Electrical fun at home

[stevej37]

A few days ago, my 65" Vizio started randomly powering off on it's own. Every time I restarted it...it would be fine for a couple hours at least.
Yesterday, during the Lions game, it did it and wouldn't restart. I then noticed that other room lights were off also.
Checked the breakers...none tripped.
Took the the cover off of the breaker box and immediately saw a white wire melted and hanging open. Before I started to strip it down and re-attach it to the ground bar, I decided to check voltages.
120 at the breakers...good
100 at the white wire....wtf?? Where does it go if it's a hot wire??

I gave up on going any further....I called my local electrician at 8am today and he was here at 8:30
He said he sees that often. He just shut all the breakers off, stripped the white wire back and attached it to the ground bar. Flipped the breakers back and everything works.
He then took his screwdriver and torqued all the connections (breakers and ground bar) down extremely tight. He said it is a good idea to do that maybe every other year because they will work slightly loose on their own. He was only here for about 45 minutes.


I said everything worked..meaning all that didn't die in the process of the low and high voltage.
I lost my Sony A/V receiver, various light bulbs, portable phone and two handsets and my ECO robot vacuum.
Amazingly, the Vizio tv survived.

It could have been a lot worse...meaning a fire.

[masraum]

Wow! Glad it wasn't worse, because yeah, it could have been a lot worse. And I can only assume that if/once there's fire in a breaker box, things rapidly get worse.

[stevej37]

I should have added...he said it usually starts with a loose screw on the ground bar and then it sparks over and over until it eventually gets the wire hot enough to melt itself and sometimes other wires that it is contact with.

I am def no electrician...but I learned a lot today.

[Dantilla]

Though minor, the connections in the breaker panel experience heat/cool cycles.
Over time, the heat/cool turns into expansion/contraction ever so slightly. Eventually, tight connections loosen.

[Rusty Heap]

as that is your line neutral, you could of had a "floating ground" as it wasn't really refenced to anything. You can see 100 vac on a line but there's no "work" or watts behind it.

[stevej37]

The weird part of the whole thing is when the tv went off and the lights went out, I was checking other lights. When I would turn them on...they would get about half bright and slowly dim to nothing.
It was like they were running on batteries and they slowly died.....strange.

I always figured the ac power always on or off....no in between.

[p911dad]

What's the safest way to check a box for tight wire connections - trip the main breaker, then screw down each wire? Or call an electrician? Interesting. I thought the heat cycle affected the old aluminum wires but not the copper.

[stevej37]

^^^ If you are careful...no need to trip the breakers. Just use a screwdriver that fits the bolt head good and has a good insulated handle. Lean into it and reef on it.

All of mine were loose enough that he got up to a full turn on them.

[stevej37]

Originally Posted by Rusty Heap

as that is your line neutral, you could of had a "floating ground" as it wasn't really refenced to anything. You can see 100 vac on a line but there's no "work" or watts behind it.

It gives a good spark/arc when touching it to anything....I found that out.

[p911dad]

Originally Posted by stevej37

^^^ If you are careful...no need to trip the breakers. Just use a screwdriver that fits the bolt head good and has a good insulated handle. Lean into it and reef on it.

All of mine were loose enough that he got up to a full turn on them.

Thanks! Can't be too careful with that stuff.

[flatbutt]

Originally Posted by stevej37

It gives a good spark/arc when touching it to anything....I found that out.

Any laundry damage?

[stevej37]

^^^ Luckily no.

I'll admit that I'm scared of electricity....I just don't understand it enough.

[Rusty Heap]

You def had a floating ground.............voltage needs to be referenced to earth ground or your line neutral.

I'm a EE engineer. shrug.


Most puzzling troubleshooting was at my moms 50 year old house. Lights would dim and or burn out, depending on what appliance was on that circuit. Turned out a tree branch had rubbed through and broke the main power line neutral into the house. So we had a "floating" 220 vac circuit with nothing to reference to.

learned something new that day.

[stevej37]

^^^ That sounds more serious than my 110 wire inside the breaker box.

[flatbutt]

Is a loose white wire responsible for lights that occasionally flicker?

[stevej37]

Originally Posted by flatbutt

Is a loose white wire responsible for lights that occasionally flicker?

I'm going to say yes it could be, because I recall that happening in the last week before the circuit went. I thought at the time that the bulb was going bad...nothing else.

Others (Rusty Heap) would know better for certain.

[Rusty Heap]

when in doubt, get your Fluke meter out, easy peasy. Even upper end Harbor Freight models are your friend when troubleshooting.........


here you go, good explanation. Simple, short words in small sentences, even Steves Turtles could fix it, but they'd be slow..........


https://electricaliq.com/what-is-floating-neutral-effects-how-to-test-fix/#:~:text=Floating%20neutral%20is%20a%20condition%2 C%20in%20which%20the,neutral%20wire%20is%20permane ntly%20grounded%20to%20the%20earth.

[Rusty Heap]

a Nice Fluke meter really isn't "that" expensive and it'll last you a life time...........I used to work at Fluke assembling these.......

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p4432023.m570.l1313&_nkw=fluke+77&_sacat=0

[Bill Douglas]

The tenants in a rental talked about the electricity being "a bit weird". Lots of energy saver bulbs dying etc.

I checked it with the multimeter (240 volt supply around here) and it would go from 258 to about 100 volts, and anywhere in between. I called the electricity supply company and the guy said at the box out by the front gate where my house meets the underground, the wires were actually loose. Brown outs is the term I believe. Now it's fine and I still get between 240 and 258 which everything is OK with

[stevej37]

Originally Posted by Bill Douglas

The tenants in a rental talked about the electricity being "a bit weird". Lots of energy saver bulbs dying etc.

I checked it with the multimeter (240 volt supply around here) and it would go from 258 to about 100 volts, and anywhere in between. I called the electricity supply company and the guy said at the box out by the front gate where my house meets the underground, the wires were actually loose. Brown outs is the term I believe. Now it's fine and I still get between 240 and 258 which everything is OK with

Sounds exactly like my case.
I'm surely going to make a habit of checking the wires every year or so.