A hospital EKG machine produced unreliable results. Signal wiring routed parallel to the power cord created inductive coupling — a classic internal EMC failure invisible to utility PQ standards. Root cause: wiring practice, not utility supply quality. 75% of medical facility PQ problems are internal wiring and grounding issues.
The Marco Polo Cruise Terminal in Saint John required emergency lighting that met new fire and life safety codes for 190,000 annual passengers. An emergency lighting inverter was specified as part of the essential services infrastructure — the case covers selection, integration, and reliability requirements for port terminal power systems.
During the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, remote Maritime First Nations communities faced power reliability challenges in vaccine distribution logistics. This case covers UPS-based power continuity solutions for isolated communities with limited grid access and high dependence on critical medical infrastructure.
Canada’s oldest marine biological station at St. Andrews, NB, pumps seawater with two 100 HP pumps — whose speed and flow rate are controlled by variable frequency drives sensitive to supply quality. The case examines VFD-based pump control and power reliability requirements for continuous marine research operations.
Ein 27 MW wind farm in Newfoundland — nine 3 MW turbines — requires reliable substation control and protection power to safely detect faults and isolate them. A UPS was installed in the substation to maintain protection system availability during grid disturbances, preventing loss of the entire wind farm on a grid fault.
Canadian Forces Base Goose Bay — a NATO training facility and alternate space shuttle emergency landing site — updated aircraft ground support power systems in Hangars 7 und 8. The case covers power quality and reliability requirements for military aviation infrastructure with no tolerance for downtime.
Halifax Stanfield International Airport required a 125 Vdc station battery and charger as part of a continuous substation upgrade. The case examines battery backup specifications for airport substation operation — a critical infrastructure application where DC supply reliability directly affects all protective relaying.
A steel factory in northern Italy had all laboratory electronic equipment behaving erratically — seemingly without cause. Investigation revealed constructive defects in the earthing system creating large current loops. With heavy currents flowing through the earth return path, the potential difference between equipment earths was sufficient to cause data corruption and equipment malfunction throughout the plant.
Mt. Washington’s communication towers serving northern New England — carrying TV, Radio, telephone, FAA air traffic control, and emergency services — were vulnerable to lightning until 1993. A comprehensive copper grounding system redesign eliminated lightning-related equipment damage and downtime, demonstrating the economic case for proper grounding in high-exposure communication infrastructure.
Florida’s Lightning Alley sees 130+ lightning days per year — communications towers are struck regularly. Orange County’s experience demonstrates that a total systems approach to electrical grounding, treating the tower, building, and all connected equipment as a single grounded system, prevents millions in lightning damage. Case covers the engineering and economics of comprehensive lightning protection.
HIOKI PW3198 Channel 4 is isolated from the three voltage measurement channels — enabling DC power supply monitoring, second-circuit measurement, or neutral current measurement simultaneously with three-phase voltage. Practical measurement configurations for complex industrial monitoring scenarios.
Eighteen days of monitoring on a 1-phase 100V circuit recorded 68 identical waveform distortion events, subsequently classified into two types: UPS switching transients and persistent waveform noise. The systematic waveform comparison technique demonstrates how event classification reveals root cause — the UPS was not returning to sine wave output after switching.
A building manager with widespread electrical malfunctions and three electricians who quit — none could identify the problem. A systematic approach starting with current measurement revealed a tripped GFCI with high neutral current feeding a malfunctioning medical device. Classic case demonstrating that systematic PQ investigation beats component replacement as a troubleshooting strategy.
DHL Airways 24×7 customer service centre installed a redundant UPS system to protect critical loads. Dranetz Encore Series monitors UPS input and output simultaneously — giving the travelling facility manager remote browser-based access to all power monitoring data from anywhere, enabling rapid fault diagnosis without on-site visits.
A Westchester condominium could not get permits because elevators would not run on emergency generator power. Diagnosed as a voltage drop problem and chased with expensive fixes — new transformer, tap adjustments — that failed to help. Dranetz monitoring identified the real cause: generator output waveform distortion incompatible with the elevator drive controllers.
After September 11, 2001, local utility provided portable generation to lower Manhattan. An infrared thermographic inspection of the generator terminal connections revealed overheating at connection points requiring immediate remediation — prior to the connections failing under load. Case demonstrates infrared as a first-line diagnostic tool for temporary generator connections in emergency power scenarios.
