Since I intalled CSA rated trough heaters, designed for this particular fibreglass impregnated plastic water trough two of the horses have not been drinking water, leading me to believe that they must be experiencing some stray current somehow in the water since the customer mentioned he thought that the water might be too warm and stuck his finger in the trough (idiot, lol)but it was fine and after asking him if he got a lift or tingle he said no.
Any troubleshooting tips or suggestions before I head out their tomorrow afternoon??
My plan of action tomorrow is to test voltage to ground, voltage to neutral, neutral to ground and ground to a different sourced ground (3prong ext cord to the house power). Then test for voltage on the stainless steel backing of the element mount to ground and to neutal for any strange readings.
As a last resort, I'll drain the trough and remove the heater element to check for voltage on the outer shell of the element.
This is a new 60A sub at the barn from the house splitter to a disco fused at 60 A with a run of 190ft of 3 wire #4 WMU direct burial. It lands on a Cuttler Hammer 100A 24 circuit panel with its own groundplate and bonded. The bare ground in the panel feeder was well taped at both ends and isolated from any contact in this installation.
From the barn panel I ran a 3-12 direct burial (60ft) to a postbox for a merc vapour light and tied the second cicuit to an existing (about 15ft) 2-14 direct burial to a gfi plug (which I did test with a gfi plug trip tester and metered to grnd and to neutral, and ground to neutral with good readings) on a post behind a wooden wall dividing the watertrough and the post.
The trough heater is a 3 prong plug cord for outdoor use with a sealed unit at the heater end that screws into the plastic trough via a plastic clamping nut and gasket.
The whole property is pure sand as far as you can dig.
Thks in advance,
Greg
