+3v out of the ground wire??

[flatcat]

Hi there
An oddity, here.
My horses and goats were dodging the water trough, which has a floating deicer.
Long story short, turned out the ground was putting out a little current. A tech guy from the deicer manufacturer said it could be a poor ground [this is in the barn, whose panel runs off a 30A line from the house a hundred feet away and is grounded by a rod], or could actually be coming from the power company. Some remark on the web said the latter also.
This was not happening last year.

Solution was a pigtail into the extension cord, with a separate ground rod.

But what the heck is this, and do I need to do anything about it generally?

Mostly curious.

Flatcat

 

[Deleted member 72666]

I try and resist electrical puns.

Watts that you say, is it because there's ample of them? Wire we're on the subject don't you have an ohm to go to?

 

[flatcat]

Then I will make it a priority to upgrade first to something waterproof at the trough.
For openers.
Off to Google....

 

[DPG]

Words fail me! Except, what's a Tommyknocker? Daz

 

[flatcat]

Ah...a question I can competently answer.
Stephen King book. A generic tommyknocker is just a bogeyman or h'ant.
The reference is to the (almost invisible in this pic) disc-shaped screw cap at the corner of the conduit, sticking partially out of the ground. In the novel, someone trips over an exposed edge of metal in the woods. It's about like the rim of a buried tin can, but proves upon excavation to be the very edge of a 1000-foot diameter flying saucer.

 

[flatcat]

Just so I don't do nothin presumptive and stupid....if I want to try grounding the barn panel to the extant ground rod...do I just run a wire from the ground/neutral lug out the window and wrap it around the rod and go take a couple measurements?
Or something else?

 

[Marvo]

To be honest I can't make out exactly what's going on in that barn panel. It looks like the neutrals are fused... Is you supply voltage to the deicer 110v or 230v? I'm wondering if the neutral is actually a phase (hot neutral).

 

[flatcat]

House line runs into a "regular" circuit-breaker panel, which goes next to itself to a couple-fuse box, and also down the other end of the barn to that antique. I will look it over and see what I can see, maybe get a better pic.
It is from that old box that the trough gets its electricity. Just a 110 device.

I am sure in the course of things I should/will just put a sufficient new panel in for everything at the start, dump the old thing with fuses---unless there's no real reason to dump it. Maybe all new wires if it seems like a good idea. At least get rid of the cloth-covered stuff, eh? Not actually that many circuits in the barn, and everything out in the open.

 

[Marvo]

I would seriously consider replacing at least the cloth insulated wiring and splash out for a sensibly sized single distribution board in the barn at least. With four legged animals it's worthwhile to have GFI (ground fault interrupter or (RCD in the UK)) protection in that panel, it could save killing animals if there's a fault.

 

[flatcat]

I can ---- a GFCI into the path out to the deicer very easily. Just keep supposing it would pop too easily.

Again, though, can I run a wire from the ground bus in the new panel, or some ground connection in the funky old one out to the ground rods just to see if it does away with the pos voltage out of the system?

 

[GLENNSPARK]

christ havn`t you gone away yet?...

 

[DPG]

I still maintain that a qualified electrician needs to look at this system. You can '---- a gfci' in and put ground wires in at random places, but that looks like a dangerous system, and one which is probably putting people/animals at risk. Daz

 

[Silly Sausage]

christ, havn`t you gone away yet?...

2014 years later, he doesn't seem to be.

 

[Marvo]

christ havn`t you gone away yet?...

Glen, be nice please!!

 

[Marvo]

I can ---- a GFCI into the path out to the deicer very easily. Just keep supposing it would pop too easily.

Again, though, can I run a wire from the ground bus in the new panel, or some ground connection in the funky old one out to the ground rods just to see if it does away with the pos voltage out of the system?

The idea is you address the actual problems and not the symptoms. Is there not an electrician locally you can trust to help you or at least do some testing and recommend what remedial action you need to take? Just blindly adding extra ground connections is unlikely to make the system any safer unless you fix the problem that's causing the elevated voltage in the first place, it could even actually introduce more safety issues..

 

[flatcat]

NO BUDGET

Later, yes.