Never know what to expect...

[baub]

So I go on a call to a small natural food store in a nearby college town to check out a “non-functioning” AE4440A. Tries to start, but trips on the klixon. Bad start components or bad pump, right?

Now to access the little equipment room for the coolers, you have to go through the bar next door. College swamp bar, nobody there until 9:00 PM tonight. So I get the homemade start package I made up 30+ years ago out of the truck, hook up an extension cord to one of the bar receptacles, and proceed to connect the alligator clips to the terminals on the pump. Plus, the green one to ground.

Plug the package into the extension cord, and BAMM!!!, fireworks at the plug end! I look at the cord end, and it’s fried at the ground terminal. So I figure I have screwed up. I check to see if there is power to the condensing unit, nope,,, WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG???

Checked the ground terminal on the cord to ground on the grocery store’s panel and I get 120V!!!!

I go out to the bar, and check several receptacles, ground to sinks, water pipes etc. Every one shows 120V.

There must be (1) a dead short somewhere, and (2) the grounding wires must be disconnected in the panel.

Have you ever seen a mess like this? I called the cops, local building inspector, and the power company to cover my butt, picked up, and left. Building owner (and bar owner) wasn’t answering the phone.

Never a dull moment!

[R12rules]

Yep .... ya jus never know.

[condenseddave]

Baub, I thought I'd seen it all. Really.

Got a call for a warm walkin at a fast food dive.

Compressor running, tripping the O-load. Unit on roof. Checked voltage, on this 3 phase unit. 208-277-210. 277?????

Started looking around, OPENED THE UNIT DISCONNECT Error. Bad move. building goes partially dark. WTF?????

Look over at the pole that feeds this bacteriological study of a "restaurant", and there hangeth the "B" phase cutout.

Closed the disco, lights come back on. Voltage measures the same. "240V" marked all over everything. Called the POCO. Told them of the situation, need service, blahblahblah.

Get connected to an "engineer" (Oh, great. The day was already in the toilet, how much worse could it be?)

He says: FIND THE GROUNDED OUT MOTOR. I said: "HUH????"

here, it is one of the very few corner-grounded delta services in the area, and everytime that they get THIS SAME CALL, (No one else wanted this account, I suppose...) the "AC" compressor was grounded and trying to run, and was generating electricity through the ground, on the bad windings.

Sunuva***** was right, too. Disconnected the compressor, lights go out. POCO pops the C/O back in, 240-240-240. Checked the cope, L2 to ground.

Ya learn somethin' new every day. Sometimes, though, ya ish ya hadn't..........

[baub]

Thought I had a winning story, but I must admit, your's tops it.

I think I can understand why you got a voltage drop on L1 & L3, but help me to understand why you got 277v on L2. Why not not 240 or 208? Was it just due to the particular resistance on the grounded winding?

I will be in "no computer access land" till Monday, but would love to hear more detail.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

[gas_n_go]

not sure if this one counts, but i went to one of my stores that had a dungy dungeon for a mottor room. as i was walking down the stairs i heard some funny noises, so i poked my head down to see what was up, and there was the bread girl bent over one of my compressors with the store manger behind her with his pants around his ankles wailing away on her.

[condenseddave]

Originally posted by baub
Thought I had a winning story, but I must admit, your's tops it.

I think I can understand why you got a voltage drop on L1 & L3, but help me to understand why you got 277v on L2. Why not not 240 or 208? Was it just due to the particular resistance on the grounded winding?

I will be in "no computer access land" till Monday, but would love to hear more detail.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Apparently. the way I understand this, is that if what would be the "high" leg in this type of service, (There is no "real" high leg...) is the phase that a motor is shorted to ground on, the motor will still run, and generate this "wild" voltage, because the ground isn't really a complete path to ground.

No, I didn't get shocked, and NO, I don't fully understand WHY I didn't get shocked. The only thing I can figure is that because of this "generated" phase, the ground path was to ground somewhere else in the system...

[control_noob]

Originally posted by gas_n_go
not sure if this one counts, but i went to one of my stores that had a dungy dungeon for a mottor room. as i was walking down the stairs i heard some funny noises, so i poked my head down to see what was up, and there was the bread girl bent over one of my compressors with the store manger behind her with his pants around his ankles wailing away on her.

So, did you sneak back up the stairs or get in line? :-)

[Dowadudda]

I never get to be in suituations like that. I wish I were that lucky just to liven up a day.