Steven McFadyen's Articles

Steven is a Chartered electrical engineering consultant with considerable experience on major internationally recognised and award winning projects in Europe, South East Asia, and the Middle East. His expertise has been called on for numerous technically challenging projects in power systems, airports, rail, mining, pharmaceutical, datacentre, and other industries.



Write your best report

Years ago I was told that you should always try to write the best report you can.  Many years later I still think on this as one of the better pieces of...

ANSI (IEEE) Protective Device Numbering

The widely used United Sates standard ANSI/IEEE C37.2 'Electrical Power System Device Function Numbers, Acronyms, and Contact Designations' deals with...

Cost Performance and Time

Often us engineers get so bogged down in equations, using software, producing drawings and writing specifications that this becomes the sole focus.   ...

Dielectric loss in cables

Dielectrics (insulating materials for example) when subjected to a varying electric field, will have some energy loss.   The varying electric field causes...

Capacitors - Energy Storage Application

Capacitors have numerous applications in electrical and electronic applications.  This note examines the use of capacitors to store electrical energy....

E-Ink

Before the technical, some general information. E-ink display are found in a lot of e-readers, some mobile phones and similar devices and the intent is...

myElectrical - Cable Sizing Tool Upgrade

Our IEE cable sizing was wrote a few years ago and had become rough around the edges. I thought it was time to give the tool a service. Unfortunately when...

The dc resistance of conductors

This is the first of two posts on the resistance of conductors. In the next post I will look at the ac resistance, including skin effect and we deal with...

What are you reading!

Reading is a bit of a hobby of mine and I"ve done a few off-topic posts in the past on this. Rather than continue doing the occasional post I thought ...

9 power supply issues solved by using a UPS

Installation of a UPS can help in reducing problems due to issues with the power supply.  A lot of people relate this to nine key issues.  Depending on...

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