If you're wondering why NYC wants to get a heat pump for every apartment, consider this.

Jells

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

I am still waiting to see the cost of the electrical upgrades they will need to do

My wife used to do social work visits in the projects, and says these places are built like bunkers. They're like concrete walls not plasterboard. I have no idea how they would wire this stuff, maybe conduit on the surface. I can't imagine the cost to upgrade these places to be less per unit then the actual PTAC cost.

ChrisJ

Jells said:

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

I am still waiting to see the cost of the electrical upgrades they will need to do

My wife used to do social work visits in the projects, and says these places are built like bunkers. They're like concrete walls not plasterboard. I have no idea how they would wire this stuff, maybe conduit on the surface. I can't imagine the cost to upgrade these places to be less per unit then the actual PTAC cost.

Conduit?

delcrossv

Jamie Hall said:

Fundamentally a tradeoff between cost, efficiency, durability, and fancy features. Fancy features raise cost without necessarily affecting either efficiency or durability. Raising either efficiency or durability also raise cost. An extreme example -- Voyager I is still going strong, 45 years after launch. It wasn't cheap. A smart phone may last two to three years and is real fancy but is relatively cheap. The refrigerators you mention were both expensive in the day, and were kind of short on fancy features and aren't as efficient as new ones, but they'll likely outlast you. The ones you buy now have the features, but they've traded durability for efficiency and features to hold the cost. And so on.

No, as fridges in the 20's -50's weren't a significantly larger percentage of income than now. What happened is companies found that they could make a lot more profit selling stuff that breaks and sold that bill of goods to consumers.

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

ChrisJ

delcrossv said:

Fundamentally a tradeoff between cost, efficiency, durability, and fancy features. Fancy features raise cost without necessarily affecting either efficiency or durability. Raising either efficiency or durability also raise cost. An extreme example -- Voyager I is still going strong, 45 years after launch. It wasn't cheap. A smart phone may last two to three years and is real fancy but is relatively cheap. The refrigerators you mention were both expensive in the day, and were kind of short on fancy features and aren't as efficient as new ones, but they'll likely outlast you. The ones you buy now have the features, but they've traded durability for efficiency and features to hold the cost. And so on.

No, as fridges in the 20's -50's weren't a significantly larger percentage of income than now. What happened is companies found that they could make a lot more profit selling stuff that breaks and sold that bill of goods to consumers. Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

Careful there.
1920s they were a fortune.

But the early 30s they had dropped,I think my 1933 was the equivalent to around $3k today but it's small.  

But by the 1940s-50s yeah prices were very reasonable and they were still very good machines.

jad3675

Jells said:

In the back of my work shop, I have a 1947 GE refrigerator that my dad bought used on the side of the road 50 years ago. Someone has to explain to me how something with a motor and compressor can run trouble free and do so continuously for 70 years without a failure. The only sound it makes is a tiny "ting" sound when the thermostat clicks. Still ice cold.

John

I have a 1951 Sears/Kenmore Coldspot fridge. Icebox in the top corner. If I set the temp to 'coldest' I'll end up with exploded cans of sparkling water. I've had it for...20 years, and the only thing I've had to replace is the cord.

It's the one on the right of this catalog page. It's right around $1600 in today's dollars.

delcrossv

ChrisJ said:

delcrossv said:

Jamie Hall said:

Fundamentally a tradeoff between cost, efficiency, durability, and fancy features. Fancy features raise cost without necessarily affecting either efficiency or durability. Raising either efficiency or durability also raise cost. An extreme example -- Voyager I is still going strong, 45 years after launch. It wasn't cheap. A smart phone may last two to three years and is real fancy but is relatively cheap. The refrigerators you mention were both expensive in the day, and were kind of short on fancy features and aren't as efficient as new ones, but they'll likely outlast you. The ones you buy now have the features, but they've traded durability for efficiency and features to hold the cost. And so on.

No, as fridges in the 20's -50's weren't a significantly larger percentage of income than now. What happened is companies found that they could make a lot more profit selling stuff that breaks and sold that bill of goods to consumers.

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

Careful there.
1920s they were a fortune.

But the early 30s they had dropped,I think my 1933 was the equivalent to around $3k today but it's small.  

But by the 1940s-50s yeah prices were very reasonable and they were still very good machines.

OK, might have started too early (new items are expensive), but you get my point. You won't get an equivalently priced fridge today that will last 70 years. Same with washers, dryers etc, etc.

HydroNiCK

@DanHolohan
The first problem is this is taking place in a bizarre world called Civil Service.   Nothing will change. However if this does come to fruition its going to go horribly wrong.

  DanHolohan said:

@TimSmith, the whole thing is nuts. Jake Myron summed it up in another thread a few weeks ago. He was in the middle of this for years at NYC Housing, and I was with him for a bunch of that time, looking at things that didn't work simply because there was no one who could fix them except for guys like Jake. And then they all retired and we now have what those news articles are about, and we have the same situation every winter. It's ridiculous what the tenants have to put up with, and the City sees the only solution as being the heat pumps. But as you bring up, who is going to maintain those? And at $3,000 per, does this even begin to make any sense

Jells

ChrisJ said:

Conduit?

I'm sure you've heard of it, it's a pipe they run cables through when you can't run it inside the walls. Similar to Wiremold.

/s

delcrossv

Jells said:

ChrisJ said:

Conduit?

I'm sure you've heard of it, it's a pipe they run cables through when you can't run it inside the walls. Similar to Wiremold.

/s

Surface mount EMT? How "industrial".

ratio

delcrossv said:

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

I've mentioned this before, but I don't see it as a bunch of CEOs (or whoever) sitting around saying "let's make it break after a few years". It's a lot easier to explain it along the lines of "let's make it cheap enough that everyone will want to buy it". Failing after a short life is a side benefit of making it cheaper, but not a design goal.

It may look like splitting hairs, but it better describes the place we're in, & it makes clear the path out…

ChrisJ

ratio said:

delcrossv said:

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

I've mentioned this before, but I don't see it as a bunch of CEOs (or whoever) sitting around saying "let's make it break after a few years". It's a lot easier to explain it along the lines of "let's make it cheap enough that everyone will want to buy it". Failing after a short life is a side benefit of making it cheaper, but not a design goal.

It may look like splitting hairs, but it better describes the place we're in, & it makes clear the path out…

No,
That would take too much effort honestly.

I think it all falls under things being made "good enough" and then stuff just fails.

SlamDunk

ratio said:

delcrossv said:

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

I've mentioned this before, but I don't see it as a bunch of CEOs (or whoever) sitting around saying "let's make it break after a few years". It's a lot easier to explain it along the lines of "let's make it cheap enough that everyone will want to buy it". Failing after a short life is a side benefit of making it cheaper, but not a design goal.

It may look like splitting hairs, but it better describes the place we're in, & it makes clear the path out…

No, but I worked for a small manufacturing company that made industrial equipment. Historically, designs were 25% more robust than necessary. Never had a problem. The equipment lasted forever. The CEO says "we're giving away 25% for free. We can't be competitive if we charge 25% more, so engineer out that extra 25%". That was a mistake. Warranty costs sky rocketed and within five years the company was sold to a competitor.

The father, the first CEO, was an engineer, dictated the extra 25% back in the fifties. The son, who became CEO in the early 90's, was a business man. The company was sold in 2004.

DanHolohan

https://www.riverdalepress.com/stories/nycha-residents-freeze-as-temp-dips,77530

ethicalpaul

I do find it interesting that people are so concerned with how will some new technology possibly work, when the existing systems aren't working anyway.

delcrossv

I'll have to disagree with you guys. Increasing quarterly profits is meat and potatoes to corporate execs. That's driven by analysts and institutional investors who are the big players. Planned obsolescence drives profits and I'm convinced it's a design goal.

If you sell someone a fridge, and they don't buy another for 40 years, where's the profit in that? Pretty obvious what the drivers are.

ChrisJ

delcrossv said:

I'll have to disagree with you guys. Increasing quarterly profits is meat and potatoes to corporate execs. That's driven by analysts and institutional investors who are the big players. Planned obsolescence drives profits and I'm convinced it's a design goal.

If you sell someone a fridge, and they don't buy another for 40 years, where's the profit in that? Pretty obvious what the drivers are.

I don't think you're actually disagreeing in this case.

The difference is I don't think anyone technically "engineers it to last X amount of years".
To an extent, they have figured out how much they can get away with and that's what they do.

The modern stuff is designed terrible, plain and simple.

ChrisJ

@delcrossv I know it's kinda splitting hairs.

delcrossv

ChrisJ said:

@delcrossv I know it's kinda splitting hairs.

No worries.

Jells

SlamDunk said:

Planned Obsolescence. It's infected pretty much every industry.

I've mentioned this before, but I don't see it as a bunch of CEOs (or whoever) sitting around saying "let's make it break after a few years". It's a lot easier to explain it along the lines of "let's make it cheap enough that everyone will want to buy it". Failing after a short life is a side benefit of making it cheaper, but not a design goal.

It may look like splitting hairs, but it better describes the place we're in, & it makes clear the path out…

No, but I worked for a small manufacturing company that made industrial equipment. Historically, designs were 25% more robust than necessary. Never had a problem. The equipment lasted forever. The CEO says "we're giving away 25% for free. We can't be competitive if we charge 25% more, so engineer out that extra 25%". That was a mistake. Warranty costs sky rocketed and within five years the company was sold to a competitor. The father, the first CEO, was an engineer, dictated the extra 25% back in the fifties. The son, who became CEO in the early 90's, was a business man. The company was sold in 2004.

Great story that illustrates how that younger CEO didn't understand deviations from the mean. If you want the vast majority of units to meet the design specification you need to set your manufacturing goal for that specification far above it to account for variation in the manufacturing process,  AKA: quality control.  If you set your manufacturing goal right at the specification then 50% of your product will be under spec.

An importer of machine tools once explained to me that the problem with Chinese tools wasn't that their design was bad, mostly it was copies of American tools, it was that their quality control sucked. So unless you did like he did and toured every factory and observed their practices before contracting with them, you end up with every purchase being a spin of the roulette wheel. 

DanHolohan

Do you folks think this is going way off topic? Perhaps it needs its own thread?

SlamDunk

DanHolohan said:

https://www.riverdalepress.com/stories/nycha-residents-freeze-as-temp-dips,77530

The funny thing is this is in the Riverdale Press but Ft Independence is nowhere near Riverdale! I don't think Riverdale has projects. Unless you consider the Russian Diplomatic Compound a project building. Looks like one. Another slow news day in Riverdale!

cross_skier

I'm really surprised a group has not stepped up and offered to help given the publicity.  If you had a team with a steam expert with a great track record at an institution, an engineer, a purchasing guy, a PR person there is a lot of good they could do and probably make a decent profit.  If they were really smart they would develop a process, give a sexy name like "Encore" and say it could fix any institution's steam system.

DanHolohan

@SlamDunk, the Fort Independence Houses are in the Bronx, just 3.3 miles from Riverdale.

delcrossv

cross_skier said:

I'm really surprised a group has not stepped up and offered to help given the publicity.  If you had a team with a steam expert with a great track record at an institution, an engineer, a purchasing guy, a PR person there is a lot of good they could do and probably make a decent profit.  If they were really smart they would develop a process, give a sexy name like "Encore" and say it could fix any institution's steam system.

Look up higher. Dan and the General Society tried. There'$ $omething el$e going on.

DanHolohan

During the late-'70s, the City replaced the windows in most of these buildings. It was a huge business and the Mafia was involved. The problem, though, was there is no mechanical ventilation in these buildings. Tenants kept cooking and bathing, as you would expect, and that led to a black-mold problem that spread everywhere.

No one had considered this beforehand.

They solved the mold problem by drilling holes in metal frames of the the brand-new windows so fresh air could get it, just as did with the original, leaky windows.

jumper

>>First, I know a few guys who can, and do repair them. So saying it's not repairable is false.<<

who cuts open a hermetic compressor and then welds it closed?

ChrisJ

jumper said:

>>First, I know a few guys who can, and do repair them. So saying it's not repairable is false.<<

who cuts open a hermetic compressor and then welds it closed? </p>

We need to get the thread back on track but no, I wasn't misunderstanding, it's a thing on antiques.

ChrisJ

@DanHolohan Has there been any discussions on how the electric will be generated in the future for this?

Are there any nuclear plants planned?

DanHolohan

@ChrisJ ConEd just applied for a very large rate increase with the State. It's for the infrastructure for this, and other electrical things that are on the way. They don't seem at all concerned.

ChrisJ

DanHolohan said:

@ChrisJ ConEd just applied for a very large rate increase with the State. It's for the infrastructure for this, and other electrical things that are on the way. They don't seem at all concerned.

Oh I'm sure they're not concerned I was just curious.

I have no doubt ConED is over there like

DanHolohan

Big Electric.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/con-edison-rate-increase-proposal-could-boost-electric-bills-more-than-11-in-2023-2022-01-28

Steamhead

Seems the most accurate part of that company's name is "Con".

Jamie Hall

What amazes me, @DanHolohan , is that someone thinks that such rate rises are surprising. Maybe "thinks" isn't the right word...

DanHolohan

Yes.

wmgeorge

Aside from nuclear which we need to be doing right now can you folks who do not live in a apartment put up your own solar panels like we can?

cross_skier

@wmgeorge

Don't you mean wind turbines?  You guys in Iowa are leading the country in wind

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/iowa-view/2021/06/11/wind-energy-is-should-remain-iowa-success-story/7640696002/

ChrisJ

cross_skier said:

@wmgeorge

Don't you mean wind turbines?  You guys in Iowa are leading the country in wind

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/iowa-view/2021/06/11/wind-energy-is-should-remain-iowa-success-story/7640696002/

I don't think homeowners can install wind turbines

fentonc

There have been (and continue to be) very good incentives for installing solar in ConEd territory - I put panels on my house in 2018 and have full net metering with ConEd. I'm still disappointed that NY shutdown Indian Point (which is in my backyard, more or less), but there are also a number of offshore wind farms in development, in addition to a number of proposals to bring in more hydroelectric power from canada.

delcrossv

ChrisJ said:

@DanHolohan Has there been any discussions on how the electric will be generated in the future for this?

Are there any nuclear plants planned?

If only. They did just close Indian Point.

Jamie Hall

Sure, we can put up solar panels. Here in New England we get almost 3 hours of sunshine per day on the average, year 'round. Which means you need a lot of panel area to be close to breaking even for ordinary domestic use, never mind heating -- and you also need a lot of battery capacity, since it is not uncommon to go three or four days with negligible solar input.