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Remember this thread ?

<paul harvey>
And now the rest of the story...
</paul harvey>

A week or so after the service in the above thread was energized (after I fixed it) the owner called to complain of flickering lights.

I get there, and the lights won't flicker. Can't find anything obviously wrong...

I tell her that I'll come back in a few days to look some more, and tell her to turn that circuit off and call me if there are any more problems.

She later calls back to say that they've worked fine ever since, no problem...

Time passes...

Last night I get a call from her, says she has a big problem. She was walking in the rain (with wet hands), slipped in the mud and caught herself on the trailer tongue and got shocked.



"$#!+, when will you be home?" I asked...

So we agree on 5 PM...

I get there, with voltprobe in hand, and it starts singing at four feet away from the trailer!!!!

I shout to her to NOT open the door, don't touch anything! I go back to the truck for rubber boots and gloves, open the door, step in, and the voltprobe stops...

Hmmm... thinks I, I must now be at the same voltage as the trailer... "Ma'am, please don't touch me or anything else!" I say...

I meter 114V from panel cover screw to threshold of doorway.

I get the panel door open and locate the circuit that's faulting, shut it off, confirm that there's little to no voltage (2V on T5-1000 Fluke... Not TRMS) and declare it safe for now.

Looks like I'll have to tear out walls to find the fault...

Anyway, my mistake was to not check the tailer bond on the frame side of things for corrosion or open terminal. The darn things as green as the Statue of Liberty and as loose as Madonna.

I could have killed her!!!!!!!!



I'm so mad at myself, I could just beat myself over the head with the NEC!

GRRRRRRRR!!!!

So much for being the best sparky in Greenbrier County...

I feel like a loser!



[This message has been edited by sparky66wv (edited 11-19-2002).]