[BC] UPS hell

[Dale H. Cook]

At 09:50 AM 2/23/2012, Cowboy wrote:

> How do you call something like this a UPS ?

If I had my druthers I would call that (at best) a backup power supply. I would prefer to reserve the term "UPS" for a truly uninterruptable supply, that is, one where the load is always fed from the inverter, and the gel cells are always charging. Unfortunately manufacturers have co-opted the term "UPS" for units that are not uninterruptable, and that always cause at least a very brief interruption in supply to the load whenever the mains fail.

> Sounds like a *really* poor design to me.

It is. Unfortunately I am stuck with them in some locations, and would have to get corporate approval to replace them (1.5 kVA and larger units are not cheap), with the capital for those replacements possibly coming out of that year's already-approved engineering capital expenditures. Replacing the gel cells every three years prevents problems, and is an acceptable maintenance expense to corporate.

Dale H. Cook, Market Chief Engineer, Centennial Broadcasting, Roanoke/Lynchburg, VA
http://plymouthcolony.net/starcityeng/index.html