Re: Electrical-28 volts through ground


Chris Lewis wrote:
According to mm <NOPSAMmm2005@xxxxxxxxxxx>:

Could I just use a low impedance meter, like one with a needle that is
20,000 or 50,000 ohms per volt. Would that load make the phantom
voltage disappear?

Yes. But as I mentioned elsewhere, phantom voltage or not,
measuring voltage between ground and neutral means there's a very
real problem.

Grabowski mentions the possibility of a loose neutral in a shared
neutral circuit. That indeed is possible. However, I think it
more likely that somewhere upstream of that outlet there's
a poor ground connection. Many not-quite electricians are quite
sloppy at connecting grounds together.

A loose neutral in a shared neutral circuit has other side effects.
Like having lights brighten when you turn something else on. The
circuit will seem "sick" in other ways. Besides, shared neutral
circuits are usually only a tiny fraction of the circuits in
a home.
--
Chris Lewis, Una confibula non set est
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.

This could be the result of an amateur "fix" to a serious problem. As I
mentioned before, (if you've heard this stop me) I discovered the hard
way that the pigtail ground on the outlet in the light fixture above
the kitchen sink in a place I rented had been connected to the hot
lead; puzzled me no end since the mounting of the outlet connected the
whole fixture to that ground wire, which connected the whole bx cable,
etc. until I went into the basement and found that the BX had been
disconnected from the box at the other end, so it was all hot. Either
an attempted murder, or a really bad amateur. Knowing my landlord, I
decided the latter was more likely.

So, in your case somebody elxe could have "fixed" a problem of a leaky
partial short to the ground wire somewhere by simply disconnecting the
ground.

.

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