Rammy's Ramblings

[Rammy]

Im thinking fire because it may short out something in the breakerbox because if the ampage. Electricity scares me bigtime. Im more worried about something causing a fire from some sort of shortage or powersurge or something. I called the electrician about a popping noise I heard from one of my outlets in the house. I was worried something was wrong because my lamp wouldnt work even after I put a new bulb in. Outlet was ok. It was a bad bulb. Duh on me.

 

[B&B Happy goats]

You may want to date a electrician ....for a while anyways .....or better, take a course in basic electrical

 

[greybeard]

Got a de-icer for the cows trough but cant use it because it says very specifically not to use extension cords. So thats out.

how many watts does it pull?

A fire? Maybe. Maybe not. How is it supposed to cause a fire?

All extension cords have a power rating, in watts or amps, as do all wiring.
That rating applies to both the metal conductors and the insulation around the conductors.
Exceeding that rating usually results in the insulation beginning to burn.
The heater also has a rating, how much current or watts it will draw. That rating is based upon the cord it came with or on a specified length and ampacity of the cable required. Smaller wires in an extension cord or a very long extension cord, or a very long cord with smaller wire will result in a voltage drop at the heater. 10-15% drop is the most any heater will work at without burning the heating element out. Ohms law.

But, I suspect the warning is also simply to protect the heater itself and the animal drinking from the water trough. Those heaters are much like a little miniature version of an oven element or dishwasher heating element. It has a little squiggly high resistance wire nested inside an insulated tube. A burned out oven element looks like this:



On an oven, there is little danger of fire or electric shock because the little hi resistance break & burned spot in the tube results in the hot wire still being encapsulated in insulation, but if the element is in water, that water quickly migrates into the tube, and the water becomes a conductor, shocking anything that comes in contact with the water (assuming that 'anything' is also grounded).
Heating elements have a much greater chance of burning out if they are being used in a low or high voltage condition. They will work marginally with a bit of variance either way, but it's best to avoid voltage drops if you can.

 

[greybeard]

Im thinking fire because it may short out something in the breakerbox because if the ampage.

Breaker box fires happen because of one or 2 reasons.
1. Loose connection screws. The screws that hold the wires to the breakers or the screws that hold the big wires to the main lugs.
2. Because someone has installed a breaker with a much higher rating than the circuit was designed for.
Plugging more stuff into a circuit designed (for instance) to handle 20 amps, bringing the total amp draw up to 30 amps, will cause the 20A breaker to immediately trip.


Breakers btw, are not designed to protect people from being shocked and aren't designed to protect appliances. Their sole function is to protect the insulation on the wiring in each breaker's circuit. Residential current cycles 60 times every second. That is once every 60/th of a second. In 3 eyeblinks, household current has cycled 60 times. Most household breaker can't/don't react that fast. If we grab a hot wire, we would be zapped in a fraction of the time it takes a breaker to trip....

There 'are' some newer breakers out now that can help protect us from electrical shock, but they look a lot different than the breakers most of us have in our homes and are wired in a lot differently. (They are also a lot more expensive)

Call or email the manufacturer of the heater, explain what you need/want to do and follow their guidance.

 

[Rammy]

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/farm-innovators-1500w-sinking-tank-deicer?rfk=1
I got this one at TSC since I have a plastic tank. Its 12.5 amps.

 

[Rammy]

Got a dusting of snow this morning. Colder than a witches T outside. Last night I made porkchops in my Instapot. Turned out pretty good.
I put two big chops in<not Wilbur size> with a can of cream of mushroom soup, half can of water, salt and pepper to taste, cooked for 20 minutes to see how done they would be since Ive never cooked porkchops in it yet and there werent any recipes for how I made it in my Instapot cookbook. Put them in for another 15 minutes and came out nice and tender! So I guess 35 minutes is a good guestimate on time for cooking. Yum!

 

[Mike CHS]

I do one similar to that and add some sour cream when it is done. Gives it a stroganoff type taste.

 

[greybeard]

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/farm-innovators-1500w-sinking-tank-deicer?rfk=1
I got this one at TSC since I have a plastic tank. Its 12.5 amps.

Most home and farm 120V outlets are on a 20a circuit breaker, so the heater would be a little less than 1/2 what it takes to trip the breaker. (they have about 10% overload factor to allow for any motor start up which draws more than when just running) If there is nothing else plugged into another outlet that is on the same circuit, you're well within the limits. (depending how long the extension cord is)

So many factors, it is hard to say whether it would work ok with an extension cord. My gut feeling is most likely 'would' work fine. It's been about a dozen years since I lived where we used a de-icer (or had to) but we ran #10 thhw wire in underground conduit and came off that & put a gfci receptacle pretty close the tank, and that's the only way I would recommend it done unless the tank is very close to a 20a outlet.

 

[Bruce]

Colder than a witches T outside.

A college roommate used that "description" though his was "Colder than a witch's "T" in a brass bra in January". Not sure how he would know:

• that witches have cold Ts
• how cold it might be in a brass bra in January, he lived in San Diego. Probably never saw anything colder than 45°F and that would have been quite rare.

 

[Rammy]

True.