When I lived in New York State, one section of Buffalo would have a problem with 'Brown-outs', especially the refreierators, the motors, this was much more pervasive before the Niagara Falls Plant was built.
There was the Huntley station built right on the Niagara River in the City of Buffalo, and a section of Buffalo called 'Black Rock,It seems that Black Rock has always had bad luck, in 1812 it was burnt to the ground by the British, but in the late 1950s and early 1960s the Huntley station would decrease its voltage by a few percents to help Niagara Mohawk ship power to NYC, during excessive hot months of July and August,Hence, the brown outs in the Black Rock, section of Buffalo, as I said Refrigerators were the big item to die because of these voltages drops, but I never heard of bad Neutral connectons being the cause of brown outs, Not saying it cant be just that I have never heard of that one. But the appliance stores areound the area always made a killing around the 1st of September each year.
Since the Niagara Power Project came on line the brown-outs have been seriously reduced, and if you visit the Falls you gotta see the power plants, this plant rivals any engineering project in the country, just totally impressive.
Also right across the gorge is the Adam Beck plant the Canadian version. Both impressive sites.
Sorry for the diversion, but it did eliminate the brown-out problem.
-Mark-