Typhoon' Pedring’ shuts down Metro Manila

Typhoon revives memories of ‘Ondoy’

Government and business operations on Tuesday came to a standstill in Metro Manila as howling winds and rains of Typhoon “Pedring” unleashed flash floods, kept millions of people indoors and forced patients in one hospital to evacuate.

The latest typhoon to hit the country did not even spare one of Manila’s five-star hotels, flooding the restaurant and basement of the Sofitel Philippine Plaza and breaking hotel windows.

Cars parked outside the hotel drifted in the floodwaters as helpless attendants watched. All guests were evacuated safely to nearby hotels.

Roxas Boulevard seemed like an extension of the bay as Pedring (international name: Nesat) submerged it in knee-deep water. The strong waves and the high tide destroyed street lamps and washed out embedded stone tile floorings on the sidewalks.

Some areas along Manila Bay suffered their worst flooding in decades.

Some 20,000 people fled their homes in Marikina City and Manila as Pedring sideswiped the metropolis of 12 million residents with winds of 120 kilometers per hour, stirring memories of Tropical Storm “Ondoy,” which ravaged parts of the capital two years ago and left nearly 500 dead.

At least five people were killed in Metro Manila in the wake of Pedring.

Read more here.

And this story about Wide areas of Luzon without electricity due to Pedring winds—Meralco

I've never known a year quite like this in Marikina City. Our family there and our house have already been significantly affected a number of times so far.
We have not been able to contact anyone there so far, just hope they are safe and well.
Also hope I don't have another bif hit for house repairs.
I've said it before, but this house is now costing just too much. But what can we do? We have a family living there.

Hello,I am a relatively new member to British Filipinos.I saw your thread after I put POWER TOOLS into the search engine, I will be coming out to Philippines, Negros Oriental , in a few months,I want to take my power tools out with me or rather send them out by BB,
I am worried about the power situation , My power tools are for UK use and rated at 220-240 volts @ 50Htz, I see in the Philippines the electric power is 220 volts @60Htz.My question is do you have overheating problems with your British power tools.Are you able to use your power tools out there OK
I have seen some power tools offered for sale on OLX/Sulit.com the Philippines equivalent to Ebay, those power tools were 50Htz, same as UK, but I could not see if they were selling them because they did not work on PH electric.
sorry for the long winded post
regards
Tony

http://www.szpowerdrive.com/news/50hz-transformer-running-on-60hz-power-supply.htm

Hi Tony, I'm using an UK power drill on my house in the Ph, works fine, so any other power appliance should work. Also have a tv from the UK, that too works fine.

I haven't tried it, but the quality of power tools (generally Chinese made) available in the Philippines is such that I would want to take mine from the UK.

An AC motor running on 60hz AC will run, or try to run, 20% faster, of course.
With domestic equipment like washing machines and fridges this isn't a problem, as the fan also runs 20% faster, but as you say with power tools it may be an issue.

When drydocking ships and connecting to shore power on "the other frequency" we use a converter but this is a big expensive and troublesome bit of kit as ships have pretty massive electric motors fitted to lots of kit.

I think you should be OK, but if you are thinking of big tools getting three phase may be an issue.

Solely in terms of voltage there's usually no major problem for many items.

Plenty of people have sent electrical items to Phils without issues.

But, in terms of domestic appliances there is some caution needed that you should be aware of.

UK electricty supply is 240V@50Hz (technically specified at 230 V +10% /- 6%).
Philippine electricity supply is 220V@60Hz (sorry no idea on the technical spec even if there is one which I very much doubt when I hear my electric fan speed up and down from time to time)

Problems might crop up due these differences in frequency.

When the required power is low, say for example less than 50 Watts, then it's virtually a plug and play scenario.
There's also plenty of domestic equipment and 'gadgets' such as computers, chargers for phones and camera's etc that are actually designed to work safely with a range of input voltages and frequencies.

When this is the case it will almost certainly be indicated somewher on the equipment, transformer or the adapter.

It's interesting to see by simple calculation, { [(60Hz – 50 Hz)/ 50 Hz] * 100 = 20 % } that plenty of appliances/equipment will run 20 % faster than their normal rated speed. This may not always be safe if insulation and windings burn-out.

There's also quite a large range of equipment these days that have some or other form of electronic timer or micro-processor control system in-built
These devices will, at best, run 20% faster than they are designed for. This may or may not be a problem, but it certainly makes electronic alarm clocks pointless and you'll also need to develop new recipes and cooking times for your electric breadmaker or microwave

Some larger items (eg washing machines etc) may well work without major issues for a time and others will very soon not work at all. Depends on the motor configuration and internal wiring.
All similar 'motor-driven' appliances are going run 20% faster and produce an equivalent increase in heat output. Period.

My advice would be to seriously consider the likelihood of problems, the age of the equipment and cost of shipping versus the cost of buying new in Philippines.

Always double-check. Not only for the protection of the equipment but also for the safety of home and body.

Lots of domestic electronics will be able to automatically adapt to operate on either 50Hz or 60Hz frequency, but there are still many that won't.
Newish TV's are more likely to automatically adapt, if it doesn't, the different frequency is going to impact the refresh rate and picture quality.
Also, many newish TV's have built in capability to switch from PAL to NTSC, but not all. Do your research, ask the manufacturer and discover how the 'switch' works if it's not included in the set-up menu.

All of my power tools are working fine so far without problems. My circular saw works hard but does get hot so I just allow it cool down before setting off again.

Finally, read the instructions and technical specification

My Samsung TV plasma bought in 2006 then took it to Philippine's last year, works fine did not even change the setting.

We shipped our Hitachi plasma screen in 2007 to family and it still being used today.
We took the gamble despite being informed that plasma screen TV wasn't shipping proof without specific and expensive packing and handling.

No probs.
Since 2007 we've shipped over 8 TV's
Some worked fine others only work for games DVD Karaoke etc

nOT USE

Not used it with the tuners, only satellite and cable. Don't think tuners would work, different altogether.

Will a projector work in PH, thinking of buying one in UK, seen some here but they only give one weeks warranty.

latest model projector, HDMI, etc. To connect a DVD player and satellite digital box. seen in Ph with HDMI. But the warranty one week puts me off.

Most electrical components are configured for 50/60 Hz and 220/240v so should be OK
Plenty of components get hot here.
I get hot here too

Warranties here are mostly a bit of a joke really. As you say around 7 days from the retailer.
Anything shipped over from UK is best covered by a worldwide warranty. Some stuff is but some stuff isn't. Check with the retailer.
My Pioneer AV receiver was covered by a worldwide warranty for 12 months from date of purchase. I missed the deadline by 1 month and they would touch it.
It still works, kind of. If it gets switched off or we have a power-outage it's the devils own job to get it to stay on more than a few seconds. I usually spend around 30 minutes messing with it.