Pacific Electric Sub-Station No. 14
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Pacific Electric Sub-Station No. 14 | |
.jpg) Pacific Electric Substation No. 14 | |
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| Location | 802 E. 5th St. Santa Ana, California |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 33°44′55″N 117°51′37″W / 33.74861°N 117.86028°W |
| Area | 0.1 acres (0.040 ha) |
| Built | 1907 |
| Built by | Pacific Electric Railway Construction Dept. |
| NRHP reference No. | 83001219[1] |
| Added to NRHP | September 22, 1983 |
The Pacific Electric Sub-Station No. 14 is a former traction substation in Santa Ana, California. It was built by the Pacific Electric Railway to provide electricity to run the railway's streetcars in central Orange County, California. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.
Electric trolley and interurban cars required 600 volts direct current (DC) to operate a car's DC traction motors. The function of a "substation" was to convert very high voltage alternating current (AC) from a power station, often miles away, for the necessary conversion to a lower voltage DC. High voltage AC entered the substation, was dropped to a lower voltage by a transformer, and then fed to a device called a Rotary Converter for the conversion to 600 volts DC. Substations were required on every trolley and interurban line in the United States and often still are for today's subway and light rail lines. Later the very large and cumbersome rotary converters, as much as eight feet (2.4 m) in diameter rotating and vibrating and requiring a human round-the-clock operator, were replaced by small package solid state converters with no operator.[2]
