Carl's Question...Neutral problems

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Moderator Post (s) for this thread: > The "back-stabbed" connections by doug seibert on 08/07/2004 > Previous Neutral Problems....... by doug seibert on 08/11/2004

Consider a circuit fed from a 2pole breaker.....Three wire w/grnd circuit........Red/Black/White and grnd......

A single cable carring two circuits to a new addition or ......Commonly used for the Kitchen small appliance circuits.......Every OddOutlet was wired to Red and EvenOutlets to the Black.....

This is also the configuration for old Knob&Tube wireing where a central neutral was tapped for all circuits........

IF A BREAK OCCURS in the Neutral....eliminating the Main panel from our neutral wire (like that back-stab connector failing)....

....Depending what is "turned ON" and "Plugged in" ......The power can flow from the Black thru a device to the White(never connecting to neutral) and thru a second device on to a RED wire.......a SERIES circuit containing 220 Volts split between the two (or more) devices......

The classic warning sign: LIGHTS GET BRIGHTER than normal!......

Everybody "KNOWS" and understands how electricity works when things go correctly........Troubleshooting is the art of finding and correcting the problems when things go BAD........Where do the COMMON neutral faults occur?

.....The POCO.....many neutral connections get burnt off at the transformer or masthead....Use a binoculars to get close enough to see the connection.....CALL POCO and tell them your lights flash TOO bright.....they'll be right over.....

.....The Panel's Neutral buss......old panels with brittle bussbars.....the swisscheese nature of the busses leave them open to damage from too much torque on the setscrews....isolating a portion of the bar from Neutral.....Yet still interconnecting Two(or more) unrelated circuits in Series...

.....Or the WIREING.....Here's the back-stabbed-gone-Bad........or the crowded Wire-nut connection.....