More!!!!! No, really... MORE!
- Thread starter RGP
- Start date
Bensonrad said:
Crazy??? Crazy not to, rent is dirt cheap up here, compared to some (not all) locations the further south you go (and yes, I do feel very strongly about high rent prices for no reason). I had the opportunity to buy straight away if I wanted but with it being a second mortgage and me being self-employed i'd likely have to raise 15% quite quickly which would be about £15k - I had to raise 20% on my first apartment and that actually did put me in hospital for 3 days with a heart issue after getting messed about by the mortgage provider after exchange of contract.
Yes, you do need to come up, you need to come visit your old Zac cab and meet a load of members who come up to most of them, there's plenty of floor space with having two places like John has said and the hotel down the road is pretty inexpensive (~£45/night double room).
The landlord is absolutely fine, I explained to her what I wanted to do before getting into it. I rang her up as I knew her from her son being my neighbour (asked to keep an eye for anyone starting trouble for him) and just said I had a potential long term reliable tenant for her... me!
Elec bill, we've done this before and i've been asked it a few times on twitter/facebook so i'm doing a video to verify it but here's the facts for everyone (and good ammunition against any Mrs' that try to use electricity to diminish your collections).
Take out the manual to that lovely 42-60" TV - especially those who buy plasma TV's as they want the latest biggest screens - you'll find that those sizes use anywhere upto 600watt of electricity.
This means that if your unit charge per kWh is 14p, having that 60" plasma TV on for ONE HOUR costs a whacking 8 PENCE.
An arcade machine takes about 200watt when you first switch it on and draws that for about 2-3 seconds while everything charges up then goes to a general consumption mode of around 115-150watt depending on PCB and monitor size.
ArcadeMatt on JAMMA+ proved these figures a couple of years ago.
So that means that a cab costs 2.1p/hour to run opposed to the 8p for the TV. You also get FREE HEAT from an old arcade cab something very desirable today when you live in a single fuel house.
So to put it in perspective your arcade cab can run for approximately 4 hours before it uses the juice of a 60" plasma TV and with the amount of sheer rubbish being broadcast to us is much better entertainment value.
I have a projector which uses a 200watt lamp which draws about 275watt altogether which would be more efficient than my plasma TV but the replacement lamps cost £130+.
Now ok, some of you are using OLED or LCD and yes, they do cost less than a plasma but still run at realistically 100watt with all factors considered.
Some smaller sized TV's like 28-32" run at about 50watt nominal but unless you have a room of about 8ft x 10ft are more of a bedroom TV than a family room.
Interestingly, set-top-boxes are the guzzlers, add those back on to the lower-powered TV's and you're back up in 200-300watt territory until they change over to using solid state drives in them as they have an IDE/SATA drive and fans to run.
Anyway, that's just some info i've had to figure out since being in all this and it's in the top 3 comments outsiders general make because of the government propaganda on energy usage.
To summarise though, an average party night of about 10 hours costs about £10-£12 in electricity for the machines, the pinballs do take a bit more as the coils cause spike draw on the power up to 8 amp for a second or so.
I really appreciate all the thoughts and support by everyone and I don't mind answering questions like this, armed with the facts you can get the Mrs' to back off when she wants you to go from 3 cabs to zero because it must be costing a lot.
Her hair-straighteners/curling tongs/other beauty product stuff costs wayyyyy more run.
BristolMartin
Active member
Im not sure the figures are correct. I calculate mine based on amps and i get alot higher figures. My electric bill is £350 a month for the entire house. I calculate my cabs on about 50p per hour per crt monitor. The amp draw for the gameboards is not alot.
BristolMartin said:
I'm going off something Matt and I discussed heavily one night after his ex Mrs had been on at him about electric costs for running the machines.
I'll be conducting an experiment to determine the exact current draw soon, thanks for pointing that out about amps which is what i'll measure but the formula W = A * V generally works each way round.
I really don't want to get into an argument over something that was meant as light hearted but 50p/hour per CRT would mean they're drawing 3.57kWh - that's the equivalent of running a kettle constantly for an hour. Putting it into the formula that would mean a cab draws 14 amps?
50p/hour divided by 14p/kWh = 3.57kWh divided by 240 volts = 14.87amps
I'm paying £259 per month for electricity and that's without running the cabs most of the time - I seldom get time to play, i'm convinced there's a supply leak issue, I leave a router, one media server, fridge, freezer and the sky box running while i'm not in. But i'm a heavy user due to working from home so the kettle gets boiled a good few times a day, washing is done etc.
frothmeister
Active member
What the hell do you guys do with all this electricity? Mine averages around £60 per month for a reasonably large 3 bedroomed house and I think that is bloody extortionate.
Congratulations on acquiring the second place though James, that is going to be amazing once filled up with machines.
frothmeister2013-06-09 22:49:03
Congratulations on acquiring the second place though James, that is going to be amazing once filled up with machines.
frothmeister2013-06-09 22:49:03
G
Guests
Guest
Nice one James, looks like you have a bloody big Arcade going on!
As for Electric..... I pay £38 a month by DD and i'm normally under this.....if it was more, I'd rather walk around in the dark the robbing basts!!!
As for Electric..... I pay £38 a month by DD and i'm normally under this.....if it was more, I'd rather walk around in the dark the robbing basts!!!
BristolMartin
Active member
I do use a lot of electric, but I do also do carbon offset, which by the way guys is very cheap and you should look into it for our children's sake, also gives you a warm fuzzy feeling planting trees remotely
pooman2084
Be Attitude For Gains!
James, I think I love you.
I can't believe you have actually pulled it off James
That is awesome lol
Will the two arcades be separated by genre or themed in any way ?
That is awesome lol
Will the two arcades be separated by genre or themed in any way ?
Chuckie egg said:
I haven't decided yet, it will likely evolve over a few parties.
So far "first fix" cabling, cleaning, painting etc has been done, i'm waiting on some deliveries (non machine) before I can finish the primary build.
The pinballs and gun game will be in their own room in the new place, all food/drink will be served in the original lair but feel free to take it with you.
When I did the initial plans I figured I could hold upto 70 video and 6 pins, i'm cutting the maximum limit back a bit to keep it sensible. Haven't decided which machines are going where yet, that'll happen last minute before the next party.
I've a few project cabs in the pipeline now, mostly its just wiring and some artwork. Going to try and have Frogger, Space Invaders Pt2 and Asteroids running by then.
Could do with a temporary loan of a tempest board.
Can anyone repair a super off road PCB? have 2 part working sets that need making into 1 good one.