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Galvanic Isolator vs Transformer


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What are peoples views on the below comment that is wandering around that awful place called Facebook. I always appreciated a Transformer was better but I certainly never believed a Galvanic Isolator was useless!
"It is now a well-proven fact that in highly populated marinas, galvanic isolators are being activated by the stray currents on the shore side of the galvanic device, so rendering such a device useless."

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53 minutes ago, Traveller said:

What are peoples views on the below comment that is wandering around that awful place called Facebook. I always appreciated a Transformer was better but I certainly never believed a Galvanic Isolator was useless!
"It is now a well-proven fact that in highly populated marinas, galvanic isolators are being activated by the stray currents on the shore side of the galvanic device,
so rendering such a device useless."

 

That is why you would ideally use GI with some form of monitoring so you can see if its conducting. It is a possibility. My boat was 12V only but if it had a shoreline I would use a transformer if it spent a long time connected in a marina but if it were a question of connecting up for the odd night or few days I am sure an IT with monitoring would be fine.

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Isolation transformer will need a soft start circuit to avoid tripping breakers on switch on and will use current all the time even when there is no appliance in use. Then you have to consider where to site it, on the boat but it will hum or on the land where it will get stolen.

 

GI is not as fail safe and needs regular testing but will achieve the similar result.

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4 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Isolation transformer will need a soft start circuit to avoid tripping breakers on switch on and will use current all the time even when there is no appliance in use. Then you have to consider where to site it, on the boat but it will hum or on the land where it will get stolen.

 

GI is not as fail safe and needs regular testing but will achieve the similar result.

 

Soft starts are simple and cheap I hava a similar one to THIS fitted to my transformer which sits in the bottom of a cupboard at the stern. The power used is miniscule so much so that I got bored trying to measure it. Uncased its only about 9.5 inches by 4 inches so hardly large. 

My transformer must know all the words because it doesn't hum :) 

Would I have a GI ?    NFC.

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