Power Draw Mini+  

RE: Power Draw Mini+

If your lights are flickering in your home you have more problems not related to your printer. The 150W power supply the Mini has is hardly a drain. If it is the lights in your home flickering you need to get an electrician in.

RE:

Well this is timely. 😆 The lights just flickered here due to high winds...which killed a print I was 90 minutes into. I was just thinking what requirements I'd need for a UPS to run my Mini.

RE: Power Draw Mini+

Oh no! Yes, definitely get something like an APC 1000, you can find them on Amazon.

RE: Power Draw Mini+

I'm in an apartment so that's not really an option...the landlord will just tell me to not run my printer. Did you get 150W from the back of the power supply or have you tested it with a reader?

Posted by: @distinctly-average

If your lights are flickering in your home you have more problems not related to your printer. The 150W power supply the Mini has is hardly a drain. If it is the lights in your home flickering you need to get an electrician in.

RE:

It is the rating of the PSU, no need to test there. It is the theoretical maximum the PSU can deliver. 

If your landlord doesn’t want to do anything about your iffy electricity supply then your landlord should be ashamed of themselves. What will they say next, you cannot use a kettle, microwave, heater or any other appliance that uses far more power than your printer. Even some laptops have a larger PSU than that. Honestly, if lights flicker when you use something with such a low pier drain there  is a fault in your apartment that should be addressed as a potential fire hazard. Flickering suggests a poor or loose connection, arcing at some point. When that happens heat is generated which can lead to fire. The repair could be as trivial as a screw needing tightening on the consumer unit or on a socket or switch. But any loos connection in home wiring is a potential source of heat. There are regulations in most countries regarding the quality of connections and tests on each circuit to ensure resistance is within set limits as a result. Any qualified electrician can quickly test this.

Try other devices in the same socket and at the first sign of flickering tell your landlord to do the responsible thing to protect their investment.

RE: Power Draw Mini+

Just to add. I am in the UK so it was a little pointless me doing wattage readings for you. While wattage would technically be the same, how I derive it using my dvm and clamp meter would give different figures. Still, both are 150w PSU 

So a quick Google lead me to a review on YouTube by 3DPrintedDebris called Prusa Mini Honest Review (30,000 Farm Hours). Not sure why he has to capitalise every word but that is Americans for you 😉

He tested with a wattage meter and it was 148 watts max whilst heating and around 40 watts whilst warming up. So not exactly a monster.

Thi problem you are getting is almost certainly mains side. Least likely is your PSU although in theory there could be a knackered solder joint on the mains side. Check to see if you hear any buzzing or arching sound directly from the PDU. Next would be the lead. These can get damage but you can usually see it on inspection. Check the connectors both ends for signs or any burning marks. Next and most probably is your wall outlet. That would need an electrician to check. Poor connections behind, worn or burnt contacts inside etc can all cause arching. Test the socket with another device or two, preferably one with a heating element such as a kettle or toaster. Try a few devices as those terrible sockets can be tight with one plug and less so with another. Finally, there could be a deeper issue with your mains. As Is said above, this concerns me. Any flickering of lights suggests something arching. That indicates high resistance which means heat. This heat can cause a fire and often does. Many a consumer unit has gone up in flames simply because the electrician didn’t tighten the screws well on the breakers. I know I said this above. The reason I have written another post is because it bothers me and I wouldn’t want to see you get hurt because of this. 

RE: Power Draw Mini+

I have my mini connected to a zwave smart switch that also measures the power usage:

But I'm with the others here, the problem isn't your printer, it's the mains. 150W is peanuts

RE:

I'm in the UK. So our mains is 240V. The power usage will be just the same though. Our appliances just draw half the current of appliances in the U.S. I have a plug-in power  meter which constantly shows the consumption of any device plugged into it. This was an interesting exercise for me. I can see that the power being drawn varies quite widely. If the printer is cold and I tell it to eject the filament, then I see 150W on the meter whilst it warms up. At other times it is much less than this. I just started printing a model. Whilst it was slowly putting down the first layer I saw the usage was only 40W. Now it is has speeded up and is printing the rest of the model, the usage is between 60 and 90W. I had assumed the power usage to be a few hundred watts. So to see these low levels is quite pleasing.