What Does Generator Regulation Mean?

DUPLICATE THREAD!

THEORY, CONSTRUCTION, AND OPERATION

Regulation means continusly maintaining frequency and voltage within required limits. In addition it can be regulation of exhaust temperature and pollutant. Also can be protections against reverse current, over loading, earth fault etc. Load is divided between parallel sets by speed droop characteristic of individual gensets and by adjusting the speed droop the share of load can be adjusted. A genset with lesser speed droop will take more load. Power factor is not a characteristic of genset but is of load; as such there is no question of adjusting it for a genset When genset speed is unstable even at constant load it is known as hunting. It is result of inability to stabilize fuel supply due to various reason - air in fuel, sticky actuator, restriction in fuel lines, loose sensor or actuator connections, very low droop or gain setting, radio interference with controller, presence of high ac ripple over dc supply to controller

To get even a better grade on your homework, include some of the interesting story about how the word 'regulate' as it pertained specificaly to steam engines entered the lexicon.

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Matthew Boulton (partner to James Watt in a very successful commercial venture producing early steam engines) was known for using colorful language to describe the erratic speed variation when the engines were not tightly controlled. Boulton would describe the dangerous erratic jumping of the machine by relating it to an animal known for leaping.

'The blasted engine began gazelle get, right away'

'If we can just keep it from pronghorning on startup'

'Come quickly, once again, it is beginning to horse around that same load'

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Later someone (possibly James Watt) noticed that all the animals Boulton used to describe the unsteady operation were ungulates.

It soon followed that if an ungulate described running uncontrolled, the 'gulate' must mean to run properly controlled (since 'un-gulate' means not to run properly controlled).

It was decided that the device that returned stable running conditions, i.e. provided 'gulate', could be described as a 're-gulat-or', or as it is known, a 'regulator'.

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There was even a ballad inspired by the historic event....