Outram power-quality analyser revolutionises on-site detection of power-losses for PQE Ltd

Key Facts:

  • Enhances field measurements of power quality and on-site detection of power losses for trouble-shooting specialist, PQE Ltd
  • Automatic download to USB memory-stick provides unlimited memory capacity and eliminates the need to take a laptop on-site
  • Industry-leading power-quality analyser captures IEEE 1459 and IEEE 100 parameters to support customer energy-reduction initiatives

Outram Research Ltd – a specialist manufacturer of leading-edge data-loggers – has revolutionised the way in which global power-loss trouble-shooter, PQE Ltd, takes on-site measurements which enable commercial and industrial customers to reduce energy costs by identifying power losses in their electricity supply.

PQE Ltd provides customers world-wide with a power correction service which requires them to locate and identify power losses and disturbances which increase energy usage and costs. The recent introduction of Outram Research’s latest power-quality analyser has enhanced and simplified the way in which PQE Ltd carries out on-site measurements of harmonic distortion, supply interruptions and load-profiles.l

Harold Birtwistle, Managing Director, PQE Ltd., commented; “Outram’s Ranger PM7000 out-performs all of our previous recording equipment. It enables us to measure harmonic distortion in its totality as well as individual harmonic currents and voltages in KWs, KVAr and KVA, and also power factor, voltage dips, sags, spikes and flicker. The great beauty is that it measures these parameters simultaneously and it has a prodigious memory. This means that it doesn’t have to be downloaded before it is used again and saves all the trouble of taking a laptop to site to prevent new recordings overwriting old data.”

“Most recorders will catch spikes when they create over-voltages, but catching these is dependent on when they hit the sine wave and whether their polarity is the same as that of the waveform. If a spike’s polarity is opposite to that of the sine wave, the resulting voltage is the difference between the two, so there is no overvoltage and the events will not be detected by a run of the mill recorder”, explained Harold, “However, the Ranger’s high-speed recording process looks for and captures distortion over all of the waveform and it has revolutionised the results we get. Recordings can be used to confirm a site’s compliance (or otherwise) with the harmonic distortion limits stipulated in engineering recommendation G5/4.

John Outram, Managing Director of Outram Research, explained further; “Our units offer three sampling speeds from 19.2 k to 153.6 k to 1.23 M Samples per Second. We have designed the PM7000 to make data management and analysis easier. Not only do we capture the distortions at any part of the cycle but we identify and then rank them in order of severity, discarding the least interesting as more are captured. This eliminates the laborious and reiterative process of manually setting thresholds and during analysis users can go straight from one disturbance to the next.

The market-leading Ranger PM7000 power-quality analyser is the industry’s only Cat IV 600V Phase A-powered analyser and offers the most comprehensive range of power quality measurements of any instrument in its class. The recent addition of USB compatibility allows data to be downloaded automatically onto a USB memory-stick for offline analysis, in practice giving the user the benefit of virtually unlimited memory combined with fast, convenient data retrieval which requires no skill or special training” explained John Outram.

Released in January 2009, the latest version, of the Ranger PM7000 captures data to IEEE 1459 and IEEE 100 parameters which will provide PQE with an improved measurement tool to correctly size power factor correction capacitors. The Ranger PM7000 also measures parameters to the IEC61000-4-30 standard, including harmonics and interharmonics to IEC61000-4-7, and flicker to IEC61000-4-15. The IEEE standard 1459 is an emerging standard that defines more effective ways of measuring the parameters which provide detailed information on power consumed due to losses caused by imperfections in the sinusoidal waveforms of the current and voltage

Harold concluded; “We are so impressed with the product, and with the back-up we received from Outram Research, that we have already purchased a second Ranger PM7000”.

PQE Ltd is a private limited company which designs, manufactures and installs power factor correction equipment and harmonic filters. The company has operated since 1998, but senior employees have more than 40 years experience in the products mentioned above. We supply countries worldwide including Europe, Middle East, Asia and Africa. In addition, PQE Ltd provides site measurements of harmonic distortion, supply interruptions, load profiling and electrical problem troubleshooting at customer premises.

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For further information, please contact:

Valerie Outram, Outram Research Ltd
Tel: +44 1243 573050
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