Hello All,
I’ve got a weird problem here at the house. We’ve been here for over a year and it never occured to me to check the voltage at the outlets. I’ve been working on some Halloween hacks and had reason to test the voltage.
I’ve got a decent fluke multimeter, I’ve recently had the service and drop upgraded to 200amps. I’ve tested several outlets and they all show 160V? That’s from hot to neutral. I’ve done this in the past at many other places and have always gotten readings of slightly less than 120V but always in that range.
Should I be concerned here? I havent wired any 240V outlets but when I do won’t I be seeing 320V there? That can’t be good for my expensive welding equipment or air compressor could it?
What should I do? Is it possible that I am measuring this wrong?
thanks,
Daniel Neumansky
Restoring our second Victorian home this time in Alamdea CA. Check out the blog http://www.chezneumansky.blogspot.com/
Oakland CA
Crazy Homeowner-Victorian Restorer
Replies
Have you measured the incoming line voltage at the meter base?
Heck yes. Indeed, call whoever did the service change .... I'm thinking in terms of a bad neutral connection at the drop.
Meanwhile, make sure every appliance you value is on a surge suppressor .... or the high voltage will kill them. If the suppressor fries, leave the circuit alone until the problem is fixed.
Measure more outlets in the house. If some outlets are similarly low (eg, 90V) then you almost certainly have a loose neutral connection somewhere between pole and breaker panel. Note that if you have a loose neutral then often the voltage measured will vary wildly depending on the amount of load in the house, and the voltage on the "opposite" side of the 240V line will be as low as the first side is high.
A loose neutral connection is a very dangerous situation and should be remedied immediately.
It is possible that the meter is somehow giving a false reading. You might want to check an outlet at a neighbor's house to see if you're getting consistent numbers. But don't waste time doing this if you can't do it ASAP -- call an electrician.
I had similar occurence at my home years ago. Reported this to the power company and they sent out a tech to check. Gave me the readings coming off of my transformer (I have my own) that contradicted my readings. Turned out my meter was faulty. So, check these voltages with another meter before taking corrective action.
Thanks everyone for replying.
Ocam's razor is always the best way to tackle these things. If I had had 160V in the house for a year I'm sure I would of fritzed several things by now.
I changed the battery in the multi-meter and now it reads a nice normal 122V at all the outlets.
thanks again
Daniel Neumansky
Restoring our second Victorian home this time in Alamdea CA. Check out the blog http://www.chezneumansky.blogspot.com/
Oakland CA
Crazy Homeowner-Victorian Restorer
Hi Daniel,
This post saved me about $250 in fees from an electrician to come to my home. I also noticed my outlets reading about 148-160 volts. I was diagnosing inter-connected smoke detector issues.
Upon checking the health of my meter's 9V battery, it showed low. (Which I checked based on this discussion.) Replaced the battery, and all outlets now read between 118-122 volts. Perfect.
Many thanks!
First thing to do is replace battery in your voltmeter. I had same issue showing 160V at outlet. Put a new battery in my voltmeter, and now it shows 120v.