Where my electricians at?

The Green Goat

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So I have an odd situation with my house that I can't quite figure out. This is going to be a lengthy run-up to my question, but, a little background:

~7 years ago, either my house (built in 2002) or something in my backyard was struck by lightning. It hit hard enough to lift me about a foot off the bed. When that happened, some 'odd' things happened directly after the strike. My living room TV got smoked. My garage door opener got smoked. My house alarm went off (wasn't armed). And I have one of those 9v sump pump alarms sitting next to my sump pit (on a concrete floor) in the basement (not on a circuit) that got fried with the alarm stuck on (it never got wet). So, fixed the TV, replaced the garage door opener, turned off the house alarm, and never could quite figure out where the strike hit exactly. I put it out of mind.

~Fast forward to last year when I was hanging some shelves in my garage. Using a stud finder that senses electrical current, I lag-bolted the shelves into the studs. During this project, for whatever reason, I passed one of those electricity-sensing probes over some drywall, and the whole sheet alarmed that there was live electricity near it; odd. So, I plugged one of those dummy receptacle testers into one of the garage outlets (all on the same circuit) and it showed an 'open neutral'. So, I got a bit paranoid that I ran a lag bolt threw some Romex. I tested all the continuity on that circuit that I could and none of it failed, so I'm 99% this wasn't something I screwed up. During this testing, I shut the breaker off to the garage. I was pulling one of the light switches out that is on that same circuit and while I had my screwdriver in there, I touched both the ground and neutral together and it sparked just a little. So I'm thinking, that's odd, this circuit breaker is off. So I do some further investigating and sure enough, there's still voltage on that ground; ~18ish volts. I talk it over with my father, who's an old retired electrician and he seemed to think the original electrician didn't put in a good enough grounding rod for the house. The house main ground appears to be tied into the tiny telephone grounding rod. I noticed when it rained really hard around here, the circuit had zero volts on it, but if the ground was dry, it would carry some volts. I assumed it was because the wet ground provided a better conductor to dissipate any charge on the ground. I got busy with other projects and never got around to putting in a proper grounding rod but will eventually do so. That being said, putting in a grounding rod seemed like a bandaid solution to me when what really bothered me was that the ground had a charge on it at all. Where was this charge coming from? I never could figure it out.

~Fast forward to last week and I'm installing a new septic aerator timer as the old one broke. Simple enough project. So, I shut off the breaker to this timer and for good measure, probe the wires to make sure it's dead. Turns out, it's not. It's still carrying 18ish volts on this 'dead' circuit. Now that I'm reminded this was a problem I had forgotten about, I'm determined to sort it out because it doesn't sound safe. Since the timer is right next to my breaker panel, I decide to start switching off circuit by circuit to find the culprit. Low and behold, it's the 60A circuit that feeds my pole barn in my backyard (where I think the lightning struck). When the barn circuit is on, the whole house carries ~18v on the ground. When the barn breaker is off, the whole house ground is 0v. So something isn't right with the barn wiring, it appears.

I initially thought that maybe the cable between the house and the barn (buried in plastic conduit) got messed up by the lightning. So, I disconnected the cable from both the house and the barn panel and ran a continuity test on the neutral and ground wires. Neither shows any compromise as far as I can tell.

I don't have anything plugged into the barn that would feed a charge. So at this point, I'm at a loss. Any idea where this mystery charge could be coming from? It's an odd voltage and varies a little bit depending on when and where I check it.

Sorry for the long post, but I thought it needed some background context.

Thoughts?
 
Phantomhunter1

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Im not an electrician, but do a lot of electrical work with large pumps and have wired quite a few barns, dryers, and such. Sounds like you have at least narrowed it down to the barn circuit. The barn panel would be a sub panel. The ground and neutral in that panel should NOT be bonded like your house panel. Maybe check that first. The neutral bar should be isolated from the panel and the ground bar attached to the panel with a ground rod connected to it as well. Also if you think the barn was struck by the lightning I would check that panel over very well and make sure nothing got melted together.
 
Russ989

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So I have an odd situation with my house that I can't quite figure out. This is going to be a lengthy run-up to my question, but, a little background:

~7 years ago, either my house (built in 2002) or something in my backyard was struck by lightning. It hit hard enough to lift me about a foot off the bed. When that happened, some 'odd' things happened directly after the strike. My living room TV got smoked. My garage door opener got smoked. My house alarm went off (wasn't armed). And I have one of those 9v sump pump alarms sitting next to my sump pit (on a concrete floor) in the basement (not on a circuit) that got fried with the alarm stuck on (it never got wet). So, fixed the TV, replaced the garage door opener, turned off the house alarm, and never could quite figure out where the strike hit exactly. I put it out of mind.

~Fast forward to last year when I was hanging some shelves in my garage. Using a stud finder that senses electrical current, I lag-bolted the shelves into the studs. During this project, for whatever reason, I passed one of those electricity-sensing probes over some drywall, and the whole sheet alarmed that there was live electricity near it; odd. So, I plugged one of those dummy receptacle testers into one of the garage outlets (all on the same circuit) and it showed an 'open neutral'. So, I got a bit paranoid that I ran a lag bolt threw some Romex. I tested all the continuity on that circuit that I could and none of it failed, so I'm 99% this wasn't something I screwed up. During this testing, I shut the breaker off to the garage. I was pulling one of the light switches out that is on that same circuit and while I had my screwdriver in there, I touched both the ground and neutral together and it sparked just a little. So I'm thinking, that's odd, this circuit breaker is off. So I do some further investigating and sure enough, there's still voltage on that ground; ~18ish volts. I talk it over with my father, who's an old retired electrician and he seemed to think the original electrician didn't put in a good enough grounding rod for the house. The house main ground appears to be tied into the tiny telephone grounding rod. I noticed when it rained really hard around here, the circuit had zero volts on it, but if the ground was dry, it would carry some volts. I assumed it was because the wet ground provided a better conductor to dissipate any charge on the ground. I got busy with other projects and never got around to putting in a proper grounding rod but will eventually do so. That being said, putting in a grounding rod seemed like a bandaid solution to me when what really bothered me was that the ground had a charge on it at all. Where was this charge coming from? I never could figure it out.

~Fast forward to last week and I'm installing a new septic aerator timer as the old one broke. Simple enough project. So, I shut off the breaker to this timer and for good measure, probe the wires to make sure it's dead. Turns out, it's not. It's still carrying 18ish volts on this 'dead' circuit. Now that I'm reminded this was a problem I had forgotten about, I'm determined to sort it out because it doesn't sound safe. Since the timer is right next to my breaker panel, I decide to start switching off circuit by circuit to find the culprit. Low and behold, it's the 60A circuit that feeds my pole barn in my backyard (where I think the lightning struck). When the barn circuit is on, the whole house carries ~18v on the ground. When the barn breaker is off, the whole house ground is 0v. So something isn't right with the barn wiring, it appears.

I initially thought that maybe the cable between the house and the barn (buried in plastic conduit) got messed up by the lightning. So, I disconnected the cable from both the house and the barn panel and ran a continuity test on the neutral and ground wires. Neither shows any compromise as far as I can tell.

I don't have anything plugged into the barn that would feed a charge. So at this point, I'm at a loss. Any idea where this mystery charge could be coming from? It's an odd voltage and varies a little bit depending on when and where I check it.

Sorry for the long post, but I thought it needed some background context.

Thoughts?
If you have sub panel in the barn, check the voltage on your grounding rod at the house as you kill each circuit out there. I would guess there’s an issue on one of the neutrals.
 
Russ989

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Im not an electrician, but do a lot of electrical work with large pumps and have wired quite a few barns, dryers, and such. Sounds like you have at least narrowed it down to the barn circuit. The barn panel would be a sub panel. The ground and neutral in that panel should NOT be bonded like your house panel. Maybe check that first. The neutral bar should be isolated from the panel and the ground bar attached to the panel with a ground rod connected to it as well. Also if you think the barn was struck by the lightning I would check that panel over very well and make sure nothing got melted together.
Sound advice. 👏
 
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Im not an electrician, but do a lot of electrical work with large pumps and have wired quite a few barns, dryers, and such. Sounds like you have at least narrowed it down to the barn circuit. The barn panel would be a sub panel. The ground and neutral in that panel should NOT be bonded like your house panel. Maybe check that first. The neutral bar should be isolated from the panel and the ground bar attached to the panel with a ground rod connected to it as well. Also if you think the barn was struck by the lightning I would check that panel over very well and make sure nothing got melted together.
what he said - and just ohm testing a cable is just a quick check - really need to hit it with a megger to make sure there is no slight earth leakage high impedance ground. same for that barn panel.
 
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All kidding aside, Im not an electrician, just an HVAC and Generator tech and deal with my fair share of electrical. Id check the sub panel like in post#2. You have an issue with your ground/neutral. U should not have voltage at either. Something is most likely melted and touching not enough to trip breakers. Also, Id re do that ground with a new rod and separate it from the phone ground. This is on top of the other issue that can elevate other problemS.
 
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A few years ago a buddy had a budget remodel done and had issues with floating grounds/live grounds. Turned out some of the outlets had the neutral and hot wires switched during the remodel. Food for thought.
 
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You should have ground rods for the sub panel at the barn as well. This may have stopped the surge from making it to the house panel when the strike occurred. That's all I got.
☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻THIS☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻
 
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The Green Goat

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You should have ground rods for the sub panel at the barn as well. This may have stopped the surge from making it to the house panel when the strike occurred. That's all I got.
Yup. Barn sub panel does have a grounding rod.
 
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The old phone systems had voltage either 36 volts or 18 volts. Might be a coincidence.
Change the breaker that feeds to the barn and check for ghost voltage (I have seen breakers do this)
Disconnect your sub-panel at the barn and see if you still get the ghost voltage.
Disconnect the feed (same breaker you just changed) to the barn at your house panel and check for ghost voltage.
Since you have the house alarm turned off, try disconnecting it from power completely.
 
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If you have a sub panel in the barn you might try to isolate the floating voltage. Can you run your voltage check against each barn circuit to isolate the voltage ?
You might have to go outlet by outlet on the circuits to find the cross (melted?) source?
 
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The Green Goat

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what he said - and just ohm testing a cable is just a quick check - really need to hit it with a megger to make sure there is no slight earth leakage high impedance ground. same for that barn panel.


My father mentioned this years ago when the house/barn/whatever got struck by lightning. He even mentioned at the time that lightning has a way of F-ing things up in funny sorts of ways. Never could find anyone to run the test for me and he no longer had his since he retired.

Update as of today- I checked all the voltages in the barn and found something odd. One hot from the house into the barn is ~110v, the other is 140v. So, after talking to him again today, best guess is that there is some insulation breakdown in the cable between the house panel and the barn panel.

Little bits of the story are starting to make more sense. Several years ago I bought a brand new Delta table saw. It lasted for about 2 years out in the barn before the motor bit the dust. I chalked it up to moisture in the uninsulated barn, however, after discovering this voltage mix up, I'm almost betting that's what smoked it.

I just priced out some wire to replace what is probably bad. I would like a 100a service instead of the 60a that's there, so I priced out (3) 2AWG wire x 150ft + (1) 6AWG ground..........Holy crap. Over $2k just for wire!?!?!?!? Didn't realize that stuff was that pricey.

Just searched Slamazon for a megger and Klein tools makes a 1000v version for a reasonable price. Hopefully 1000v is enought. I might pick one of those up just to make sure the insulation is truly bad before I spend a couple grand replacing it.
 
Squeegee

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My father mentioned this years ago when the house/barn/whatever got struck by lightning. He even mentioned at the time that lightning has a way of F-ing things up in funny sorts of ways. Never could find anyone to run the test for me and he no longer had his since he retired.

Update as of today- I checked all the voltages in the barn and found something odd. One hot from the house into the barn is ~110v, the other is 140v. So, after talking to him again today, best guess is that there is some insulation breakdown in the cable between the house panel and the barn panel.

Little bits of the story are starting to make more sense. Several years ago I bought a brand new Delta table saw. It lasted for about 2 years out in the barn before the motor bit the dust. I chalked it up to moisture in the uninsulated barn, however, after discovering this voltage mix up, I'm almost betting that's what smoked it.

I just priced out some wire to replace what is probably bad. I would like a 100a service instead of the 60a that's there, so I priced out (3) 2AWG wire x 150ft + (1) 6AWG ground..........Holy crap. Over $2k just for wire!?!?!?!? Didn't realize that stuff was that pricey.

Just searched Slamazon for a megger and Klein tools makes a 1000v version for a reasonable price. Hopefully 1000v is enought. I might pick one of those up just to make sure the insulation is truly bad before I spend a couple grand replacing it.
If you have 110 and 140 sounds to me you have a neutral problem. What’s the voltage on each leg at the house? Your neutral is the most important connection and will also cause stray voltage
 
The Green Goat

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If you have 110 and 140 sounds to me you have a neutral problem. What’s the voltage on each leg at the house? Your neutral is the most important connection and will also cause stray voltage

Just checked the house panel.

With barn breaker on:
Between the two main hots : ~245v
(A) Main hot + Main neutral: ~122v
(B) Main hot + Main neutral: ~122v
Main neutral + ground : ~15v
(A) Main hot + ground: ~107v
(B) Main hot + ground: ~139v

With barn breaker off:
two hots: ~245v
(A) hot + neutral: 122v
(B) hot + neutral: 122v
Neutral + ground: 0v
(A) main + ground: 122v
(B) main + ground: 122v
 
Phantomhunter1

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My father mentioned this years ago when the house/barn/whatever got struck by lightning. He even mentioned at the time that lightning has a way of F-ing things up in funny sorts of ways. Never could find anyone to run the test for me and he no longer had his since he retired.

Update as of today- I checked all the voltages in the barn and found something odd. One hot from the house into the barn is ~110v, the other is 140v. So, after talking to him again today, best guess is that there is some insulation breakdown in the cable between the house panel and the barn panel.

Little bits of the story are starting to make more sense. Several years ago I bought a brand new Delta table saw. It lasted for about 2 years out in the barn before the motor bit the dust. I chalked it up to moisture in the uninsulated barn, however, after discovering this voltage mix up, I'm almost betting that's what smoked it.

I just priced out some wire to replace what is probably bad. I would like a 100a service instead of the 60a that's there, so I priced out (3) 2AWG wire x 150ft + (1) 6AWG ground..........Holy crap. Over $2k just for wire!?!?!?!? Didn't realize that stuff was that pricey.

Just searched Slamazon for a megger and Klein tools makes a 1000v version for a reasonable price. Hopefully 1000v is enought. I might pick one of those up just to make sure the insulation is truly bad before I spend a couple grand replacing it.
Look for 2-2-4-6 wire for 100 Amp barn service. It's commonly called "mobile home feed". Lowes even sells it bulk for around $4 a foot. We have a local electrical supplier called Dickman that sells the same wire for around $2 a foot. Maybe check if you have a Loeb supplier near you.
 
Squeegee

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Just checked the house panel.

With barn breaker on:
Between the two main hots : ~245v
(A) Main hot + Main neutral: ~122v
(B) Main hot + Main neutral: ~122v
Main neutral + ground : ~15v
(A) Main hot + ground: ~107v
(B) Main hot + ground: ~139v

With barn breaker off:
two hots: ~245v
(A) hot + neutral: 122v
(B) hot + neutral: 122v
Neutral + ground: 0v
(A) main + ground: 122v
(B) main + ground: 122v
First step I would do is make sure the neutrals and grounds are not bonded and separated at the barn panel. Look for a green screw in the panel and remove it if it’s in the barn panel
 
DRZRon1

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My father mentioned this years ago when the house/barn/whatever got struck by lightning. He even mentioned at the time that lightning has a way of F-ing things up in funny sorts of ways. Never could find anyone to run the test for me and he no longer had his since he retired.

Update as of today- I checked all the voltages in the barn and found something odd. One hot from the house into the barn is ~110v, the other is 140v. So, after talking to him again today, best guess is that there is some insulation breakdown in the cable between the house panel and the barn panel.

Little bits of the story are starting to make more sense. Several years ago I bought a brand new Delta table saw. It lasted for about 2 years out in the barn before the motor bit the dust. I chalked it up to moisture in the uninsulated barn, however, after discovering this voltage mix up, I'm almost betting that's what smoked it.

I just priced out some wire to replace what is probably bad. I would like a 100a service instead of the 60a that's there, so I priced out (3) 2AWG wire x 150ft + (1) 6AWG ground..........Holy crap. Over $2k just for wire!?!?!?!? Didn't realize that stuff was that pricey.

Just searched Slamazon for a megger and Klein tools makes a 1000v version for a reasonable price. Hopefully 1000v is enought. I might pick one of those up just to make sure the insulation is truly bad before I spend a couple grand replacing it.
1000V merger is more than plenty - hopefully someone has one you can borrow - probably has a 250v and 500V setting - 250V is fine for what you have.

what he said above - check all connections for corrosion/loose terminals from house to barn - take connections off at barn and power it up and check voltage with the wires hanging in the air - just process of elimination


just have to ask - why 100A at 240V - jeez........I went down that same road 15 years ago and said WTF am I doing, put a 60A service in and called it good - I run a large upright air compressor - the cheap HF 120V welders, a freaking house bake oven for baking out powder coated parts, lites, beer fridge, pool pump, etc. and never ever ever was short on juice. load factor is the technical term for sizing it down - lol.......good luck
 
The Green Goat

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First step I would do is make sure the neutrals and grounds are not bonded and separated at the barn panel. Look for a green screw in the panel and remove it if it’s in the barn panel
Will do this tomorrow. Thanks!
 
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