*Shallow end, being shocked when grabbing railing*

[NowintersinAZ]

See the arrows in the upper left corner? Make sure the set screw in the neutral bar is tight. Then also what should be a green screw on the other end of the bonding jumper attaching it to the metal enclosure. If they are tight then loosen and re-tighten to make sure proper connection is made. You might want to take a voltage reading from one end to the other and see if you get that stray voltage across this point, then perform the tightening. top of set crew to top of other crew.

Lifting that neutral is going to be tough as it's bare and will touching every other bare conductor in the enclosure. It will need isolating in some way.

I see a lot of aluminum wires these can become loosened over time because of expansion and contraction from heat. Every couple of years they should be checked to make sure they are tight. Even the mains coming in.

(disclaimer: My lawyers want to make sure you understand I am not advocating that said owner if not a licensed electrician should attempt to touch or engage with these main wires from the electric meter in any way.) SAFETY FIRST call someone to complete that task please.

 

[gamerfan2004]

When you said, "with all their equipment unplugged", did that mean that the inverter was powered down (i.e. panel DC disconnected from the inverters) or did you mean that the solar system was simply disconnected from the AC mains?


Also, what do you mean by "Over by the pool motor, we were seeing around 3V on the ground. "? Measured from where to where?

The main power switch was flipped for the inverter which directs over to the main panel, all grounds and commons inside the inverter were pulled.

3V was from the ground wire coming from the house to the pump. When I connected the leads between the pump and the house ground I measured 3V.

 

[Newdude]

3V was from the ground wire coming from the house to the pump. When I connected the leads between the pump and the house ground I measured 3V

If you use the house ground to test you simply reconnect the loop and see the same voltage. You need to know the direction of travel so you need a different ground to test both halves. Can you run a wire out a basement window to make your own testing ground ?

Also, if it does end up coming from the backyard, your electric come from the street IIRC but phones and CATV may be in the backyard. Do they come from the street or the back ? If either one is faulty/damaged and close to your bonding grid the current may be straying. This would certainly help explain how it gets to the pool.

 

[gamerfan2004]

If you use the house ground to test you simply reconnect the loop and see the same voltage. You need to know the direction of travel so you need a different ground to test both halves. Can you run a wire out a basement window to make your own testing ground ?

Also, if it does end up coming from the backyard, your electric come from the street IIRC but phones and CATV may be in the backyard. Do they come from the street or the back ? If either one is faulty/damaged and close to your bonding grid the current may be straying. This would certainly help explain how it gets to the pool.

Everything comes from the street and all connect on the side of the house. Phone and CATV have ground terminations off of the ground wire. Granted, I can't even see my ground rod, only the wire coming out of the dirt.

 

[mas985]

The main power switch was flipped for the inverter which directs over to the main panel, all grounds and commons inside the inverter were pulled.

But did they disconnect the solar panels from the inverter? Usually there is a breaker and/or disconnect between the two.

3V was from the ground wire coming from the house to the pump. When I connected the leads between the pump and the house ground I measured 3V.

So that means that the pool water and bonding wire have a different potential than the house ground. That probably also means that the railing is not bonded to the pool. Were you the original owner of the pool? Did you take any pictures when they were building it?

Also, just to confirm, you previously said that when you cut the power to the entire house, assuming through the main service breaker, it does not change anything correct?

 

[Newdude]

Everything comes from the street and all connect on the side of the house

Ok. At least we know that.

Phone and CATV have ground terminations off of the ground wire

They should be 3/8 nuts on the clamps. If you pull them and test both the now pulled wires and the original ground wire (still connected to the house), With your own ground, we can rule them out in 2 mins.

To make your own ground at the side of the house, either shove the test lead in the dirt or tape it towards the handle side making contact with a screwdriver and shove the screwdriver in the dirt.

 

[gamerfan2004]

But did they disconnect the solar panels from the inverter? Usually there is a breaker and/or disconnect between the two.


So that means that the pool water and bonding wire have a different potential than the house ground. That probably also means that the railing is not bonded to the pool. Were you the original owner of the pool? Did you take any pictures when they were building it?

Also, just to confirm, you previously said that when you cut the power to the entire house, assuming through the main service breaker, it does not change anything correct?

Yes, they disconnected the panels from inside the inverter and flipped the main outdoor breaker cut-off.

It was my parent's house, which I was there when it was built in 2003. We have some pictures of the build, low resolution, but nothing up close of the bonding.

 

[Navywife]

The issue: When entering or exiting the pool through the shallow end, and you grab the railing you are feeling like you are being shocked. This is not happening anywhere else in the pool. The deep-end ladder isn't demonstrating this issue.

Info: The pool was built in 2003 and is bonded with a #8 copper wire from the pool motor, over to the four corners of the pool, hand railing anchors in the shallow end, deep end ladder anchors, pool light, and the concrete rebar; it all passed inspection. This issue has never happened until this summer, June 2021.

Testing and isolating: Voltage from the railing to the concrete is about 1.5V and railing to the water is around 1.9V. When we disconnect the ground wire to the house, the voltage drops to .0023V at the railing in the shallow end, and the shock goes away. This is the closest point to the pool motor from where the bonding begins.

We have solar panels on the house. We had them come out to verify that there isn't a voltage leak or grounding issue on their equipment. With all of their equipment unplugged, power off, main breaker to the house turned off, we still had the voltage in the shallow end. Over by the pool motor, we were seeing around 3V on the ground. Absolutely NOTHING was turned on at this moment. All of the solar equipment checked out. The next course of action, check with the power company to see if there's a load issue. They came out, performed a load test, and everything checked out. The house grounding rod is secure and reads 0V. We've taken out breakers, disconnected all of the wires for the pool motor, timer, outdoor outlets, checked the GFCI's. Nothing, absolutely freaking nothing is leading us to the source.

We've never had this problem, but it's only isolated at the railing in the shallow end. I'm planning on removing the railing, cleaning up the bottom section for better contact, then taking a wire brush and running it inside the anchors to see if that helps.

All of the bonding is encased in concrete. However, is there a possibility that the anchor lost its bond? Any insight would be helpful. Thank you!

We had a similar issue. I paid two electricians who found nothing, had 2 more ground rods added, one at the pump and yet another at the main in the garage. Still no change. Ours would vary in voltage and the power co guys thought I was nuts until I said take off your shoes and hold that railing, he did and he felt it pretty good. What about the coping? If you have a cut on your hands you may feel it there as well. We did. Deep end stairs were fine because they are in the water. This drI’ve us crazy for over two years. Fast forward and one day I get so frustrated I kill the breakers and rip the wiring out of my pool light box. Lo and behold the Ground wire was cut and stuffed up into the corner. I stripped the wire, connected it properly and knock on wood never had another problem. When We bought this house it was a nasty divorce situation and the guy didn’t want to sell so he sabotaged everything he could, and we believe this was one of the things. Was kinda ****** the electricians didn't find this as it was an easy find when you pull out a ground wire that was clearly cut and not stripped at all. I hope yours is something that easy. Take your time, write down everything you can, what was done when and result. If the power should go out in your neighborhood run out there and test it. I hope it’s something that easy.. I learned more about equipotential bonding than I ever wanted to! Have you tried running copper from deep end ladder to that railing and see what happens or even to the water for that matter. Note all the results. I‘d def Check the light wiring though.

 

[ParB]

Navywife, that is such a crazy story! I'm glad you found it!

 

[gamerfan2004]

We had a similar issue. I paid two electricians who found nothing, had 2 more ground rods added, one at the pump and yet another at the main in the garage. Still no change. Ours would vary in voltage and the power co guys thought I was nuts until I said take off your shoes and hold that railing, he did and he felt it pretty good. What about the coping? If you have a cut on your hands you may feel it there as well. We did. Deep end stairs were fine because they are in the water. This drI’ve us crazy for over two years. Fast forward and one day I get so frustrated I kill the breakers and rip the wiring out of my pool light box. Lo and behold the Ground wire was cut and stuffed up into the corner. I stripped the wire, connected it properly and knock on wood never had another problem. When We bought this house it was a nasty divorce situation and the guy didn’t want to sell so he sabotaged everything he could, and we believe this was one of the things. Was kinda ****** the electricians didn't find this as it was an easy find when you pull out a ground wire that was clearly cut and not stripped at all. I hope yours is something that easy. Take your time, write down everything you can, what was done when and result. If the power should go out in your neighborhood run out there and test it. I hope it’s something that easy.. I learned more about equipotential bonding than I ever wanted to! Have you tried running copper from deep end ladder to that railing and see what happens or even to the water for that matter. Note all the results. I‘d def Check the light wiring though.

Thank you for sharing your story. That's horrible that the issue wasn't identified for two years Did you turn off all of the breakers and still have the voltage?

 

[gamerfan2004]

Let's begin adding some data! YOUTUBE videos are linked in this post as well!



First I went out to the side with CATV, fiber, and phones grounds. Here's what I found:

7/30/2021
| A wire was connected to a screwdriver that was driven into the ground for this testing below |

| Verizon FiOS ground going to the router |
50mA
310mVDC
2.2-2.46VAC
60Hz



| Old phone line ground |
115mVAC

| Coax from FiOS router leading into the house |

-38VDC
16VAC
60Hz
-100mA DC
880mA AC

| Coax Unplugged |

Unplugged from house coax: 22VAC
Unplugged from the house and FiOS router: 2.2VAC (How the heck does that happen?)
Unplugged without power: 843mVAC
Connected back to coax back into the house: 5.9VAC
All coax reconnected: 4.2VAC
-30 through -50mVDC

| Measurements from the screwdriver to house ground |
120mA AC
30mA DC
60Hz
465mVDC
2.3-2.9VAC


Now on to the pool....
The point of failure







| Pool without house-ground connected |
| Railing to water |
113mVDC
119mVAC
-150mA DC
0A AC
60Hz (changed)

| Railing to deck |
9mVAC

| Water to deck |
173mVAC
-147mVDC

| Screwdriver in-ground connected to bonding wire, house-ground disconnected, and pump off |
| Water to deck |
130mVAC
-137mVDC

| Railing to deck |
0VAC
-325mVDC

| Railing to water |
129mVAC
0Hz all
266mVDC
Screw driver in the ground w/ wire attached - No power | Water to Railing

| Railing to water *deep-end* |
-214mVDC


| Screwdriver wire connected to bonding wire, checking measurements over to exterior of pump ground screw (pump off) |
17mVAC
Frequency went up and down from 0 to 45 but mostly stayed at 0Hz
0VDC
-190mA DC
0A AC

| House ground over to timer (no bonding wires attached to pump) |
500mVAC
60Hz
Bonding wire detached | No power | Testing voltage at timer

| House ground over to pump (no bonding attached) |
1.32VAC
60Hz

| Checking the neutral wire inside the pump motor encasement |
Checking neutral wire stashed inside pump motor housing for voltage

| House ground attached, ground wire going to screwdriver in the yard |
Powered on but only with screwdriver with ground wire | DC Voltage

| Railing to water |
123mVAC

| Railing to deck |
0VAC

| Deck to water |
120mVAC

| Railing to water & water to deck |
560mVDC
200-450Hz all over the place



| Everything reconnected like normal |
Reconnected the bonding wire to the pump exterior and this happened

| Railing to water |
3.4VAC

| Changed common lead on oscilloscope and multimeter to screwdriver wire in the ground |
260mVAC
60Hz
430mVDC
-190mA DC
0A AC

| Water to deck |
434mVDC
320mVAC


I probably missed a valuable pointer someplace in our book. There's a ton more to dig into because I mean, we do have 10 pages worth of suggestions and ideas to go off of. Thanks again everyone

 

[Newdude]

I’m going to try again tomorrow. Right now it’s late by me so I think that half of it is I am shot and the other half is I’m used to holding the meter and not reading about it. But all of the above is coming up Greek at the moment.

2 immediate stand outs to me is the pointy graphs from the Fios equipment that match the ones from the pool, and you pulled the wrong Coax.

First, it can’t be the Fios, in any capacity so that’s one thing off the list for good. The only thing coming from the street is a glass tube wrapped in rubber. It has nothing to conduct. The powered equipment could certainly fail, but they would have turned off with the main breaker and the trouble would have disappeared.

The (old) buried copper phone line, specifically the cooper sheath under the outer insulation of the feed wire, is the suspect if there is one.

We also need to find the original CATV line and test that. That was the culprit in the similar thread from May, but not the coax from the Fios equipment, The Comcast / Cox outside connection.

@mas985 made the point earlier that if you had any serious voltage coming in on your phones or TV line that you’d have service issues. And he’s right. But here you go…. You aren’t using either of your original services and are now all on Fios. They could be shredded and you’d never see a service disruption. Also, if either of the originals was the problem, they could be removed and taped up and you wouldn’t care if it took them 6 months or 6 years to figure out.

 

[Mike1162]

There's a ground wire at the timer that's not connected. I'm guessing it's just disconnected for testing.

 

[gamerfan2004]

you pulled the wrong Coax.

The Comcast coax is hanging disconnected under the telecommunications box. FiOS is the only active coax to test.

 

[gamerfan2004]

There's a ground wire at the timer that's not connected. I'm guessing it's just disconnected for testing.

Yup, that's the naughty house ground

 

[Newdude]

The Comcast coax is hanging disconnected under telecommunications. FiOS is the only active coax to test.

If it’s swinging in the breeze and not attached to a splitter with a ground then Comcast is out as well.

 

[Newdude]

Good morning and I’m already feeling better half way through my coffee. For example, now I see that the blue sentences are typical links to (in this case) videos. And thanks for them !!! Maybe it jars thoughts out of somebody.

So, Fios and Comcast are out. It hit me at 3 AM that solar is out too. Solar checks two of the 3 boxes but misses the 3rd. It works when the main breaker is tripped. (Check). And when the Electric Co cuts the feed to the house (check).

It would not stop if the Electric Co cut the whole streets power. (No check).

So we still need an outside influence. Upon closer look at pic one. The Verizon Copper interface appears to be mounted to the electric pipe. Does it swing in the breeze or did some ***Wahoo**** actually screw it into the electric’s PVC ??????? Open it to see. Then remove any grounds from inside the interface. The most suspect one if there is more than one is the one attached to the buried wire sheath. Anywho remove them and check for voltage at the pool. And please Mary Mother of God tell
Me that the interface isn’t secured with 2.5 inch screws. That’d be some ‘stuff’, huh ? Lol.

 

[mas985]

Here is what I think is happening. When the ground is separated from the bonding wire, the pool and railing are in isolation and at the same potential. Much like a lineman in a insulated cherry picker grabbing on to a high power line, he won't get shocked. It doesn't matter if they are at a potential higher than the house ground/neutral, everything is at the same potential so no shock will occur.

However, grounding the pump pulls the pump and water to the power companies neutral potential which is different than what the area of around your pool is due to some localized voltage source. I believe the primary problem is that the bonding between the railing and the pool has been compromised or perhaps doesn't even exist. If it was working properly, grounding the bond wire would pull everything to the same potential so there would never be a shock even with a localized voltage source. You can prove this by laying a temporary bonding wire from the railing directly to the pump bonding lug or to the house ground/neutral. This should pull the railing to the same potential as the pool water. If the distance is too long and you have an outlet near the pool, you can use the ground terminal on the outlet. To be safe, turn off the breaker for that outlet. You are just using the grounding wire.

On to the stray voltage source. One way to find the source would be again to use that same house ground/neutral connect and measure the ground potential around the pool (one lead on screwdriver in ground near pool and one lead to house ground/neutral. See if the voltage is higher in one location than another. That might localize where the issue exists.

But again, finding the stray voltage will fix one problem but you will still need to fix the bonding issue.

 

[Newdude]

But again, finding the stray voltage will fix one problem but you will still need to fix the bonding issue.

I’m almost certain we are looking at multiple failures where each one should not be in the first place.

I had another thought at 3 AM (when the best ones arouse you from a deep slumber). But it’s been 20 years since I was an electrican, and that was only for 6 months so I’m certainly no pro. Anywho is there any chance that the main breaker could be bad at 40+ years old and allow some voltage through when tripped ? So OP kills power to the house but still sees the 3V at the pool ? The electric co lifts one leg at the street and voltage persists. They put it back, lift the other and still have the voltage on the 1st leg ? To them they checked both legs but missed it ? Then once they kill the neighborhood, both legs and the pool go dark ?

 

[Sparkmaster]

I haven't read all the comments but I had a similar situation with a customer. Found that the bond was corroded in the meter box and no bond to the water meter inside the house.