Hurricane? Isiaas

[PAUL161]

Had this installed about 5 years ago and it's been a blessing. Fully automatic, comes on 15 seconds after power goes out and shuts down as soon as it comes back on. Ran for 4 days solid on one outage. Living out in the country, we get outages in the winter if we have a freezing rain due to branches falling across power lines, in the summer from storm and high winds. Kinda common in this part of the country. Had it hooked up by a certified electrician. I wouldn't be without one! PJ
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[Rhodyspit75]

I’m glad you have solved your problem. I’m still puzzled how either side of you has no power but you do? You must live right!

 

[vette]

Try going outside and listening to you neighbor’s generator. Have someone turn on your A/C. If you hear the generator bog down then what I suspected is true. IMMEDIATELY go tell your neighbor to disconnect the generator he could kill someone working to restore power. .

Well truth be told years ago there were some industry accidents where power from a private generator did cause the generators power to back feed unto the power line and workers were hurt or killed. But today their working methologies pretty much exclude that happening. Of course any generator hooked up is suppose to have the customers main switch opened or the meter pulled to keep the generator power from backfeeding unto the power line. But yes most individual customers probably don't know that. So the industry has developed working practices to protect their workers.
The two significant steps that a line worker is suppose to make before he/she even thinks about touching a power line is that he must check for voltage on the line and then upon verifying "No Voltage" He is suppose to ground the line with solid grounds before working on it. The grounding of the line before working on it is to also ensure that the line does not become energized by "induced voltage" from another nearby live line. These practices are pretty much standardized by all power providers in the industry today. I know, I am retired from the power company. And I have worked with other utilities outside our own area. We are all trained the same way. A lineman would be working with rubber gloves and sleeves and sometimes hot line sticks to do the voltage check and apply the grounds. The power line could not become energized under these conditions. Only if the worker made serious mistakes in practices could he become exposed to voltage.
About two having no power and one in the middle having power.... If each customer is supplied by there own transformer and the power line itself is still hot, then the ones with no power could have their transformer fuse blown killing power to just their house while the one still with power may be lucky in that his transformer fuse did not blow and the transform feeding his house is still working.

 

[vette]

Maybe I'm stupid but I have never understood the neutral wire. I'm used to car wiring with a hot wire and a ground wire. I believe our electric stove and oven are 240 - don't know about washer and dryer. Anyway, when those are switched on, nothing happens. Only the ac causes lights to dim and stay dim. I'll try it again right now. Yes - kitchen fluorescent fixture at the other end of the house dimmed and flickered. I called our ac man and apparently he's now out of business. I'll call my electrician who's very responsible. We had more storm damage than anyone else in Stamford I'm sure - and who is going to cut up the huge tree that fell across my driveway. This is a freaking nightmare and crazy because the winds never got over 70 mph - supposedly.

Paul, I know this is a long dissertation and is kind of an indirect way of explaining the difference between a neutral wire and a ground wire but it should help to explain the purposes of each wire. The neutral wire is the return wire of the circuit similar to how a ground wire in a car returns the current back to the battery. In construction wiring a ground wire is a completely different purpose.
So here is my lengthy dissertation from another post I made a few days ago.
As you may have read elsewhere, the purpose of keeping the grounding wires and the neutral wires separate in a structure is so that all the return current comes back to its source on the neutral wire. The ground wire is for the purpose of bonding all metal enclosures of all devices, including boxes, switches & receptacles and appliances, together with a very direct path back to the source if one of these enclosures should come in contact with a hot wire. The ground wire in a structure is never to
carry current unless there is a fault (shorted wire) between the hot wire and the metal enclosure.
So having said that, where is it allowed that the neutral and ground wire should be bonded together. Most utilities serve their customers with a 3-wire service ( on a single phase service). Multiphase services do have more but houses only get single phase.
In a 3 wire service there is no separate ground wire. The neutral carries all what is called the unbalanced return current. But at the customer's panel there is in modern times what we call a "derived" ground wire. In other words from the customer's main panel is derived the ground wire which is extended into the structure with all the electrical circuits. In order for this ground wire to be a direct path back to the source ( without carrying any current under normal operating conditions ) it has to be connected to the neutral somewhere. That point of bonding is at the customer's main panel, no where else in the house. Because the utilities service is only 3 wires that bonding jumper at the main panel is where any fault current ( current returning on the ground wire because of a short in the house) is then drawn unto the neutral and returned to the utilities source.
Now here's my point, it depends on where the separate grounding wire is derived. Once a ground wire is derived (created) and bonded at its point of origin it is never connected to the neutral again down stream. If it was it would allow any current from the neutral to start to flow on the ground wires. I know this can get belabored sorry, BUT THE POINT IS THAT THE POINT OF DERIVING THE GROUND WIRE MIGHT NOT BE AT THE MAIN PANEL. It may be at the meter base. Or it could be at the utilities service transformer especially if the transformer is a for an underground service lateral. If there are 4 wires coming from your meter base to your main panel then the ground wire was derived at the meter base and there are 2 hot wires, 1 neutral wire, and 1 ground wire coming from the meter base to your main panel. As can be seen then the bonding of the ground wire to the neutral wire is at the meter base and should be separate at the main panel. In this scenario under the definitions of the NEC (National Electrical Code) your main panel is actually a subpanel to the meterbase and the neutral and ground must be separate. This would explain why the utility man you described earlier told you to remove the bonding jumper between the ground and neutral bars in your panel. The same would be the case if the utility considered the underground service transformer as the point of deriving a separate ground wire and extended to the property a 4-wire service with 2 hots, 1 neutral and 1 ground wire. This then would have the ground wire separate at the meter base as well as at the main panel. Although this configuration is unlikely.
Hope I have helped instead of confused.

 

[pdplot]

How did you remember all that?
I did learn something from all of this.
My friend in North Stamford is having trouble with his Generac. I don't think he ran it enough. We haven't had any out(r)ages lately around here but this S.O.B. made up for it. And it's not even the hurricane season yet. Eversource (power company) is taking all kinds of hear for their slow response.

 

[DavidApp]

Some people will connect their generator to the dryer outlet and back feed their home. If their main breaker is not switched off they can back feed to the transformer on the pole.
I gather linemen coming out after a storm will listen for generators and check the installation before they get to work on the lines.

You need one of these.

David

 

[PAUL161]

The Generac system does not feed back into the pole line. It completely disconnects by throwing a main breaker off and switching over to the generator, this process takes 15 seconds, when power is restored by the power company, it shuts the generator off and switches back to normal power. two different circuits. Once a week the generator starts, preset by it's computer, runs for 12 minutes to check it's self and circuitry and shuts down. It should only be installed by a certified electrician, it's not a DIY job! The power Co. must be notified as the meter must be pulled, re-installed when done and power Co. has to put their seal on it. PJ

 

[Rhodyspit75]

“About two having no power and one in the middle having power.... If each customer is supplied by there own transformer and the power line itself is still hot, then the ones with no power could have their transformer fuse blown killing power to just their house while the one still with power may be lucky in that his transformer fuse did not blow and the transform feeding his house is still working.“

That is true. It’s not normally the case around here unless you’re in a remote area. All good points regarding the correct way to run on backup power.

I’m somewhat an expert on utility company safety equipment. I’ve played in the local electric company golf league for 30 years and all those guys talk about is work!

I was hesitant to bring up the famous dryer plug generator connection but since David did I’ll say it’s one of the more dangerous things you can do. I once turned off a main breaker and the basement lights stayed on. The only thing that happened was the handle moved but the contacts were corroded together.

 

[pdplot]

Neighbors generators still running. Two streets over, large limb still resting on wires, blocking road. People living below can't get out by car. Cul de Sac. They could walk up and take one of the infrequent buses that stop about 1/2 mile short of our area. We have no buses serving our area.