Fun with electricity

Let'sgoflying!

Let'sgoflying!

Touchdown! Greaser!
Joined
Feb 23, 2005
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20,316
Location
west Texas
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Dave Taylor
Can anyone sketch a wiring diagram of this? Purely out of curiosity.
The two drops serve 2 homes. Each has 120 & 240.
I am at the end of a line.
Just have never been able to wrap my mind around what is happening with these. Bonus points for approx voltages.
Thanks.C58039EF-C81C-4BE0-81A0-EB8FB965E282.jpegC6BF5631-50F1-4204-BACA-2FD6658B3E56.jpeg
 
8C60A0BD-29B2-49DA-8907-75E07267A978.jpeg It's similar to Single Wire Earth Return, but you have a ground wire.
My neighborhood is the same way, one incoming line feeds half the neighborhood, one feeds the other half.

The incoming is somewhere in the low kilovolt range.
 
The lower wire in the primary - it’s connected to ground.
Does that mean you would not be electrocuted if you were able to reach up on your (25’) tippy-toes somehow, and grab it?
(be assured I have no plans to; this is all hypothetical)
Is it not the return path? (ie kV)
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
The lower wire in the primary - it’s connected to ground.
Does that mean you would not be electrocuted if you were able to reach up on your (25’) tippy-toes somehow, and grab it?
(be assured I have no plans to; this is all hypothetical)
Is it not the return path? (ie kV)
Click to expand...
It is the return path but it is at ground potential, you'll see there are no significant insulators on it. Touching it is fine, but I'd recommend against cutting it.
 
Zeldman said:
All I know is when one of those things blow it will wake everyone in the house....
Click to expand...

Lost a phase at one of my transmitter sites a while back. Guys comes out to fix it, complete with NAPA hat turned around backwards. (The official headgear of Alabama.) Bucket lift up to the transformer, I head back inside the building. A short while later, I hear an earth-shattering BOOM.

I stick my head out the door, guy has a silly grin on his face. He yells, "I fount yer problem!"
 
chartbundle said:
It is the return path but it is at ground potential, you'll see there are no significant insulators on it. Touching it is fine, but I'd recommend against cutting it.
Click to expand...

If you're in an area with poor ground conductivity (like Alabama), that's especially true. We had a brain-damaged copper thief here who was cutting and stealing the thin copper grounding wires on each power pole. First one, second one ... no big deal. He kept cutting them and cramming them in his bag. Eventually, he had removed enough grounding, and was at a pole with especially bad conductivity, that he was electrocuted. The deputies found him hanging off the pole.

We've even had some utter maniacs climb inside high voltage substations to get at the wiring. More Darwin awards.
 
Stephen Poole said:
If you're in an area with poor ground conductivity (like Alabama), that's especially true. We had a brain-damaged copper thief here who was cutting and stealing the thin copper grounding wires on each power pole. First one, second one ... no big deal. He kept cutting them and cramming them in his bag. Eventually, he had removed enough grounding, and was at a pole with especially bad conductivity, that he was electrocuted. The deputies found him hanging off the pole.

We've even had some utter maniacs climb inside high voltage substations to get at the wiring. More Darwin awards.
Click to expand...

Good riddance. Saved the taxpayers a bunch of money that otherwise would have been spent prosecuting and incarcerating his useless bod.
 
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