When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

XBee projects like the adapter, xBee tutorials, tweetawatt/wattcher, etc. from Adafruit

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fiver
 
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Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 12:42 pm

When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

Post by fiver »

I love the tweet-a-watt!!

In another forum (http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/02/tweet-a-watt-crowned-winner-of-greener-gadgets-2009-design-compe/#comments) the tweet-a-watt coinventor PT said "we made a real device that works and others are making these and also making businesses around the idea already."

Assuming its not confidential, could someone elaborate on this? In particular:

1) I want a tweet-a-watt (not to twit my usage, just to store it and analyze it). Will someone else make it? When might it be available?

2) Any idea what ultimate cost might be? I'm guessing it would come down a lot from $90 w/ mass production (especially since zigbee chips don't cost much).

3) Can you say who is making these, or give other info?

4) Will the folks who make these be modifying a kill-a-watt as you have or will they be building their own monitors?

5) Do you (or anyone else) have similar plans to mod a PowerCost Monitor (or another whole-house monitor) as well as per-outlet monitors?

Thanks!

adafruit
 
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Joined: Thu Apr 06, 2006 4:21 pm

Re: When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

Post by adafruit »

you can buy the kit from adafruit.com right now!
we dont know specifics about other people's businesses and when/what/how much it would cost. you would have to ask them about it, but most of these companies would never give that information out anyways.

fiver
 
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 12:42 pm

Re: When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

Post by fiver »

Thanks.. I should have said I'm too dumb/lazy to follow the instructions in the kit. (Plus, I don't own a soldering iron or similar equipment.)

Do you have names or contact info for other these other businesses? And do you know they exist, or was this just speculation that it would inevitably happen?

Thanks!

adafruit
 
Posts: 12151
Joined: Thu Apr 06, 2006 4:21 pm

Re: When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

Post by adafruit »

i dont remember their names, they emailed and called but that was a few months ago and we just said the schematics are up online and deleted the email.
i hate crowded inboxes! :)

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glenntrewitt
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Thu May 14, 2009 12:22 am

So, you want to monitor power for your whole house?

Post by glenntrewitt »

If you want to put stuff in your electrical panel, a good choice for monitoring current can be had from Saelig:
http://www.saelig.com/miva/merchant.mvc ... gory_Code=
A bit pricey - $60, and you'd need two for normal two-phase circuits. These guys are really convenient, though: they output 0-5V across their range. The one Saelig sells measures from 0-100A RMS.

An even better choice for hacking (cheaper and has no exposed bits) is the TED - "The Energy Detective". See http://www.theenergydetective.com/store for their store. Their box + data logging software will cost you $200. If you just want to buy a finished product, this probably qualifies. However, they also sell the transducer "Additional MTU and CTs" for $70. This looks like a great BANNED to me.

I borrowed a TED once and could never establish a data link from the transducer to the monitoring unit - I was not impressed. It uses RF over the power line, but I'm betting that an XBee could be fit into the box. However, you should consider that this will all be stuck inside - a metal breaker box. I'll leave it to other clever folk to figure out the best/safest way to get the signal of the breaker panel.

I only just noticed that they sell the transducers separately, or I would have already been playing around with it.

For your information, here is TED's diagram of how the thing is installed in the breaker panel:
Image

kyoorius
 
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Mar 04, 2009 12:48 am

Goog-a-watt?

Post by kyoorius »

Just stumbled across this link yesterday:

http://www.google.org/powermeter/index.html

Everyone is jumping on the energy visualizing bandwagon.

lamplight
 
Posts: 12
Joined: Wed May 13, 2009 10:04 am

Re: When can I buy a tweet-a-watt?

Post by lamplight »

the ted 5000 should be out any time and has networking built in :)

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