Posted by Jon Martin on January 05, 2002 at 01:15:46:
In Reply to: How do touring groups deal with European power? posted by Simon P. Coffin on January 04, 2002 at 04:15:52:
: Ladies, Gents,
: I'm going to be doing some touring in Europe and need to
: figure out a way to use whatever power the hosts throw at me.
: It could be anything from 120v/50hz to 240v/50hz. All
: of my equipment is American spec and needs a nice clean
: 120v/60hz. I found that Furman makes a converter called
: the AR-PRO that accepts pretty much anything and outputs
: 120v/60hz, but it's a bit costly at $2000.
: Does anyone else make something to solve this problem?
: Thanks
: Simon
I don't know where you are starting from or what you are trying to power. (backline,PA?) ( UK?, Germany?...) But, IMHO, your best bet is to find a rental company over there that has transformers. I've found that they will have all the turn-arounds and other various gack that you will need for dealing with foreign power.
Be prepared to run into all kinds of weird things, 2 nutuerals, no N, no ground,N tied to G-where the G goes to nowhere, Delta service, Y service and dont forget to factor in the Hz ratings- Sharing power with the factory behind the venue that has 64 HVAC motors going, all sharing your ground/nutural, etc...Also, The color coding changes from contry to country.
THE #1 RULE: METER EVERYTHING!
Do not plug in any gear untill everything IS METERED!
Here's a link to a rental co. in the UK that I've gotten transformers from. I'm sure there are more.
* Be sure to METER THE TRANSFORMER(S) YOURSELF BEFORE LEAVING THE SHOP
. This will ensure that you haven't got a bum transformer. ( It's happened to me )
Also be sure that the transformer is tied into the same source as the PA!!! There should be NO exceptions to this rule if you are dealing with transformers and PA!
* Please read Dave's artical on this @ http://www.prosoundweb.com/live/articles/daverat/shocking.shtml
Have fun and please post back and let us know how it's going.
Triple-J