Posted by Sherman in Idaho [72.47.153.105] on Monday, January 13, 2014 at 23:10:45 :
In Reply to: Re: OT......Is there a electrician in the house posted by John Eickhof [98.255.230.52] on Monday, January 13, 2014 at 22:33:10 :
For what it might be worth to anyone, all common AC wire is legal for use at up to 600 V. That means you can run 480 through it. Most power transformers in the 1KW and up range are wired for 120/240/480 depending on how you connect the taps. If a guy is going to put a transformer at each end in order to minimize voltage drop through a long wire, he might as well go 480 rather than 240 and get twice the power for no extra cost. Also with a transformer on the downstream end, you can have a local ground and avoid ground loops, and your 120 V loads are automatically balanced from the point of view of the high voltage line in, which then only needs 2 wires rather than 3 (or 4). Lots of advantages to appropriate use of transformers.
But for the electric gate, I'm saying solar.