I am NOT and engineer, but worked as an Engineering Technician for a Llarge power production company for many years.
Likely... for an home project you don't need to "Split" the electrical current. As long as the single source of power is large enough and the voltage is regulated to 120 volts the load can change and electrons will flow to where the load is needed, be it razors or lightbulbs.
If you feel that you need to "protect" the Lightbulb from Voltage drops etc and it is actually suffering from a performance problem that is measurable you can install a subsytem that will protect it from power "sags" in the main system by many different means...
stereo system size problem...a capacitor in the circuit for the light bulb, it just helps keep the voltage up/down to where it should be during short 1-5 cycle spikes caused by the power sucking Bass woofer.
A Transformer with a "filter system" built in. The capacitance in a transformer is bigger than simple "capacitors" if used correctly, but this is for BIG projects.
other system.. a battery UPS for the circuit in trouble (convert ac to dc and then back again like a Uniterruptible Power Supply circuit. that battery isolates the Light bulb from surges, spikes and circuit "noise")
Bigger than that...a separate Motor generator circuit. ( a large electric motor that drives a heavy flywheel with a generator attached, or built right in. It absorbs big voltage spikes ( and I mean BIG Fricken voltage spikes and makes nice clean power..mmmmm clean power ...mmmmmmm)
Finally - A Synchronous condenser. This is like a HUGE motor generator set in principle. They are used to maintain the voltage in Transmissions systems (I mean Province/State wide electrical distribution systems. We use Synchronous condensers to manage an smooth out large burps, voltage spikes and even some harmonics occurring in our power transmission systems, where clean power in large amounts is imperitive or customers call and ask us to replace their tv sets after a lightning storm.
If you ensure that the main power supply is big enough it will eliminate the need to split the power in the first place. But like I said if you are avoiding Spikes of usage from something similar to a "Current sucking/ voltage dropping" SubWoofer... You need a big capacitor on the rest of the system.
Analyze the problem... is this a peak load problem? ... and is that throwing the other half of your circuit off (dropping it's voltage internittently causing distortion/harmonics/noise etc.?) FYI Distortion harmonics and noise occurr in all power systems.
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Living on the edge of sanity
Last edited by RCAlyra2004; 02-24-2005 at 08:08 AM..
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