadvantage is their high price, so these devices are less popular than the first two.

Double Conversion

This is an excellent voltage regulator for the refrigerator. How to choose it, we will consider in the next section. The equipment of double conversion is recommended to be used for the most sensitive to the voltage drops consumers current capacity of 1-30 kilowatts. These stabilizers are characterized by complete suppression of external noise and are characterized by silent operation. The error is not more than 1 percent at the output. Also, the double conversion equipment has a large input voltage range (from 118 to 300 volts). At cost they are more similar to triac analogues. However, the reliability and quality of work, they exceed them at times.

We select the apparatus by power

How to choose a voltage regulator depending on the power of household appliances? To do this, calculate the total load consumed by your refrigerator, washing machine, computer and other devices. This information can be found in the technical data sheet for the device or in the operating instructions. Sometimes the manufacturer makes a sticker on the back of the product, which indicates the maximum power consumption (on monitors, for example). This value is designated by the letter W.

When calculating the power , attention should also be paid to the starting value. For example, for devices in whose construction electric motors are provided, special multiplicity factors are used to calculate such values. For each line of instruments, they are different. For example, for a refrigerator it is 5 and 10 for new and old models respectively. The conditioner has multiplicity factors from 2 to 35. The washing machine is from 3 to 5. The microwave oven and the puncher are of the order of 3. To calculate the power consumption, multiply the coefficient by the nominal data. For example, if the old refrigerator has a capacity of 100 watts, at the time of starting the engine, it will consume 1000 watts. By the way, for these devices this factor is most important, because the launch time can last up to 1-2 seconds, and this is a relatively large load on the network.

What else to consider before choosing a voltage regulator?

Also, when calculating the total power of the devices, it is important to consider how much they can work synchronously. If some devices are not switched on at the same time, the total power will be an order of magnitude smaller. Consider the fact that all stabilizers should have a power reserve of at least 20 percent.

In any case, it is difficult to guess what other electrical appliances will appear in your house after the purchase of this device. Therefore, the larger the stock, the better. Moreover, all devices have become more powerful and powerful lately. That there is one refrigerator!

Often, the voltage regulator for a refrigerator (how to choose it, read further) is normalized in power at an input voltage of 220 volts. The main parameter for it is the maximum input current, which is measured in Amps. Most often, the product of this voltage at the peak input of the stabilizer is the maximum value of the input power.

For example, we have a "Guarantor СН7000" - a voltage stabilizer 220V for the house. How to choose and find out if it is suitable for our premises? According to its characteristics, it has a peak power of 7000 W with an input value of 220 volts. The input current is 32 Amps. That is, at a voltage of 150 volts, the maximum load power will be 4800 watts. Thus, the stabilizer is designed for a load not exceeding the above value. This is enough for 200 Watt lighting, a refrigerator for 1000 watts, a washing machine (2300 W) and an electric kettle for 1200 watts.

How to choose a voltage regulator for a summer residence and an apartment?

We need to calculate the power of the stabilizer for a room where a TV, refrigerator, air conditioning, computer and lighting with a capacity of 100, 200, 1500, 170 and 300 watts are used, respectively. Here it should be taken into account that the second and third devices consume an order of magnitude more current than in the usual mode of operation (we do not forget about multiplicity factors). So our calculation will look like this: 100 + 1500 * 2 + 200 * 5 + 170 + 300, where we get 4.57 kW in total. In addition to the above devices, the kettle, iron and vacuum cleaner can additionally be connected. Thus, the load can grow by as much as 1000 watts and even more.

Depending on what devices are located in your apartment or in the country, add or subtract some of them. This will help to determine how powerful your defender should be from current surges.

By the same principle, voltage regulators for gas boilers are purchased . How to choose them? Now modern boilers consume more energy than before, since most of them are equipped with circulating pumps. They take about 130-150 watts in power. Accordingly, this value should be added to the figure obtained (we have 4.57 kW), as a result, the device should have a power of up to 5-6 kW (do not forget about the power reserve of 20-30 percent!). Of course, you can buy a cheaper option. However, in this case, without a power reserve, you have to manually turn off certain devices, for example, not to burn the voltage regulator for the computer. How to choose it, we already found out. The main thing is not to lose power and not to forget about the coefficients.

Conclusion

Now you know how to choose a voltage regulator for a boiler, TV, refrigerator and other electrical appliances. Such a device is very expensive, but sometimes its use is simply necessary. For example, in cases where the voltage is so low that the devices simply can not start without the presence of this element. You should not save on buying this device if you have expensive electrical equipment in your home. On this question, how to choose a voltage regulator for the house, can be considered closed.