Nearly burned down my home due to mining farm (tips on how to stay safe )

[Skaterdiejosh]

This is exactly why I installed a 50 amp breaker in my panel and im running the wires tonight after work. This is pretty much the only way to continue to mine bitcoin at today's levels. 15 amp breakers on your normal outlets is a huge fire risk on anything over 2000 watts. It's not only the miners that is the problem its overloading the wires in your wall wich can catch the whole house on fire...  Also you can run your power supplies at 240 volts wich is more efficient and will produce less heat ...

I'm interested in your power config here.  Are you running multiple lines off the same 50 amp breaker or several lines off several 50 amp breakers?  How are you setting that up?

Im running 8/3 gauge wire to a 8 outlet 240 volt plug in box that my power supplies will connect into. Im also thinking about picking up a 40 amp fused disconnect box like what you would use for a hot tub power setup, that will be installed befor the outlet box. I work as a industrial electrician so my set up might be a little over kill but it will allow me to run at least 5000 watts of mining power...  After all the miners are running on the 240 volt supply all you have to do is put a amp meter on the line and find out what you current draw is to figure out the size of fuses to install in the disconnect . The calculation is pretty simple ..

Total line Amps x 1.50 = size of fuses to install to protect wire feed incase of overload or power supply failure.
 You can also do the calculation at 1.25 if you want to be even more on the safe side

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[Sydboy]

wow this is certainly something I will be looking into more with my own setup.
I now have alot of reading to do i wanted to go to bed.. its 3am..

i've got 6 290's burning, well I should not say burning anymore. Mining perhaps is a better word for them.
no fires yet!

[ionux]

This is exactly why I installed a 50 amp breaker in my panel and im running the wires tonight after work. This is pretty much the only way to continue to mine bitcoin at today's levels. 15 amp breakers on your normal outlets is a huge fire risk on anything over 2000 watts. It's not only the miners that is the problem its overloading the wires in your wall wich can catch the whole house on fire...  Also you can run your power supplies at 240 volts wich is more efficient and will produce less heat ...

I'm interested in your power config here.  Are you running multiple lines off the same 50 amp breaker or several lines off several 50 amp breakers?  How are you setting that up?

Im running 8/3 gauge wire to a 8 outlet 240 volt plug in box that my power supplies will connect into. Im also thinking about picking up a 40 amp fused disconnect box like what you would use for a hot tub power setup, that will be installed befor the outlet box. I work as a industrial electrician so my set up might be a little over kill but it will allow me to run at least 5000 watts of mining power...  After all the miners are running on the 240 volt supply all you have to do is put a amp meter on the line and find out what you current draw is to figure out the size of fuses to install in the disconnect . The calculation is pretty simple ..

Total line Amps x 1.50 = size of fuses to install to protect wire feed incase of overload or power supply failure.
 You can also do the calculation at 1.25 if you want to be even more on the safe side

Oh ok, cool.  So you're running a single line of 8/3 gauge wire to an 8-outlet 240v plug.  From there, are you plugging your power supplies directly into the 8-outlet plug or do you use power strips or a UPS in between?  Can you even use power strips or UPS's on a 240v line?  Shows what I know about wiring..lol

[Skaterdiejosh]

This is exactly why I installed a 50 amp breaker in my panel and im running the wires tonight after work. This is pretty much the only way to continue to mine bitcoin at today's levels. 15 amp breakers on your normal outlets is a huge fire risk on anything over 2000 watts. It's not only the miners that is the problem its overloading the wires in your wall wich can catch the whole house on fire...  Also you can run your power supplies at 240 volts wich is more efficient and will produce less heat ...

I'm interested in your power config here.  Are you running multiple lines off the same 50 amp breaker or several lines off several 50 amp breakers?  How are you setting that up?

Im running 8/3 gauge wire to a 8 outlet 240 volt plug in box that my power supplies will connect into. Im also thinking about picking up a 40 amp fused disconnect box like what you would use for a hot tub power setup, that will be installed befor the outlet box. I work as a industrial electrician so my set up might be a little over kill but it will allow me to run at least 5000 watts of mining power...  After all the miners are running on the 240 volt supply all you have to do is put a amp meter on the line and find out what you current draw is to figure out the size of fuses to install in the disconnect . The calculation is pretty simple ..

Total line Amps x 1.50 = size of fuses to install to protect wire feed incase of overload or power supply failure.
 You can also do the calculation at 1.25 if you want to be even more on the safe side

Oh ok, cool.  So you're running a single line of 8/3 gauge wire to an 8-outlet 240v plug.  From there, are you plugging your power supplies directly into the 8-outlet plug or do you use power strips or a UPS in between?  Can you even use power strips or UPS's on a 240v line?  Shows what I know about wiring..lol

  To tell you the truth im not doing it exactly to code lol !! Im actually just using industrial grade 120 volt outlets that the power supplies can directly plug into with out having to chop the cords and put a huge 240 volt plug on it !! Each power supply dont pull that much current, not nothing like a dryer would so you can get away with it. So basically the 120 volt outlets will just be supplied with 240 volts instead of 120. Just make sure you make it clear that its 240 volt plugs dont plug in a 120 volt fan or anything on accident lol ...  I also highly recommend the fuse box or atleast some inline fuses that will give you added protection. Remember that 50 or 60 amp breaker you install won't trip untill it goes over the Amp rating.. That could be enough current draw to hurt your power supplies or miners in the case of a short,overload or failure of anyway...

[tzortz]

I want to see a burnt miner.

Pictures please.

[tzortz]

What temps do you run your antminers (s1) at??
Always wonder, my ones showed ~64C on average however, when touching the heat sink it was like touching the asicminer 333mh usbs :/
Have you had the same experience??
Thanks,
JT

64C ??

[zvs]

I had a 20ft 16 gauge extension cord that melted, but didnt catch on fire or anything....  uh, the socket of the power supply or whatever melted out.  

I use 12 gauge 50' extension cords now.  these:

http://www.lowes.com/pd_67439-16503-UTP511830_4294722561__?productId=3203689&Ntt=12+gauge&pl=1&currentURL=%3FNtt%3D12%2Bgauge&facetInfo=

except when I bought them they were only $50/ea.

oh, this was just from your typical household socket here in the US (rated for 15 amps)

[hammo]

I very good lesson for all of us. I guess it's only a matter of time before something like this hits the mainstream news as another blight on bitcoin.

[NuSalvo]

Sounds like you had bad wiring in your house, and once you put a constant 80%+ amp load on the circuit the wiring heated up and eventually caught.

Just because it ran for a week doesn't mean your OK, you need to make sure you don't exceed 70-80% of the circuit amperage.

I've seen many houses in my area catch on fire from electric heaters.  Those big ones pull 8A - 15A alone from the socket and easily overloads it.

[phillipsjk]

 To tell you the truth im not doing it exactly to code lol !! Im actually just using industrial grade 120 volt outlets that the power supplies can directly plug into with out having to chop the cords and put a huge 240 volt plug on it !! Each power supply dont pull that much current, not nothing like a dryer would so you can get away with it. So basically the 120 volt outlets will just be supplied with 240 volts instead of 120. Just make sure you make it clear that its 240 volt plugs dont plug in a 120 volt fan or anything on accident lol ...  

They do make North-American 240V power connectors that are not much larger than the 120Volt connectors. Not sure what premium the power supply cables with a 240V plug would carry though (If you are an electrician, you would be able to just replace the plug).

Somebody up-thread was talking about 2 30 Amp PDUs on a 50Amp breaker. I suspect it would not be too hard to find a 20Amp breaker for one of the PDUs.

[Anon136]

thank god you are still alive. not just for your own sake either. if you had died than the government would have ceased the opportunity to ban bitcoin saying "sorry we had to ban it but its only for your own safety, you have to understand, bitcoin burns people alive".

[tzortz]

thank god you are still alive. not just for your own sake either. if you had died than the government would have ceased the opportunity to ban bitcoin saying "sorry we had to ban it but its only for your own safety, you have to understand, bitcoin burns people alive".

I think I have read that already somewhere...

[spazzdla]

That's why it's very important to use high quality a-brand PSU's and not let them run 24/7 at 80%+ load.

So widly over size my PSU.. done.

[phillipsjk]

That's why it's very important to use high quality a-brand PSU's and not let them run 24/7 at 80%+ load.

So widly over size my PSU.. done.

Don't forget the "high quality" part. Cheap PSUs tend to have inflated ratings.

I bought the smallest capacity PSU I could find (380W) and am still nowhere near 80% load (drawing less than 200W).

I suspect you can run a quality PSU at 100% 12V load as long as you do not exceed the limits of the 12V rail. For example, My PSU (without checking) probably allows only 300W to be drawn on the 12V line. The other 8OW would be from the 5 and 3.3 Volt lines.
 

[windpath]

This is what i call https://i.imgur.com/dzcQ0F3.jpg burned miners ;-).

Wow, source?

[ibminer]

I feel like I want to see some pictures of your burned miners to see where the overload or overheating occurred. I am happy it didn't actually burn your house down or get hurt. This definitely should be a fear for most household miners. I had 4 cubes simultaneously running since they had first come out until a few months ago when I turned them off. The cubes themselves never got too hot but the cheap PSU's I had powering them would get hot cables due to me running them on a single rail. I ultimately changed the PSU's out when they died (somewhat quickly) and never had an issue with them after that, although they did occasionally blow a fuse.

Out of curiosity, were you running the cubes overclocked?

[windpath]

Source? My OWN miners ;-(. And this is just 1 building. Had another 2 buildings burned to the ground.

Wow, that really sucks!

What was the source of the fire?

Where was the mine located?

Any other photos?

Plans to rebuild?

[ibminer]

Do you see cubes in my Photo? Those are all spondoolies sp30. ITS a 5MW facility that burned down to the ground. Not a house. I have helped keeping the last difficulty jump down by putting off some peta hashes ;-).

Well I appreciate your help with keeping the difficulty down but my post was directed towards the OP and those cubes  

However, if you have burned down 3 places, you may want to add in some remote cameras and sensors for temperature monitoring into the budget??    
Seems like a pretty large loss of equipment..... were all 3 places loaded with these sp30's?

[mavericklm]

Barbeque much?
Some ps30 look ok on the outside!

[MacDuro]

That's what I call an expensive bbq !