I am installing 27 Monex credit card readers that are capable of doing 17 different forms of payment as of today and growing. They swipe, stab and do touch and go of virtually every card or wallet out there and consolidate the billing to just one account. The older generation of the competition required 3 different components to do what this guy does in a devise about the size of 2 playing card deck like Hoyle produces. Much of the install has gone well in the wash bays but on the commercial stainless steel vacuum cleaners the units boot get almost ready to go operational then click and start to reboot..the issue is the power . Needs to be 24VAC but nearly all 13 produce 28.3 to 29.5 VAC. I tried a doorbell transformer that is supposed to create 24 VAC but it too creates a little over 28 Of course what they're expecting is that you're going to run along distance of wire and that that thin wire over 50 ft you're going to have a drop and then it will likely be in the range that would work but these are not going more than a foot or two Do I buy 20 to 40 ft of wire and let nature take its course are do they make a buck down voltage regulator for VAC to vac like they do for DC to DC. I took a year of electronic in high school so I only know enough to be dangerous and the price tag on these units leaves me wanting to do it right.Advice?

 

You could use one of these to reduce the mains input voltage – or something similar to suit your local mains voltage/socket outlets.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/35491737...Flo7V4NiiQ4l2ZeKjJXgOfOdM=|tkp:Bk9SR-7yyLrGYg

 

For a cheaper solution, use a resistor rather than 40ft of wire.

If the current drawn is reasonably stable, you can calculate the required resistance value.

In your application you want to reduce the ac voltage by around 5V, if the current drawn is 50mA, then the required resistor value becomes 5/0.05 = 100Ω with a power rating of at least ¼ watt.

 

I’d be interested to know if the suggested plug-in dimmer, solves the issue.

If the credit card readers are located in close proximity, the dimmer could probably power more than 10.

 

I am installing 27 Monex credit card readers that are capable of doing 17 different forms of payment as of today and growing. They swipe, stab and do touch and go of virtually every card or wallet out there and consolidate the billing to just one account. The older generation of the competition required 3 different components to do what this guy does in a devise about the size of 2 playing card deck like Hoyle produces. Much of the install has gone well in the wash bays but on the commercial stainless steel vacuum cleaners the units boot get almost ready to go operational then click and start to reboot..the issue is the power . Needs to be 24VAC but nearly all 13 produce 28.3 to 29.5 VAC. I tried a doorbell transformer that is supposed to create 24 VAC but it too creates a little over 28 Of course what they're expecting is that you're going to run along distance of wire and that that thin wire over 50 ft you're going to have a drop and then it will likely be in the range that would work but these are not going more than a foot or two Do I buy 20 to 40 ft of wire and let nature take its course are do they make a buck down voltage regulator for VAC to vac like they do for DC to DC. I took a year of electronic in high school so I only know enough to be dangerous and the price tag on these units leaves me wanting to do it right.Advice?

Well I was wrong about it being over powdered in fact The problem it was having was that it's underpowered and a lot of people have had a similar experience with these ring doorbell cameras systems whenever you install one of those one of the first things that they want you to do is to put a bigger transformer on there that's got 40 VAC there's not up from 15 or 20 VAC you know that camera requires quite a bit of power to run it and same way on this card reader See the power source that's there already was just enough to run the timer and a simple coin acceptor which uses very little power so whenever we were adding on these card readers Well they got a LCD screen on them and they require a good bit of power so that's the problem they would do a red screen one of them did it immediately and the other two did it on day five and then about day seven all three eventually ended up doing it These are on some older vacuums Now the ones that I installed on newer more modern vacuums with a lot of bells and whistles on it will they had bigger transformers and bigger power supplies in them you know words breaking down from 115 volts down to 24 it was the amperage that it didn't have enough of so simply by changing the transformer to a higher VAC 40 cost me like 13 bucks on Amazon and that solved all the problems So I had forgotten all about this article but that's what it took problem solved and of course the people of Monex their troubleshooters are completely unaware It was news to them I'm like you got to be kidding me they've been selling these since 2019 come on I really like the product though it does the stab the swipe and the touch and go and does all kinds of wallets and every credit card you can think of.

 

It seems that using an adequate transformer with a suitable current capacity has not been mentioned.
The cheap junk transformers use wire that is not adequate to deliver the needed voltage without an excessive voltage drop. So getting a higher voltage to compensate for the internal voltage drop is burning all that wasted power creating heat,Many of the junk transformers also have an internal over-temperature cutout switch. So if it is acceptable for the card reader to only be usable 70% of the time that will be OK.
OTHERWISE, buy an adequately rated transformer from an electronics supplier and never need to replace it.

 

It seems that using an adequate transformer with a suitable current capacity has not been mentioned.
The cheap junk transformers use wire that is not adequate to deliver the needed voltage without an excessive voltage drop. So getting a higher voltage to compensate for the internal voltage drop is burning all that wasted power creating heat,Many of the junk transformers also have an internal over-temperature cutout switch. So if it is acceptable for the card reader to only be usable 70% of the time that will be OK.
OTHERWISE, buy an adequately rated transformer from an electronics supplier and never need to replace it.

Yes I bought transformers that have much higher VAC I think the previous ones were like 15 and the new one is 40 and much heavier of course there's constraints as to how large it can't be because there's only so much room inside of the housings and heat is especially an issue in Texas although many of them are underneath carports or metal building in the shade but it regularly reaches 105 in the shade in Texas so but the larger transformers was definitely the fix the card readers work flawlessly seemingly all the time I've yet to see one performing slow or dragging or having issues The Monex is definitely several generations of technology beyond anything we've had in the car wash industry the cryptocurrency setup was to do the same thing had three different components and you know there's just not room for all that so they have miniaturized it into one small reader with a LCD screen they're pretty cool now the expenses each month that they claimed we're going to be comparable to the competition is a bit of a stretch but that's not the concern this website appreciate the input I really do. I've had a little electronic training I'm old enough that I actually had a third class radio telephone license from the FCC which I let lapse about 20 years ago a lot of respect for what I'll leave y'all doing so keep up the good work gentlemen and ladies

 

A decent quality transformer is quite efficient and it will deliver the rated voltage at the rated load current. Usually that means that the output voltage will drop less than 3% between the no-load voltage and the rated current voltage. Transformer brands such as "Signal"and "Hevi-Duty" easily deliver that level of efficiency. And operating at full load rating they will get warm but not hot. Those that have the much greater voltage drop either do not use thick enough copper wire, or they do not have enough iron in the laminations, or maybe even both shortages. And I have even come across transformers with aluminum wire windings. Not certain how that would work, but I was never willing to try one and learn.