Open neutral

I recently lost the neutral between the pole pig and my meter. I had 67VAC on one side and over 160VAC on the other. I heard loud frying sounds as multiple surge supressors died, along with circuit breakers tripping. The break has. Been repaired, but I only have a couple working circuits. I lost my A/C and I only have a few working lights. I need to replace the service. I plan to move it underground. No Internet, phone or TV for almost a month now. The open neutral damage the CATV line when the neutral current was shunted through it. I have very poor cell service here. I hope that this gets posted. It was 98 degrees in my bedroom the other night. No sleeping in that. I had to take a nap in my truck with the engine running so that I could use its A/C.

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You have my sympathy. That's both damaging and difficult to recognize in time.

In my case the resistance to the meter grounding stake and buried water pipe was low enough to keep the 'phases' balanced most of the time. I first noticed a fluorescent light buzzing when the refrigerator started. Voltage measurements showed a solid 240V across the phases and only small fluctuations in the 120V.

I don't have two outlets on opposite phases close enough together to compare their voltages with multimeters so I built a box with two analog AC voltmeters (from Variacs) and power cords long enough to reach between rooms whose outlets were on opposite phases (which I had mapped). It plainly showed the simultaneous dip in one phase and rise in the other, to as much as 180V momentarily when the fridge compressor drew starting current from the other phase. Digital voltmeters may not respond fast enough to catch starting surges.

The evidence that convinced the power company to replace the outside drop and meter box was a clamp-on ammeter reading of 30A flowing through a water pipe. They cleaned the neutral lug coming into the meter box, and when that didn't cure it they replaced the weatherhead and meter box.

My long term monitoring solution is this meter that I boxed and wired to a GFI-equipped outlet strip to display the load on my solar system inverter. When not on solar power it shows the voltage and current of the appliances I operate on the stove, like the coffee pot or slow cooker. It can check for degraded wiring connections by plugging it into one side of a duplex outlet and the 1000 Watt coffee pot into the other.

jsw

Poor soil and no metal pipes around here. Looks like at least a few thousand dollars to make repairs.

Probably way ahead of me... but if that was the Power Companys side of the equipment they should be responsible for any damage caused by a failure...

Not according to them. Some vines had grown up to them. They don't trim anything past the pole pig. The homeowner bas to do or have it done.

IMO you're in lawsuit territory now. Having the consumer maintain anything around high-voltage wires is not what they promote in all their public messages...

I was told that they will disco.ect your service for a day and drop the line on the ground so that you can remove trees and vines.

PPL electric around here, from the weatherhead on down is the homeowners, service drop to pole is theirs.

I had an Anchor brand meter base fail, fixed it on my dime. BTW Anchor meter bases have a 100% failure rate.

If one ground rod is not suffcient use two. Then they recommend copper sulfate soultion to soak the ground or a large copper plate at least 3 feet deep underground.

Remove 333 to reply. Randy

Grounding is difficult in many areas of Florida. Sand over limestone and dry. They repaired the drop, the real damage was indoors.

The good news is that your AC runs mostly off of 240 V, and all those components (compressor, fan motors) should be fine. Probably the control transformers are fried, that should be a relatively inexpensive fix.

Many computers and LCD monitors should accept anything between 86 and 265 V, if they don't have voltage selector switches. Anything with a wall-wart will at least need a new wall wart power supply (if on the high phase).

Jon

Unless, like virtually ALL of mine, they are SMPS warts which ALSO work from 84 to 240 volts - - -

It was a 120VAC window AC. It won't even turn on its fan. The computer and monitor were still working at 67VAC.

Sorry to hear that. A friend in Denver just had this issue in the apartment he moved into last week. He bought two

meters which made it quite clear.

At my advice he used the words "Open Neutral" and "Fire Hazard" on the ticket. He also unplugged everything not run by UPS & logged UPS input voltage every which made it quite clear.

The electrician took one look and called the PoCo. They responded ~4 hours later. They soon found poorly torqued neutrals in the 14 meter panel/ main disconnect.

The two phases then stayed equal and stable.

On your losses, check your homeowner's insurance coverage.

I already had one of those. It isn't very accurate. I drilled a tiny hole in the back of the case to adjust the calibration pot, without having to open it again.

I reported it to Duke Energy as an open Neutral. They canceled the order, because the so called 'smart' meter showed 245 volts. I threatened to turn them over to the Florida PUCO if they did it a second time. The woman told me that it was only logged as an outage. I told her that I didn't care what their computer showed, I had given the same information both times. Tat time they showed up. Te bare neutral was arcing on the Triplex service drop where it had cracked and separated. I saved one end of the broken conductor, for evidence.

The electrician the building hired was no dummy. Maxwell told me the first thing he did was plug both meters into one socket to check if they agreed. They did.

(I suspect even before that, he knew it was an open neutral, but it was the right test to run.)