Found two Volts in the spicket

[czechsonofagun]

I am finishing my work on Monday, washing my hands outside the house under this no freeze spicket sticking out of the crawl space. Than i took a little ip of the water and that sorry SOB feels tinkly on my lips. I tried it second time and same thing.

Got my multimeter and sure enough - 1.98V AC between the ground and the spicket - 60Hz.

I get in the crawl space with the meter - it is 3+ V on the water pump and all the pipes around. Next step I done the obvious - turn off the braker for the pump, than the braker for electrical outlet in the crawl space and so on till I run out of time. There was no change - always over 3 Volts. I will try it from the other end next time - turn of the whole house and bring it up one circuit at a time.

Now the question:

- does it make sense to ground those pipes as a temporary solution? It is an old house and it could take a while to find the problem.

 

[gf5205]

In some old houses people would ground electical devices to the water pipes. This worked fine since the pipe from the well was iron or steel. Then the dug well was replace with a drilled well with plastic pipe and the ground no longer works. I lived in an old farm house with this setup. It wasn't until the kitchen was redone and the old dishwasher pulled out that we found the source of the "tingle".
Greg

 

[ToadHill]

I found in my old house that every time I touched the aluminum siding I got a shock. Took me 2 different electricians and about $150 to find that someone had attached the ground wire in the electrical box to the common leg. Put it back to the ground screw in the box and no more shocks. It also cut my electrical bill by 25%.

 

[George2615]

Drive a ground rod in the ground and clamp a heavy gauge wire to your metal pipes. You probably have a problem similar to one mentioned in another reply. If the voltage leakage is a real problem the fuse or breaker will probably trip. You could also shut off one breaker at a time to find which one is supplying the 3 volt leakage to your pipes.

 

[schmism]

Drive a ground rod in the ground and clamp a heavy gauge wire to your metal pipes. You probably have a problem similar to one mentioned in another reply. If the voltage leakage is a real problem the fuse or breaker will probably trip. You could also shut off one breaker at a time to find which one is supplying the 3 volt leakage to your pipes.

only works if if everything is wired through the breakers....

i had a mystery circit still read 120v after i shut off the MAIN.... had to pull the pannel cover to find out they had stuck a wire under the main lugs.....

Its common in old houses to have shared nutrals and for them to pickup a few volts hear and there .....

A proper ground rod tied to your plumbing (and the nutral buss bar in the breaker pannel) should eliviate your problem...

 

[KaiB]

In the last two posts, Steve and George said it just right.

Ground directly to earth, tied to your pipes. Your local electrical supply store will have the right rods and tie for your application.

 

[Nat]

I don't want to disagree with the other posters, but!!!!! It isn't uncommon for the power company to have a ground bleed. I sold and installed swimming pools for years and we would often have the homeowner to call and say they were getting a tingle when they touched the coping. In ever case it was a ground bleed in the incoming power supply. There can be a cut or a nick in the underground power line and can cause the same tingle. If you don't find the trouble on your end I would call the power company and have them investigate. It can't hurt. Later, Nat

 

[Shimon]

Putting in a ground rod attached to the pipes will help alleviate the problem of having 3v at the pipes but it doesn't fix your problem. You have current flowing to ground (your pipes) which is abnormal. You need to find out why that is. Easier said than done but I would continue to investigate or hire an electrician to find the fault.

 

[chili]

Something i found handy as you have someone turn off breakers while your are testing the voltage is those 2 way radios. Makes things go alot faster.

 

[DrainPondDesign]

1, check (or Czech ) your ground wire to grounding rod connection to see if the bare copper wire is broken or corroded. This rod is outside normally near your meter service entrance.

2, Hook up your volt meter to the plumbing and one at a time turn off your circuit breakers to try and identify the source.

We had a washing machine hose smoldering because the water heater shorted bleeding a half cycle (60 volts) into the plumbing.

Bohemia Bill