Constant hot wire

Jpohara · Mar 25, 2020

I have an electrical question about a shed that I have which is always hot. I bought my house 1.5 years ago and there are 3 sheds in the backyard. All of them have power. There is a 240v outlet in one shed that has a breaker in it as well. I've determined that this breaker controls the power to the other 2 sheds. When the breaker is off the main shed still has power but the other 2 don't. I then went to the main circuit breaker for the house and start flipping breakers and checking the line going into the circuit breaker of the main shed. None of them did anything so finally I flipped the main breaker to the whole house and it was still hot! I'm trying to kill power to this shed so I can tear it down but flipping the main breaker to the house didn't do anything. I've asked my uncle who knows about electrical work because he's a maintenance guy at work and he said something about it being tied directly into the main line coming into the house or something. He tried tell me how to locate the source of the power but I didn't understand. How can I determine where the source of the power is coming from? How can I safely disconnect the power so that I can tear down the shed?

westward10 · Mar 25, 2020

Is your uncle not close by.

pc1966 · Mar 25, 2020

Until you locate the source of power you really should not try anything!

Can you post some photos of your house's main board and meter area, and also of the breaker, etc, in the shed that has the power on at all times?

Can you see any sign of where the cable might run? Any physically close neighbours, etc, that might have been involved with those sheds years ago and from where the power might come?

Jpohara · Mar 25, 2020

My uncle is close by but he works 6 days a week and doesn't want to come over. If I bug him a lot maybe he will eventually come over when he has time off but it's not easy. I think he has been over maybe 2 times in the last 1.5 years and one time was after I was in a pretty bad motorcycle accident so if that tells you anything lol. I took some pictures though. The circuit breaker in the shed you can see has a wire coming in from the bottom. That's the wire that's always hot. When the breaker is on the 2 on top are hot and feed the other sheds but when it's off their dead. The wire goes down but idk if it goes underground or not can't tell. The picture of the main panel is included as well. I tried flipping every breaker including the main one but nothing changed. I think my uncle said the white wires at the bottom might be it but I can't remember because it was months ago. Any thoughts?

pc1966 · Mar 25, 2020

Well that is pretty messy!

Still there is nothing obvious to indicate a wire tapped off before the main switch. Can you post some pictures of the incoming supply meter and arrangement there?

It would be incredibly stupid to take power from before the main switch, but from the look of that installation it does not say "professional electrician" to me, so anything is possible.

Megawatt · Mar 27, 2020

Jpohara said:
I have an electrical question about a shed that I have which is always hot. I bought my house 1.5 years ago and there are 3 sheds in the backyard. All of them have power. There is a 240v outlet in one shed that has a breaker in it as well. I've determined that this breaker controls the power to the other 2 sheds. When the breaker is off the main shed still has power but the other 2 don't. I then went to the main circuit breaker for the house and start flipping breakers and checking the line going into the circuit breaker of the main shed. None of them did anything so finally I flipped the main breaker to the whole house and it was still hot! I'm trying to kill power to this shed so I can tear it down but flipping the main breaker to the house didn't do anything. I've asked my uncle who knows about electrical work because he's a maintenance guy at work and he said something about it being tied directly into the main line coming into the house or something. He tried tell me how to locate the source of the power but I didn't understand. How can I determine where the source of the power is coming from? How can I safely disconnect the power so that I can tear down the shed?

Does the main shed have it’s own meter ?