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Alright so. After a morning of flipping breakers and running back and forth I feel like I know more and less at the same time. The good news is that with the entire house shut off there's no current on the water pipe, so it's not something like a neighbor's broken neutral returning current through my good neutral through the water pipe (I don't 100% know what this means but I read that it happens sometimes). I found a few breakers that individually cause the current in the water pipe to change. Basically every breaker that services something in the basement affected it, as well as one kitchen breaker and an unlabeled breaker that I haven't identified yet. Is this something that any regular electrician will know how to fix or am I way off in the land of weird edge cases with my electrified water? I also hooked my guitar up to my laptop on battery power to find the breakers making the most noise. With everything off there's the expected amount of ambient noise so that's a bit of a relief, I'm not living in an electromagnetically cursed location where it's impossible to record stuff. But for the most part, any breaker that affected current in the water pipe made noise. The loudest breaker was the one the kitchen GFCI outlets are on. I got an outlet tester last week and it says they're all properly grounded so I'm not sure what to make of that, there's nothing plugged in to them. The breaker with the basement ceiling lights and outlets was pretty loud too. The lights were all switched off so it's not dimmers or fluorescent lights making the noise, it's just the breaker being switched on. And finally the furnace breaker was making a lot of noise for some reason. So knowing all this, what do. Again, is this regular electrician work or do I need some kind of EMI expert for this?
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Feb 22, 2024 17:08
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| # ? Apr 29, 2024 01:58 |
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Something, somewhere, is leaking current to ground. You can pay an electrician hourly to solve this. It's around $1000/day. Next step is to unplug everything on a given breaker, but let's start easy. Do you have any 220v appliances with 3 prong outlets? Unplug those and see if it goes away.
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Feb 22, 2024 17:14
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My only appliance with a 3 prong 220 plug is my dryer and unplugging that and/or shutting off the breaker doesn't affect the reading or the noise whatsoever. Should I unplug all the appliances and everything on each circuit repeat what I just did? I feel like it may be related to the basement light/outlet wiring given what I've seen so far, that breaker causes the biggest change and makes the most EM noise. There are also a few (unused) ungrounded 2 prong outlets on that breaker.
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Feb 22, 2024 17:33
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internet celebrity posted:My only appliance with a 3 prong 220 plug is my dryer and unplugging that and/or shutting off the breaker doesn't affect the reading or the noise whatsoever. Should I unplug all the appliances and everything on each circuit repeat what I just did? I feel like it may be related to the basement light/outlet wiring given what I've seen so far, that breaker causes the biggest change and makes the most EM noise. There are also a few (unused) ungrounded 2 prong outlets on that breaker. Yes, start with the biggest change and work from there. 2 prong outlets shouldn't be effecting it - they don't even have ground. 3-prong-220v can leak voltage L1-G to power the 120v control board is why I suggested it. Otherwise yeah, start testing. Have a laptop with a video camera? Setup your meter on a zoom call. Join it from your phone. Unplug things and watch it go until it auto shuts off and you have to go turn the meter back on.
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Feb 22, 2024 18:38
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Even if something is leaking current to a ground conductor, shouldn't that just be joining with the house neutral at the main panel/disconnect and going noiselessly up the service neutral? I wonder if the ground/neutral bond is hosed up. Can you check and see if there is a potential between ground and neutral on the basement circuit (and other circuits). Also you might want to check the water main coming in to make sure the previous owner didn't install some stupid magic "treatment" device that is applying current to the water.
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Feb 22, 2024 18:51
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H110Hawk posted:Have a laptop with a video camera? Setup your meter on a zoom call. Join it from your phone. Unplug things and watch it go until it auto shuts off and you have to go turn the meter back on. This is brilliant. Shifty Pony posted:Also you might want to check the water main coming in to make sure the previous owner didn't install some stupid magic "treatment" device that is applying current to the water. This is something so crazy I never would have thought of it.
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Feb 22, 2024 21:59
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jammyozzy posted:Does this link work? https://www.mcmaster.com/products/o-rings/system-of-measurement~metric/width~1-500-mm/id~7-500-mm/
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Feb 23, 2024 22:38
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  They were finally able to get started on this today! Nothing is wired up yet, and they have 3 more batteries to install Monday pending some change they have to ask the fire department about. 2 of the battery modules were supposed to go on the block wall to the left but some last minute measurements realized a mistake in their initial ones. Now we're going up. They need to verify the vertical clearance required by the FD - Enphase (and UL) say these specific modules can do 6", standard plans/prior generations required 36" or something. I don't care how high they go, that's my neighbor's and the electricians servicing them's problem.The hilarious wire coming out of the conduit in the ground there was a whoopsy doodle once they were done moving the main panel and couldn't figure out where the heck the pool pump was getting its power. It will be cleaned up / figured out by the time final inspection rolls around. Yes we have gotten 3 feet of rain so far this year and yes that is a NEMA 3R rated splice, why do you ask? What are you a narc?
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Feb 24, 2024 01:55
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H110Hawk posted:
That's really interesting you have a switch between the battery and system controller, and no rapid shutdown switch My install has no switch between the battery and system controller, and a rapid shutdown switch outside. That battery disconnect isn't doing much, because if you've got the IQ8 inverters they'll continue to make power even w/o the battery. Why are they doing a bunch of individual batteries? Enphase makes brackets/covers to wire 3 of them all in one unit.
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Feb 25, 2024 05:02
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devicenull posted:That's really interesting you have a switch between the battery and system controller, and no rapid shutdown switch The plans have both, there's an AC disconnect box between the batteries and the controller. There is a RSD that is drawn but not yet installed that is coming off the controller.  Can you post this bracket thing? Because "I don't know" is the answer. H110Hawk fucked around with this message at 05:26 on Feb 25, 2024 |
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Feb 25, 2024 05:16
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ah the 5p batteries...looks nice! they don't get joined like the previous model, the 3 and 10t i think it's a little unusual there's a disconnect between the controller and batteries when there's a breaker in there that will serve as a disconnect as well as a separate rapid shutdown switch but that's AHJ's for you
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Feb 25, 2024 05:33
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Extant Artiodactyl posted:ah the 5p batteries...looks nice! Yeah my city required disconnects between both my batteries and the solar combiner and the system controller, despite having basically redundant breakers and the rapid shutdown edit: also my controller is apparently super hosed and my whole system is in shutdown until enphase can come out with my installer on the 4th to fix/replace it
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Feb 25, 2024 07:36
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H110Hawk posted:Is it all on the same circuit? You mentioned only having one outlet "on that side of the house/garage/something" - you only need one right where the circuit first starts from the panel assuming it's a home run from the panel to that outlet. Then you're good to go for the whole circuit. Or use a GFCI breaker. Honestly I think given my playing with electrical habits being closely aligned with my posting habits (i.e. poorly thought through and frequently wrong) it's best I just do all GFCI breakers. They're not cheap but not that crazy expensive and I'm bound to do something wildly dangerous with our generator and/or welder
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Feb 25, 2024 09:41
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Extant Artiodactyl posted:ah the 5p batteries...looks nice! ROJO posted:Yeah my city required disconnects between both my batteries and the solar combiner and the system controller, despite having basically redundant breakers and the rapid shutdown Yeah it's odd but of all the BOM costs a lockable disconnect is so low on the list of stuff it didn't even dawn on me that it was weird until you pointed it out. I guess it's to guarantee to input voltage from the batteries while working on the controller? On a high level I understand wanting a visual indicator that 20kwh w/ 30kw output is isolated in case the internal controllers decide to start outputting despite an ordered shutdown. ROJO posted:edit: also my controller is apparently super hosed and my whole system is in shutdown until enphase can come out with my installer on the 4th to fix/replace it 
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Feb 25, 2024 17:54
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ROJO posted:
hoping for a good outcome. when i did an install with an enphase tech/engineer for a unique setup, he had us set up a relay the wrong way and it ended up frying a transfer switch board i also had one system controller be completely dead on arrival in a similar way, during commissioning it went into shutdown and never came out. thinking there's something up with whatever they're using for that low volt rapid shutdown initiation.
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Feb 25, 2024 18:05
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Extant Artiodactyl posted:hoping for a good outcome. when i did an install with an enphase tech/engineer for a unique setup, he had us set up a relay the wrong way and it ended up frying a transfer switch board Guess I should have asked about a bypass mode.
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Feb 25, 2024 19:15
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H110Hawk posted:
the shutdown mode still lets line voltage through to the loads, it just renders the solar and batteries inoperable. theoretically i guess it could fail in a way that has it trying to power the loads from empty battery but i haven't seen it. there's a tiny switch underneath a "don't touch this without talking to support" sticker that i think toggles it between on and off grid mode without the installer app getting involved. compared to generac, whose failure modes were more "you're up a creek", the enphase issues i've seen were usually limited to the initial install window and were more annoying than anything else. costly to the installer and not the customer
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Feb 25, 2024 22:08
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Extant Artiodactyl posted:the shutdown mode still lets line voltage through to the loads, it just renders the solar and batteries inoperable. theoretically i guess it could fail in a way that has it trying to power the loads from empty battery but i haven't seen it. there's a tiny switch underneath a "don't touch this without talking to support" sticker that i think toggles it between on and off grid mode without the installer app getting involved. Yeah, my plan if this stuff decided to poo poo the bed was to immediately tear that sticker off and make sure any actual technician who showed up knew it was intact when they arrived. 
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Feb 25, 2024 22:28
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Extant Artiodactyl posted:the shutdown mode still lets line voltage through to the loads, it just renders the solar and batteries inoperable. theoretically i guess it could fail in a way that has it trying to power the loads from empty battery but i haven't seen it. there's a tiny switch underneath a "don't touch this without talking to support" sticker that i think toggles it between on and off grid mode without the installer app getting involved. Yeah I had to resort to the hidden switch to actually get normal power back into my house. For whatever reason, just shutting everything down with breakers but not manually throwing that switch only allows 1 of my 110 legs into the house. Hence the "super hosed" nature of my controller.
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Mar 1, 2024 20:17
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Ok, how screwed am I here. 1970s home, metallic conduit with copper conductors. Conduit is ground. I am replacing some switches with smart switches. Before I bought them, I confirmed my switch box has neutrals. While I was in there, I noticed that the neutral was tied to ground in the box. I understand this to be bad and unsafe, as now the ground has a potential path to normally carry current.  So I replaced the switch, removed that illegal neutral-to-ground, and now the lights don't work. With my multimeter, I see a 120v potential between neutral and ground, 0v potential between neutral and hot. I think whoever wired this used the conduit for NEUTRAL! I went to a nearby outlet to try and pull a neutral from there, to discover that outlet no longer works, it is also tied back through the switchbox conduit. Of course there are wires going out of this problem outlet, off to someplace else to cause me problems. I am going to get a licensed electrician in here, but closest appointment is Monday. What do I do till then? Should I put the illegal neutral to ground connection back? I just don't know what else is now connected only to hot or the ramifications of this.
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Mar 1, 2024 21:04
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I would leave it off for now. In fact I would turn off the breaker for that whole circuit if possible. I think you're right on the money with the conduit as neutral theory and that's definitely not ok.
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Mar 1, 2024 21:30
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I needed a couple grounds for an ethernet surge protector and some antenna equipment... anything wrong with this? I just did ring terminals to the outlet mounting screws (that right wire is green even though it doesnt look it)
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Mar 1, 2024 23:35
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Perfectly fine. No need to insulate or anything. There might technically be a reason it needs to be physically protected being under a certain gauge but I can't think of one, I think all the reasons I've seen for that are based on protecting ground electrode conductors in article 250.
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Mar 2, 2024 01:48
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I bet that somewhere along the daisy chain of devices there's a missed neutral connection which the ground-neutral connection in that box was hiding. Leave the circuit off and make note of what else doesn't work. If you feel up to it open up those boxes looking for a neutral that isn't hooked up (or a janky connection), otherwise just having a good idea of what is on that circuit will help out the electrician.
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Mar 2, 2024 02:04
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kastein posted:I would leave it off for now. In fact I would turn off the breaker for that whole circuit if possible. I think you're right on the money with the conduit as neutral theory and that's definitely not ok. I ended up leaving it off, this seemed wise. Shifty Pony posted:I bet that somewhere along the daisy chain of devices there's a missed neutral connection which the ground-neutral connection in that box was hiding. Leave the circuit off and make note of what else doesn't work. If you feel up to it open up those boxes looking for a neutral that isn't hooked up (or a janky connection), otherwise just having a good idea of what is on that circuit will help out the electrician. Going to go digging into the boxes tomorrow. Not going to cancel the electrician till I find it though! I definitely panicked when this first happened, but watching youtubes on "open neutral" I might be able to figure it out... I have counted 4 switch boxes (totaling 10 switches), 5 light fixtures, 5 outlets, and one day/night photocell. A few of these being outdoors. I have a feeling I will be in the attic very soon, knees throbbing as I scrabble across 16" on centers.
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Mar 2, 2024 03:40
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Shifty Pony posted:I bet that somewhere along the daisy chain of devices there's a missed neutral connection which the ground-neutral connection in that box was hiding. Leave the circuit off and make note of what else doesn't work. If you feel up to it open up those boxes looking for a neutral that isn't hooked up (or a janky connection), otherwise just having a good idea of what is on that circuit will help out the electrician. wouldn't this quote:With my multimeter, I see a 120v potential between neutral and ground, 0v potential between neutral and hot. also imply that the open section of neutral wire is shorted to the hot leg somewhere? also see some red wire in that box, my guess is a PO completely hosed up trying to install a three way switch somewhere shame on an IGA fucked around with this message at 18:22 on Mar 2, 2024 |
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Mar 2, 2024 18:18
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It could just mean something else upstream of that box was using that neutral/ground connection. lovely drawing:  Neutral is purple because white doesn't show on white. Box with the now-removed ground/neutral is second from left, neutral isn't connected at the far right box. If that light bulb is "on" no current will flow but, the neutral will show 120V since there is a connection between hot and neutral via the light.
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Mar 2, 2024 18:54
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 City or FD said "no" to close spacing, or they got bored waiting. I do not care and had told them a week ago they could do this if they wanted. I cannot see this from any direction I use the house, there are mature plants blocking the view from the road.  So close. Final hookup + testing is monday or tuesday weather permitting, final permit inspections are all Thursday at which point I can submit my PTO. I need to find out what they did there with that WR GFCI outlet which is powering the pool pump. Ironically if they wound up wiring it into the controller to go "down" when the grid goes down that would be hilariously ideal.
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Mar 3, 2024 00:30
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the poor bastards who had to raise those ~110lb units that high
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Mar 3, 2024 01:28
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I see a couple code violations (but not big ones) Conduit must be strapped even if it is under the length (30in IIRC) allowed between a box and the first strap. Box offsets would make it look nicer, but I totally understand not wanting to do them, I only learned to do them easily a few weeks ago myself. I used to get them wrong more than I got them right because I just trial and errored it instead of actually doing the math.
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Mar 3, 2024 01:29
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kastein posted:I see a couple code violations (but not big ones) Good thing you're no snitch.  Extant Artiodactyl posted:the poor bastards who had to raise those ~110lb units that high Yeah I said was happy to wait on the answer because I certainly wouldn't want to have to hump them up a ladder, or worse have to service them up there. They laughed and said they don't care they aren't super heavy. I imagine the head guy had uh, paperwork to do that day and couldn't make the job site.
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Mar 3, 2024 01:42
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H110Hawk posted:Good thing you're no snitch. What? I didn't see poo poo (I just thought you might want to see it and decide if you are going to have them fix it before inspection, some inspectors may let it slide or not even know, I see this violation all the time and have committed it myself)
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Mar 3, 2024 01:45
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kastein posted:What? I didn't see poo poo (I appreciate it, I'll bring it up in passing when I go by on Monday. Our new city inspector is more "by the book" on a lot of stuff since he's both good at his job and undoing a lot of previous inspector lack of fucks. Thankfully he's also reasonable, these electricians do a lot of work around the city and have precisely 0 advertising. Their website is a single picture titled "website.gif" which looks like someone's kid did it to make a 1-pager for print.)
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Mar 3, 2024 02:20
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I am not sure if this is quite the right place to ask this question but since it deals with electricity and I don’t want to burn my place down, here it goes: I have a cheap led light that is powered by 2 AAA batteries that I would like to instead see if I could power off of USB. Are there any legit battery replacement options? Is something like this legit?
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Mar 3, 2024 15:39
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KKKLIP ART posted:I am not sure if this is quite the right place to ask this question but since it deals with electricity and I don’t want to burn my place down, here it goes: Those are legit. I use USB-rechargeable AAA batteries, but if you want to put a cord in there, something like that works fine. The Electronics Thread might also have some other options. The easiest solution (and 100% not recommended, but I've done it before) is just cut the end off of a USB charge-only cable and attach red and black to + and - inside the case and be done with it.
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Mar 3, 2024 17:00
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I just replaced my ceiling fan. It has a globe light fixture. I want to use a smart bulb but I can't find a smart bulb that is both rated for enclosed fixtures and the right size to fit through the opening in the globe, but not a candelabra shape/base. I have a replacement light kit that I got second-hand but the connectors are different. This is the existing fixture:  This is the new light kit:  If there is a smart bulb, not much bigger than A19, that will work in an enclosed fixture, I'm happy. If I can get a new fixture that will have the same connector, that's good too, or if it's simple to re-wire (nothing much harder than stripping a wire and using a wire nut) I'm happy with that also. I don't want to burn the house down, but I also really don't want to have the electricians who hung all my lights come back again.
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Mar 3, 2024 17:03
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Hungry Squirrel posted:I just replaced my ceiling fan. It has a globe light fixture. I want to use a smart bulb but I can't find a smart bulb that is both rated for enclosed fixtures and the right size to fit through the opening in the globe, but not a candelabra shape/base. I have a replacement light kit that I got second-hand but the connectors are different. Post the wiring of the existing fixture on the lighting side. You're going to be connecting the black and white wires of your new kit to exactly two of the wires you see there and putting wire nuts on the other two. Just can't tell which for certain from the current pictures.
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Mar 3, 2024 17:20
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The existing kit looks like this: I should also clarify that I'm looking for one of the fancy programmable color-change bulbs. The white ones that tick the boxes are readily available.
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Mar 3, 2024 17:22
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Looks like the on/off switch with speed control for the fan is down there in the light unit. That's annoying.
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Mar 3, 2024 17:27
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Have you tested it with a Philips Hue bulb yet and can you borrow one from a friend to try it out if not? They're about the most compact RGB bulbs I've tried but too expensive to commit to before you know it'll work for sure
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Mar 3, 2024 17:43
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