TED 5004-G (The Energy Detective) Includes Four Measuring Units for Homes with Four Breaker Panels or Wind/Solar Installations

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Product Feature
- Four measuring units for homes with four breaker panels or wind/solar
- Receive instant feedback every second to lower bills and save money
- View interactive Footprints Software on your computer or Smartphone
- Package includes one Gateway and four MTU/CTs
- TED 5004-G is compatible with one (200 AMP or less) breaker panel
Product Description
The power to Save! All TED 5000 series models include interactive software embedded in the Gateway to store up to 10 years of energy usage information. The TED 5004-G comes with all the necessary hardware for monitoring energy usage from four different power sources. The package includes four MTUs (Measuring Transmitting Units), four CTUs (Current Transformer Sets) and one Gateway with the embedded Footprints software. The TED 5004-G is perfect for homes with: four electrical panels, single electrical panel and three wind/solar inverters, two electrical panels and two wind/solar inverters, three electrical panels and one wind/solar inverter, and a single electrical panel and three subpanels. The TED 5004-G is compatible with net metering installations and independent monitoring of subpanels. This package DOES NOT include the wireless display. The CTUs clamp around your wire conductors and connect directly to the MTUs, which transmits energy usage data directly to the Gateway. The Gateway stores and graphs the data from each MTU separately, but your total energy usage can also be viewed in the aggregate as well. Data can be displayed locally on your home computer, but it also can be accessed remotely via an internet connection (IP) on the web or compatible mobile phone (Smartphone) application.TED 5004-G (The Energy Detective) Includes Four Measuring Units for Homes with Four Breaker Panels or Wind/Solar Installations Review
When I bought this unit I was aware that some people have had problems with the MTU to gateway communications. I took the chance because the TED provides the most effective cost for capability if you need to handle some individual circuits and generation circuits. I've had some times when MTUs stopped working or communications have been interrupted, but usually these last less than 15 min to 1 hour. I can't provide any guarantees that something may not stop working later, but so far the reliability has been reasonable. I have been up and running for about 2.5 months now.Although I would have preferred a product that can handle more circuits, those more robust solutions were at least $700. The options are much more limited around the price of the TED. If you don't need to measure generation circuits there are cheaper options, especially if you are only watching 1-2 circuits. I can't speak to accuracy except to note that my generation circuit closely matches the independent report from the PV inverters, except for some reason I have a .85 kWh/day surplus on the TED (this does not vary with the power generated and may be due to crosstalk with other circuits or something similar).
I have found the TED software to provide useful information and logging. The web page it generates displays fine on the iPad, Mac, and Windows browsers, and I've exported data through their interface on each platform as well. I find I use the "day so far" and "month so far" data more than the instantaneous readouts. After a little troubleshooting using online resources it is also reporting consistently to myeragy.com (use the Eragy support forums as well as the TED forums for help from both sides). I have no comment on the load profiler as I haven't tried to use it, partly because no one else reports success.
I used an electrician for the initial install to make sure there were no problems, but after seeing what he did I have confidently moved the MTUs to different circuits multiple times. If you are comfortable opening your own electrical panel the installation is straightforward. You should learn about A and B circuits if you want to combine multiple circuits in one MTU.
I would recommend that you don't pay for the display unit. I got one anyway due to a packing error by the manufacturer. It is handy to have, but freezes frequently, has battery and range problems if out of the stand, and has a cheap flimsy plastic case. If I had paid the $40 difference for it I would not be happy.
As a last observation, if you are considering your first whole-house real-time monitoring system and currently have no usage info, it is definitely worth it (not in money but in knowledge). You will be surprised to see the spikes and variation from different devices. In combination with a Kill-a-Watt (I have a P4460) you can quickly learn to recognize usage from refrigerators, pumps, water heaters, and heat pumps, and determine if those or other devices are responsible for the majority of your electricity usage.
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