Copyright Infringement

By Steven McFadyen on 10/7/2013 3:34 PM

myElectrical does not support or promote the use of copyrighted material without the copyright owner's consent.

If you believe that material for which you own the copyright right has been po... read more..


Motor Insulation

By Steven McFadyen on 3/28/2012 1:02 PM

Insulation on a motor prevents interconnection of windings and the winding to earth.  When looking at motors, it is important to understand how the insulation functions and its practical applicatio... read more..


How to Calculate Motor Starting Time

By Steven McFadyen on 11/15/2011 2:00 PM

Request to look at induction motor starting time have come up a few times on the site. Hopefully in this post, I give you guys some idea on how to calculate this. Failing that, hopefully at least som... read more..


What is LED?

By Dan Ryan on 9/14/2013 8:06 AM

Light Emitting Diodes (LED ) are increasing gaining favour in both the domestic and commercial sectors; due to their efficiency, sustainability and durability.  LED are semiconductor devi... read more..


Maxwell's Equations - Introduction

By Steven McFadyen on 9/4/2013 2:33 PM

Maxwell's Equations are a set of fundamental relationships, which govern how electric and magnetic fields interact. The equations explain how these fields are generated and interact with each other, ... read more..


Control Theory

By Steven McFadyen on 3/29/2012 10:18 PM

Control theory looks at how systems work and are controlled from a mathematical view.  This note gives a brief introduction to some of the concepts – more of a notepad of concepts really, whi... read more..


Large Hadron Collider

By Steven McFadyen on 3/31/2010 6:49 AM

The 27 km, Euro 6 billion  Collider lies on the border between France and Switzerland, took nearly 30 years to complete.  Some of the lofty goals for the collider include the search for and... read more..


Harmonised Cable Codes and Colours

By Steven McFadyen on 8/28/2013 2:17 PM

Within Europe the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) has standardised the both the designation and colour of cables.   These are published in CENELEC document... read more..


Fault Calculation - Per Unit System

By Steven McFadyen on 3/27/2013 12:54 PM

Per unit fault calculations is a method whereby system impedances and quantities are normalised across different voltage levels to a common base.  By removing the impact of varying voltages, the... read more..


UPS - Uninterruptible Power Supply

By Steven McFadyen on 8/21/2013 3:21 PM

A UPS is an uninterruptible power supply.  It is a device which maintains a continuous supply of electrical power, even in the event of failure of the mains (utility) supply.  A UPS is inst... read more..


ANSI (IEEE) Protective Device Numbering

By Steven McFadyen on 3/22/2012 11:40 AM

The widely used United Sates standard ANSI/IEEE C37.2 'Electrical Power System Device Function Numbers, Acronyms, and Contact Designations' deals with protective device function numbering and acronyms. ... read more..


International System of Units (SI System)

By Steven McFadyen on 4/9/2012 1:47 PM

The International System of Units (abbreviated SI) is the world's most widely used system of units.  The system consists of a set of units and prefixes. read more..




Paths of Flight

GE have put together a time-lapse video shown flight take-off and landings at some airports. An interesting view:

Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC)

Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) is the study of coordinating electromagnetic fields give off equipment, with the withstand (compatibility) of other...

Fault Calculation - Symmetrical Components

For unbalance conditions the calculation of fault currents is more complex. One method of dealing with this is symmetrical components. Using symmetrical...

IEEE Winds of Change

IEEE TV has a part series of videos on wind power and it's implication. For a really good overview to the technologies and issues around wind power, these...

What does N+1 mean?

The term 'N+1' relates to redundancy and simply means that if you required 'N' items of equipment for something to work, you would have one additional...

Lighting - Lamps

Lamps are the essential part of any luminaire. These are the light generating components. Since the advent of electrical lighting in the middle of the...

Smarter Electrical Distribution

The other day I came across an article in Technology Review on the development of a smart transformer. A professor at North Carolina State University is...

Michael Faraday (the father of electrical engineering)

Famed English chemist and physicist Michael Faraday was born on September 22, 1791, in Newington Butts, a suburb of Surrey just south of the London Bridge...

Cable Sizing Software

When sizing cables nearly, everyone uses some form of software. This ranges from homespun spreadsheets to complex network analyses software. Each has its...

1,000 kV UHV First for China

At the beginning of the year China put the world's first 1,000 kV UHV transmission system into operation. Transmitting power at over a million volts is...

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