This is my first post here on TFP, so I apologize if this is in the wrong place.
We just had an in-ground pool installed and we've been swimming in it for about 3 weeks now. It's an 18x36, vinyl lined over vermiculite, polymer walled, salt water pool with a SWG, LED lights, a heat pump, and surrounded on all sides by a concrete deck (with a rebar grid). Everything was going fine until about 2 days ago when one of the kids said that the pool shocked them. I wasn't home, but my wife was in the pool at the time so she got out and reenacted the process. She placed one foot on a wet spot on the concrete and dipped her hand in the water and sure enough, she felt it too. It was small, but it was there. She got the kids out, called me, and I came home and tested it myself. When I tried to recreate it to feel the shock, I felt nothing. I even gave myself a paper cut and retried it to see if that helped, and nothing. My wife stood beside me and did the exact same thing that I was doing and she could feel it again and again and again. Since I couldn't feel it, I grabbed my multi meter to see if I could see anything strange and when I put one led in the water and one on the wet deck, I saw 0.15 - 0.33 volts on that side of the pool. When I tested the other 3 sides, the meter only showed 0.004 - 0.006 (small enough to be considered nothing). It's small voltage on the one side, but something is there. After I saw it, I started back-tracking from the pool sub-panel back to the main breaker at the house. One by one I flipped the breakers off, rechecking the voltage each time. In the end, I cut power to the entire house by the main breaker and still saw the the voltage. I called the electrician back out and he went over everything from the pool to house and said everything was grounded and connected properly. He reached out to the power company and is having them check their end. Our guess is that there is stray voltage from the power company coming in on the neutral line, but we're waiting for the power company to come out and take a look at it.
The power company is looking into the stray voltage and they should be able to take care of it (I hope), but it doesn't solve the second problem of me being able to feel they stray voltage when we touch the water and the deck. I went back to the pool guy and we talked about bonding and he said everything was bonded correctly and it was inspected by a county inspector and passed. I was lucky enough to see my pool built from ground breaking until the final chemicals were added, so there are things that I do know happened. For instance, I know that there was a rebar grid laid out all around the pool prior to the concrete being poured. I know that there was a copper wire attached to the hand rail well, then run across the rebar, then connected to the ladder well, then run across more rebar, then to the anchors for the diving board, then finally extending out of the concreted pad (it's now connected to the heat pump). I also know that there was an inspector at the house and that bonding is part of the inspection process, and everything was in fact "approved" by him. The coincidental part of all of this, is that the bonding wire and it's connection locations are all on the 3 sides that are showing no voltage so I'm wondering now if the wire either A) should have been connected to the other side of the deck too, or B) that there is a break in the rebar connection on that side of the deck making it it's own separate (and now unbonded) grid.
My questions are:
1. Is the voltage I'm seeing on the one side of the pool within normal earth/ground levels and I'm just making something out of nothing?
2. Should the copper bonding wire have been across and connected to all 4 sides of the pools concrete pad rebar, or should have just connecting the wire to any point on any of the rebar worked for proper bonding as long as all of the rebar was connected to each other (by touching or ties)?
3. If for some reason there is a break in the rebar on that side, could I rebond that one side by chipping away a small section of the concrete until the rebar is exposed, then running a new copper wire from where the original one exits the concrete and attaching it to the newly exposed rebar? Or, does the wire in fact have to be run across all of the rebar on that side so connecting it to one point is pointless?
Sorry to be so lengthy in my first post here, but I wanted to give as much info as possible. Any input would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
We just had an in-ground pool installed and we've been swimming in it for about 3 weeks now. It's an 18x36, vinyl lined over vermiculite, polymer walled, salt water pool with a SWG, LED lights, a heat pump, and surrounded on all sides by a concrete deck (with a rebar grid). Everything was going fine until about 2 days ago when one of the kids said that the pool shocked them. I wasn't home, but my wife was in the pool at the time so she got out and reenacted the process. She placed one foot on a wet spot on the concrete and dipped her hand in the water and sure enough, she felt it too. It was small, but it was there. She got the kids out, called me, and I came home and tested it myself. When I tried to recreate it to feel the shock, I felt nothing. I even gave myself a paper cut and retried it to see if that helped, and nothing. My wife stood beside me and did the exact same thing that I was doing and she could feel it again and again and again. Since I couldn't feel it, I grabbed my multi meter to see if I could see anything strange and when I put one led in the water and one on the wet deck, I saw 0.15 - 0.33 volts on that side of the pool. When I tested the other 3 sides, the meter only showed 0.004 - 0.006 (small enough to be considered nothing). It's small voltage on the one side, but something is there. After I saw it, I started back-tracking from the pool sub-panel back to the main breaker at the house. One by one I flipped the breakers off, rechecking the voltage each time. In the end, I cut power to the entire house by the main breaker and still saw the the voltage. I called the electrician back out and he went over everything from the pool to house and said everything was grounded and connected properly. He reached out to the power company and is having them check their end. Our guess is that there is stray voltage from the power company coming in on the neutral line, but we're waiting for the power company to come out and take a look at it.
The power company is looking into the stray voltage and they should be able to take care of it (I hope), but it doesn't solve the second problem of me being able to feel they stray voltage when we touch the water and the deck. I went back to the pool guy and we talked about bonding and he said everything was bonded correctly and it was inspected by a county inspector and passed. I was lucky enough to see my pool built from ground breaking until the final chemicals were added, so there are things that I do know happened. For instance, I know that there was a rebar grid laid out all around the pool prior to the concrete being poured. I know that there was a copper wire attached to the hand rail well, then run across the rebar, then connected to the ladder well, then run across more rebar, then to the anchors for the diving board, then finally extending out of the concreted pad (it's now connected to the heat pump). I also know that there was an inspector at the house and that bonding is part of the inspection process, and everything was in fact "approved" by him. The coincidental part of all of this, is that the bonding wire and it's connection locations are all on the 3 sides that are showing no voltage so I'm wondering now if the wire either A) should have been connected to the other side of the deck too, or B) that there is a break in the rebar connection on that side of the deck making it it's own separate (and now unbonded) grid.
My questions are:
1. Is the voltage I'm seeing on the one side of the pool within normal earth/ground levels and I'm just making something out of nothing?
2. Should the copper bonding wire have been across and connected to all 4 sides of the pools concrete pad rebar, or should have just connecting the wire to any point on any of the rebar worked for proper bonding as long as all of the rebar was connected to each other (by touching or ties)?
3. If for some reason there is a break in the rebar on that side, could I rebond that one side by chipping away a small section of the concrete until the rebar is exposed, then running a new copper wire from where the original one exits the concrete and attaching it to the newly exposed rebar? Or, does the wire in fact have to be run across all of the rebar on that side so connecting it to one point is pointless?
Sorry to be so lengthy in my first post here, but I wanted to give as much info as possible. Any input would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!