What damage can water inside copper wire cause?
Here is the problem I came accross ...
An underground lateral installed in ridged metal conduit to a riser up a utility pole where the POCO connects the type THHN/THWN at the top without any form of drip loop to prevent water from entering the wire.
So, we have the inside of the cable full of water from the point of connection at the top of the pole to the lugs in the meter, and the inside of the ridged conduit will have water in the low points underground.
Well, there seems to have been an insulation failure of one of the wires in the riser, causing a burn out on one of the hot legs to the ridged.
We just had 2 days of freezing temps (0 degrees F) and then 38 degrees on the morning of the fault. Could the freezing of the water inside the wire and subsequent thaw have caused the insulation to fail?
shortcircuit
