Good day, i would like to measure my electricity consumption on different places at home sumiltanious.  For Ex escom mains in. Escom in to inverter, supply to my outbuildings, supply to my flat. What is available with clamp on pickups? I also once read that someone used a laptop with dongle to do something similar? With technology today i am sure someone out there has a system worth looking at. Any ideas please.

Ellie's has a wireless clamp on pickup system you could look at, although i'm not a fan of ellies  you can buy it from builders though...

Also saw something the other day looks nice enough, https://www.solaranalytics.com.au/ but yeah its a AU company, to get it here if you can and then the software i don't know.

Victron have clamp on sensors if you already have a victron system, but to log that i think you need at least a VGR or a Color control GX, 

Then you can do some stuff with a Pi but that will take quite a lot of manual tinkering.

Places like measure group or comtest may have a more specialized options in their data loggers.

i'm sure there's many more options, maybe have a look in the china mall. or just give in and buy the ellies thingie

 

Thanks

Hi George,

I know of a couple of products out there that you can evaluate

Efergy monitor:   

https://engage.efergy.com/

http://www.ellies.co.za/energy_monitoring/efergy/Elite-Classic-Energy-Meter/FSEME

They have a number of products that can be used to do monitoring. All of them only monitor the AC current that run through a wire. It uses that to approximate the energy consumption (KW).  They have two types of stand alone monitors, the Elite Classic and the E2 Energy monitors. They look very similar. They both just monitor one circuit at a time. The difference comes in that the one (E2 Energy monitor) comes with an USB interface that you can plug into a laptop/pc and download the monitored data, where as the other only provides current, daily totals, monthly totals etc. They do not monitor voltage or frequency or power factor so they are not 100% accurate, but they do give you a pretty good idea as to what is going on.

They also have a HUB system. This allows for up to 5 circuits to be monitored. The HUB system normally include 1 current sensor for one circuit. It you want to monitor more you will have to add either a E2 Energy monitor or a Elite Classic monitor per circuit you want to monitor.

The HUB system records the data to the cloud and they provide you with a Web interface to look at the real time and historical data (including graphs). You can also download the data from in CVS format. They also have a smartphone app that you can use to monitor 24/7 from anywhere in the world.  The HUB systems does requires an Ethernet Internet connection. So if you do not have and ADSL connection or something similar at home then you can not use the HUB system. You can still use the Elite Classic monitors or E2 Energy monitors.  

Ellies distribute them in SA and I know Builders Warehouse stock them.

Owl energy monitors :

http://www.theowl.com/products/energy-monitors/

Owl monitors are very similar to the Efergy E2 and Elite Classic monitors. It also just measures the current flow but not the voltage, frequency, power factor. Some models include a USB interface that you can hook up to a PC and download the data.

Exsolar energy monitor : http://www.exsolar.co.za/products/monitoring-devices/advanced-energy-monitor-exsolar-em502/

This monitor can be used to monitor up to 3 circuits. Its much more accurate than the previous two monitors as it monitors both volts and amps and give you  power factor figures as well.

Open energy monitor (EMON) https://guide.openenergymonitor.org/

This monitor is also more accurate than the Efergy or the Owl monitors because it can also monitor voltage and frequency. They have various components that you can add to monitor as many circuits as you like. This is open source hardware and software you you can change it if you have the skill & time. I don't know of anybody selling this in SA so you would have to purchase it in the UK and let them ship it to you.

 

Thanks for all the info. Will shop around. The Efergy monitor working with Ethernet sounds nice, but  I use a telkom wifi router. So will have a look at my options. I want to measure consumption on at least 4 places.

 

Another one you could look at is the Current Cost EnviR.

http://www.currentcost.com/products.html

It can monitor up to 10 channels. (Like the Owl and Efergy it measures apparent power)

 

Thanks