Takes me back to 1977, I was an Army Recruiter who was only 6 months away from separation. My bosses didn't really want a short time Army Recruiter in the office since they figured I might just tell the truth to prospects rather then the "approved" sales pitch, so they relieved me with orders to go home and do what ever the hell I wanted to do till I got out! Nice guys those bosses, so I decided not to waste my time setting on a chair watching paint dry, and enrolled in a local trade school to become a mechanic. Thus my introduction to the world of Capacitors! Back then every car engine had a large capacitor under the distributor cap, this, of course was to hold the coil charge till the cap called for it to fire the spark plug. On our test bench, was a small device where you could insert the "Condenser" to test it as part of the troubleshooting of engine problems, since condensers going bad would make a car stop running. The game used to be to take a good condenser to the test bench, charge her up on the test gear and not hit the discharge button, then go to another part of the shop and call another students name, so they would turn and shout CATCH, throwing the charged condenser to them, of course 9 times out of 10 they would catch and instantly discharge a rather large voltage from the big steel encased capacitor. Used to be great fun, of course those days are now long gone thanks to electronic ignitions which were just something we were reading about in our text books.

The brighter the LED the more you save. The Golden colur adds another 5 kW to your energy savings.

I bought four of these and I have calculated that the electric board now owe me £37.53 a week. I’m still waiting for the cheque to arrive despite several phone calls. I will be writing to my local MP next week and if that doesn’t work I will be showing my arse in Burtons window on Tuesday

I ordered a super cheap one of these things a while ago just because I wanted the plugpack enclosure for something else and I thought hey I can take the juicy cap out and maybe use it for something but when I opened the case all I got inside was an LED and 4 resistors and even thought the enclosure was the only thing I actually needed I felt so cheated

I was looking at a used 200 kVA PFR for my mate and they wanted nearly a grand for it, now I can just buy him a few of these and pocket the difference, thanks Clive.

I like when bigclive says "Is that gonna come out " I don't think I've ever not seen him get it to bits.

Energy companies charging for apparent power over real power? Not allowed for residential customers in the USA, although if you are sending back nasty spikes they may send out a letter to warn you that they are going to charge you more if you don't clean up things. Now, for all industrial, some commercial, and other utilities, they charge a base rate of real power, but will charge additional amounts if you are drawing more apparent power in every country. This is done because the substation or switching station has to correct the power factor to protect the station and the generators. It is also done because it can cause damage to transformers, switching gear, etc. to run bad power through them. Especially if there are large current spikes or voltage transients. Imagine the inrush current and then the transients on a whole factory starting up/shutting down, or just a single production line. Or an inductive heating system at a foundry turning one and off over the course of a day. It can easily blow fuses at the substation or melt lines. Plus those pulses come through and effect all of the other customers on that substation. The solution, for many older factories that do not have modern motor drivers that correct the power factor one each circuit, is to place the entire facility on an uninterruptible power supply. The UPS doesn't have to be any larger than what is needed to take care of brownouts and brief power drops (sub 5 seconds). Newer or updated facilities can rely on their motor drivers to filter most of the power for them with 2 very important exceptions: the power for computer based automation and the power for sensing equipment. Both require clean, stable power to work correctly and can easily be damaged by bad power, just like your home electronics. The sensing circuits are even more susceptible to bad power and also need filtration, isolation, and shielding of their power and sensing circuits. I was an industrial electrician in the USA. I am now retired early for medical reasons.

Improve the unit by adding a big wirewound resistor to warm the casing and to blow the occasional fuse. Make sure it's floating around loose to give that unexpected mains tingle.

I just noticed that the HOPI actually *did* briefly show the power factor as 0.002 with a current of about 600mA, but it was intermittent. I guess you weren't looking at it during those brief refresh cycles where it was showing data.

You may scoff but I've ordered 10 of these, just you wait, I'll be saving so much energy the electricity board will be paying me!!

I love that it is rated at 80kW, it's just beautiful. In the same way my buoyancy aid I take canoeing is rated at -2.4 m/s^2 in water of 5C.

Zero hesitation grabbing an ungrounded metal case without checking if it's live. Balls of steel.

Glad you made it through the storm.

I think it is your fourth "power saver", energy bill will be negative xD

It does make a nice colourful voltmeter, which appears to be quite accurate, so it is not totally useless.

It’s the name of the thing that creases me up. 80Kw!! Modern supplies for UK domestic dwellings are rated at 24Kw (100A cutout fuse) , but the suppliers apply diversity: for places that don’t use night storage heaters, 10A per dwelling is taken as the approximate demand that the network needs to supply.

Hey Clive, If you keep your eye on the HOPI for the capacitor test you did you'll see the current go to 0.6 a couple of times for a brief moment (a second or two).

Thieves encouraging customers to try to be thieves? It's contagious! Thanks Clive.

A ran Google translate from the back and got this " Product principle strict product characteristics of the product is the use of safe w and the traditional reactive power to compensate for the power of the original king, so that current balance, stable for the old filter transient surge, improve power factor, big month to reduce the loss of electricity systems To achieve energy saving effect! This product does not produce high frequency □ Feng high power due to harmonics, do not pollute the grid. Is a new environmentally friendly energy-saving products. And to extend the life of electrical appliances have a certain role. "丒 high power when the funny arrogant gray with the head and node principle simple diagram / 7 automatic energy saving .AI ERA) filter ridge wave smooth for burning st1, sea -)-one."....... Take from it what you will

It did show 600 mA for a brief moment.

A fairly nice enclosure for a project, very cheaply. And you can use the caps for capacitive droppers to add extra dazzling LEDs :-)

I really liked that close look on your nail.

They should make one with a pushbutton to 'calibrate' it. After pressing that button the LED would go off or blink a few times, and it returning to 'bright' would mean 'operational'. Then al least Clive has a bigger circuit to draw...

Also, I'd love you to do a "more than you ever wanted to know" on VARs and reactive power.

Nice display and glamorous box, but for 10 Pounds (UK) rather expensive. US Plug connector too - so aimed at those Countries who use this "Type A" connector type - US, Japan, Canada, Mexico.

Conductive casing with no ground pin. Best design ever.

_"Let's add a display, maybe we'll make it look more serious"_

The capacitive dropper also has a diode bridge in series, and the meter probably only tests capacitors at 1 V or so. That wouldn't be enough to make two series diodes conduct, and so that capacitor is effectively out of circuit.

That Hopi has paid for itself a hundred times over!

Well the display makes​ it more believable for non educated people I think.

Ultrafast circuit analysis on 10:25

At least, the case looks reusable xD

Apparent power only really comes in for industrial settings. The utility companies don't like it as it contributes to power line losses (high current spikes) that the meters wont charge for, but cost the utility. They DO charge for apparent power if you have a crappy PF here in the states. Its a percentage of your total power bill added on if you don't take steps to correct it from what I remember.

I love your reviews of these bogus devices.

1:30 Rated F for 'Fucked' ..... talking about the nail here people.

I used to connect a LED with a suitable dropper resistor directly to the mains, and despite a way too high reverse voltage for the datasheet's taste, it survived just fine. I am surprised they didn't try that with this one :)

It's generous to call them tamper-proof. They only delayed you five seconds

On the plus side, you now have a nice project box with a 3 digit display.

Anti-static bag for a mains power "conditioner" ought to be somewhat redundant!

I had a very expensive kettle that used to leave the plug “live” once I unplugged it.... the first time I touched it it gave me one hell of a jolt! After I recovered what did I do? Yep I touched it again and yep I got another shock.. to anyone watching I bet it looked like watching Homer Simpson lol.

I really had a laugh when you said "let's be somewhat less optimistic". Cheers from Canada.

You did not check if the casing was live before plugging it in? Brave...

There is a place on TV for Big Clive. With the knowledge and one liners

If your name is Bill you're screwed, yeah almost had coffee come out my nose on that line.

Meter teardown? Damn, I was hoping these would be a good source of big thicc capacitors...

You know what I kinda really like that drill I'd say use it when you feel like it.

I would not be plugging that thing in before testing its HV insulation, there is no Earth pin and no insulation between the PCB and the case. The case could have been possibly live if it was made on an off day. We could have had an Ex-bigclivedotcom

I suppose it is doing the people who buy these a favour by not having a large capacitor, as most people wouldn't have large inductive loads in their homes to warrant power factor correction lol. I don't suppose you've tested your own house meter if it reads reactive power? I have a feeling it just averages the two waveforms and doesn't discern between real or reactive at all..

Can you explain real power and apparent power in a little more detail in a video please? I've always suspected there is something behind the big smart meter roll out...what's in it for them etc.

I thought capacitors in series were of a lower value than if they were individual

Poor old Bill. He spends all day, every day, writing to everyone & no one is ever happy to hear from him :(

"The main feature might be the power on indicator" :D

And the winner by a teardown---BigClive! (dingding) Stay tuned next week when you'll see Big Clive VS:...

I noticed on my shart meter that it can measure power factor too, and like you, I immediately became very cynical at the thought of them suddenly charging for bad power factors, not good, maybe I should pick myself up one of these miracle power-saving devices... :P

To what is the 80kW supposed to be related? Such a thin wire and most houses only have 9 or 15 kW supply total anyway.

Have you seen the power save stickers,and wipes for your distribution board,the more stickers you add the more you save.

good to see your thumb is getting better

And the meter has its clips on the side -- not the wide side, the narrow side. Push the sides to pop it out.

5:22 The HOPI was occasionally flashing 600ma with the capacitor connected.

Hello Clive, First of all I want to thank you for making these very educational videos. I have not seen all your videos, but allot of them, making me wonder the following. When you ordered this object you must have known you were getting screwed, it's impossible to reduce your power bill by just plugging a single phase "appliance" in a socket. Have you ever showed the video you made to the sellers of the objects and requested a refund? And if Yes, what was the reaction of the sellers and did they agree to give you a refund? I myself ordered a powerbank the size of a cellphone (8mm thick) rated with a capacity of 100.000mAh for $9.99. Of course I knew I was gonna be screwed by I was in need of a small powerbank, to have extra power for my cellphone, so I decided to order it and see how big the capacity was gonna be. After charging and discharging the powerbank several times, since it was new, I decided to start doing 3 well documented, measured and provided with video tests. The average capacity from these 3 tests was 4400mAh. So I contacted the seller and told him I had done these tests and he had the option of giving me a complete refund or I would report him to Ebay and I would provide them my complete test results and the video of the tests plus the specs of the measurement equipment I used to arrive to this result of 4400mAh. The next day I received a message from the seller to please check my paypal to find their refund, without any form of discussion. When I went to Ebay I saw that the listing was gone, but after a few days the item was listed again but by another seller, looking at the profile I think it was very safe to say that it was a new account made by the seller. I did consider doing the same thing, using a new ebay account, LOL. If I were you, you are spending quite a bit after all on Ebay I would try to retrieve my money from these scammers that are taking advantage of faithful people, with no, or at least a very limited knowledge of electricity. Greetings from across the pond (Belgium) and thanks again for your good work ;) And now it's time for a beer, a real Belgian beer, lol

When these are inevitably fire-sold off for $2 in a couple of years they could be worth it for the quite nice aluminium case.

Great subject for rogue trader outing. Would have helped to provide some kind of visual illustration to support how the box reduces the apparent current of an induction motor.

Is the frequency of the UK power grid a lot less strict than the US? Obviously, UK is 50Hz and US is 60Hz, but the deviation from nominal seems to be much greater in the UK. Just in this video, it was as low as 49.89Hz and as high as 50.04Hz on the HOPI. Here in the US, I've never seen it below 59.98Hz or above 60.02Hz (barring a severe storm coming through and knocking out random loads, causing imbalance in load and generation on a moment's notice).

from my school days - CIVIL Capacitor Current Leads Voltage, Voltage Leads Current Inductor. I once dropped a brick on my electricity meter - that made it run slower.

With these power savers, you're like a naughty walrus, you're looking for a tight seal.

At 5:24, you will see that the HOPI is showing 616 mA and .004 pf. You had an intermittent connection on your external capacitor.

Do you think that metal case with no ground is a good idea???

Companies are charged for Apparent power, not real power (in Canada at least). This is why they use PF correcting device.

You should get a chordless screwdriver. Hitachi makes one that I use every day for electrical work and it's great

I wonder if I cascaded several of these, would my meter start runnings backwards and the electric utility would start *PAYING ME?* Actually I have been pondering Ohm's Law and I should be able to accomplish the same thing with a single component: a resistor with a *NEGATIVE* value of Ohms! 😀

The Bill joke caught me off guard haha

"... bill killer. If your name's Bill you're screwed." I nearly choked on my evening grog.

At 5:24, the hopi registers a non-zero current while you're saying it's zero. It looks like the number is fluctuating. Is there a bad contact somewhere? The neon was lighting while the hopi said zero, so perhaps the capacitor wasn't making contact properly.

5:23 - The hopi meter does show 616mA briefly, then again at 5:30. It's very intermittent though.

You were feeling brave moving it when it was plugged in.

Display pops out the front, lol... Those securing tabs must be strong. Upcycle that alloy case and guage into something useful, there's certainly plenty of usable in it!

Must admit they do make usless gadgets look pretty! a little like the Iphone8.

With the amount of 'cable tie' slots around that end, it looks more like a shielding can was supposed to go there

"If your name is Bill, you're screwed" Oh, you...

It's a nice housing no matter what.

7:38 Why dont you use that every time you take the screws out? I have always thought this and figured that you didn't want the drill noise in the video, tho drill noise would be fine by me.

If that thing is cheap it might be a cheap way to get a metal enclosure and display?

is that like a power factor corrector? We had a PFC at Safeway (before they went up the creek) in the 'Electric' room. There were 2 Econolite units designed to 'dim' the fluorescent lighting the store used to save power however they were never turned on. When I was in charge of 'Maintainance' I tried turning them on and two thumpy relays kicked in but on the display 'Error' LEDs came on so I guess they were useless. Anyway the PFC was set to a COS of 1.0 and the display usually showed 0.96 - 0.99. One day I came into work and overnight some kind of fault had developed and one of the caps inside had caught fire. I just wondered what would have caused that? It cant have been the econolites as they were in 'bypass' mode ( I never left them on after the error ) They were for 25% and 75% lighting as after close a timeclock switched off 25% of the store lighting. I think the PFC was mainly for the Air Handling units and Bakery machinery as they used huge hefty motors somewhere within their purpose.

You didn't mention the cost of the 'Power Saver'. Was it worth the money for an aluminium enclosure and volt meter module?

It makes kind of a nice mains voltage display, I suppose. =)

you should try to put in a big electrolytic capacitor, maybe it would improve the performance.

That would make a rather nice project box.

how much clearance / creepage was there between the AC line voltages and the, unearthed, metal case? There's no insulator on the back of the pcb, and it's through hole, so if the pcb is in one of the lower slots in the case, the terminals might end up rather too close for comfort to the case?

I don't know why but I like the metal boxes these "energy savers" come in. I would like to get some custom made boxes of similar material in silver. I bet they wouldn't be cheap if custom.

Still I don’t understand why having the current out of sync with the voltage loads the network more than having on sync. I understand the mathematical model but not the phenomen at electron level. In other words, what is happening at electron level so a motor creates that phenomen on the network?

Old-style domestic power meters did only measure real power. I'm not sure about the newer digital ones. In industrial settings the meter *does* measure apparent power. Because current flow causes resistive losses in power lines. If you're pulling enough current in inductive loads (motors) then that apparent power causes enough resistive loss in power lines that you get charged for it. Which encourages you to fit correction capacitors so your power bill goes down. Even if newer domestic meters measure apparent power (I don't know if they do) it's probably still not a good idea to use one of these. If you have non-compact fluorescents they should have built-in ballasts anyway. Maybe the motors on your vacuum and washing machine don't have ballasts, but that would only be a problem when they're running. Which means if you leave this thing plugged in all the time and your domestic meter does measure apparent power then it will probably end up costing you money rather than saving it. Unless you do a *lot* of vacuuming.

How appropriate I just received today the paperwork from my electricity supplier that could lead to power factor measurement (not that those fire hazard/electrocution chines boxes could help in any away)

My understanding is that bad PF + near max loading = tripped breakers. IE you spam what should be 1500W of .5 PF LED lamps and you trip the breaker long before you reach 1500W because the PF is so bad.

Nice project box!

I would be intrigued to know if such device would have an affect on power line adapters, would it improve stability?

it's not even worth the cost to get the digital display, those can be got for a couple of dollars.

Im truly wondering if the Digital Meter is just wired to show the same reading no matter what is driving it????????

I have often wondered why you don’t use a little screw gun to open things in the past, do you just prefer to do it manually?

If you stick a really big capacitor across the mains, wouldn't some power flow as the mains is AC? How big does a cap need too be to start passing 50hz on the mains? I guess it depends on the output impedance at that mains point.

I'll wait for the definitive stripdown of one of these - when Clive finds a lurid pink model on ebay.