[ICanHas]

Originally Posted by mejunkhound

What is your agenda ?

What product are you pitching? What is the company? What is your shareholder stake?

I'm not pitching anything. On the other hand, I am not sure about user(s) who advocate and even misrepresent stuff in a hope of getting digital software based stuff specified by claiming its a "must".

Do you REALLY believe that big, heavy, costly to produce (both in $$ and environmental first costs), and lossy passive components (LRC) are more effective than power electronics?

More effective at what? There are many applications where passive components are more practical, tough and resilient and dwarfs the often proprietary and fragile power electronics. I do find that power electronics are over specified and completely overlooking their shortcomings.

Semiconductor manufacturing and low environmental cost do not belong together in same sentence. It is the most diverse industry in terms of plethora of extremely toxic chemicals as well as environmentally hazardous stuff. You need to allocate spills and accidental releases into first environmental cost of products.

Here are some semiconductor industry chemicals:
deadly stuff...
Concentrated HF(hydrofluoric acid is the deadliest industrial acid..), arsine gas, phosphine gas, potassium cyanide,silicon tetrachloride,

harmful stuff...
trichloroethylene, tungsten hexafluoride, beryllium oxide, various arsenic, selenium, tellurium, cadmium compounds, , SF6, WF6. Oh and guess which industry used CFC 113 and methyl chloroform LIBERALLY?


Glass is more wear resistant and practically immune from corrosion than both metal and plastic. Yet... Product damage loss per truck load is much greater for products in glass jars than metal cans. The hospitality industry has substantially more expenses in damaged glass and Chinaware than plastic and metal. Why do you suppose that is?

Hint: Failure proneness of power electronics is analogous to glassware/Chinaware. Glassware and power electronics are very delicate and fragile against inevitable roughness and bumps of the real world. Resilience and toughness are very important in the real world.

Last time I used a RLC filter for harmonics reduction was in the 1980s!

Don't worry, they're still very much in use. Tuned filters, line reactor. Ironically, they're generally used to clean up after the mess created by power electronics.

Ever since the invention of MOSFETS and IGBTs, power electronics are more cost effective and environmentally sound than passive components.

I've had quite a few power adapters fail. Of course, they were all switching type that contains POWER ELECTRONICS. ECM HVAC motors see absurd failure rates in the field. Drive failures in he washers is more common than the "motor burning out", inverter microwave? absurdly high failure rates. power supplies in monitors/TVs frying? usually power electronics. Things likely to have power surge related insurance claims? of course they contain POWER ELECTRONICS.

Pinch wires and crowbar the output of a power inverter or a motor drive? Wrong voltage? Pop crack poof!. Generally consumer market power electronics is a total loss at this point. What gets fried more often, electronic-free condenser fan motor or the power electronics stradded ECM? Of course the latter.

Folks who tout misinformation as IcanHas seems to be doing are to me in the same category as those snake charmers who sell overpriced silver plated wire and vacuum tube amplifiers to ignorant audio afficianados.

Most people know that glass will shatter when dropped or bumped in day to day handling.

There's nowhere near as much penetration of knowledge about power electronics and folks tout power electronics like something of modern days and people are generally unaware of their lack of resilience. This dark side is often omitted.

Sure, power electronics don't "wear", but which of this happens more often? A regular light switch suddenly failing or a dimmer getting stuck on maximum setting (shorted power electronics)? That's right, power electronics can't even take the surge current from when the light bulb goes out.

Currently have a patent in process for a 99.9% efficient solar power tracker.

What's your point? Patent is an administrative process of submitting some paperwork to the patents office. Even those magnets that clip onto fuel line promising mileage gain have issued patents, which says a lot that simply having a patent doesn't necessarily mean squat. It is not subject to validation unless you're trying to patent a perpetual motion machine. What is the point of bringing this other than trying to show off?

That level of efficiency cannot even be dreamt of with passive components.

The available surge and fault current available from photovoltaic is a wagon drawn through a rubber band by a couple of hampsters compared to the grid which easily have a fault current of 10,000A or more.

How much money did you save over a 90% efficient resilient passive technology when there's a transient surge or a mishap and the power electronic component goes poof and you have to buy it again? Those embedded systems power electronics up the wazoo indoor fan ECM motors are a real problem in real life. When it needs service, because of unreasonably fragile power electronics based design goes poof, it pretty much wipes out any chance of saving any money. What about the " carbon foot print" from vehicle that had to drive to your house for the service call? You've got to penalize that against the benefit.

Passive components can take quite a bit of hits and bumps in the real life while power electronics are extremely fragile like a glass wheel that will instantly obliterate from hitting a pothole. What are you going to do? include a warning that wheel with obliterate, therefore do not hit potholes?