On Thu, 19 Sep 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
> It depends on how loudly!
It's quiet. But I left it plugged in and when I was going to bed at night
and the house was quiet it was noticeable enough that I went to
investigate and determined that it was the Variac, so I unplugged it. I
noticed also that the enclosure was warm, which bothered me.
> All Variacs -- in fact just about every mains-frequency transformer --
> will hum a little. The hum will get louder when you increase the load. A
> Variac with no load should hum pretty quietly, but you may still hear it.
At the time I noticed it there was no load on it. I'd never heard it hum
before (or at least never noticed). I plugged it in today just to see if
it hummed off the bat and it does.
> On variacs, the moving contact brush will effectively short-circuit a
> couple of turns. The variac is designed to handle this, but if you're not
> using the original brush then you might have problems. Have you replaced
> the brush?
Nope. Where would I get a replacement brush if it needs it?
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
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Received on Thu Sep 19 2002 - 18:54:00 BST