I’m not thinking of doing this, but it does seem that some of these devices can RESTRICT power. EG if (some condition) then limit power to X.
How does this effect things on the output side? Thinking of my guest geyser, that’s a resistive load. It’s going to keep on demanding 2kW, but the does the ASC limit what it actually can get? How does the difference between demand and supply play out?
Or what about my pool pump? That’s a motor. It’s going to always demand 750W, but what if the ASC is allowing it only 500? It may not even start. Again there’s a mismatch of what the device wants and what the ASC will allow it. Does it just run slower and with less pressure?
OK… In smart life I can set up an automation like
WHEN MainGeyser power < 1000W THEN
“Increase electricity” (that’s the name they use) on the guest geyser, and I can specify the amount to increase to. “Electricity” is measured in watts.
Which implies an ability to restrict but it’s not explicitly there. But there is no setting to limit “electricity”. So now I’m just confused.
I think all they do is switch off if the demand exceeds the configured value for a certain amount of time.
It is useful for things like backup power to sockets in rental units, where you don’t want people to overload your inverter.
It won’t really work with a geyser, or an electric motor, since both draw a constant power value or nothing at all.
You could in theory have a “dimmer” device, that operates exactly like a light dimmer does (switch the AC using a triac to regulate power), and that would work with a geyser, but 1) probably not in an off-grid/power outage situation, since the power factor is somewhat poor, and 2) it would not be good for a motor. That’s all academic though… the CBI smart stuff use a simple relay and current sensor, pretty similar to the old Sonoff POW. Or that’s how I understand it anyway.
They have another device called the smart adaptor. This plugs in, and is really a replacement for the plug in timer switches. It has an interesting feature that it will turn itself off if demand gets too low. This is to protect your laptop batteries (or smartphone batteries I suppose) by not letting them trickle charge for hours.
I’ve now got four different types of Tuya device in use (that got out of hand quickly) and I think some of the problems are …. ermmm… translations from another language into English. And inconsistent translation at that.
The smart switches I have display properties “open” and “closed”. Then you swipe back a screen and “open” becomes “on” and “closed” becomes “off”. More like a tap than a switch, and I did guess wrong the first time.