Residential electric question...flickering lights and low voltage whenever any load come on...

[oldman]

Are linemen cutting down trees and whittling them into poles these days?

Maybe I shoulda kept my mouth shut

 

[shaffewm]

Are linemen cutting down trees and whittling them into poles these days?

No. But we could

 

[lbhsbz]

Are linemen cutting down trees and whittling them into poles these days?

If they were smart they'd have simply planted trees along all the roads 30 years ago and then they wouldn't have to set poles anymore lol.

 

[oldman]

If they were smart they'd have simply planted trees along all the roads 30 years ago and then they wouldn't have to set poles anymore lol.

Arrowhead area used trees to get services to houses occasionally. I don't think it's a prevalent as it once was.

 

[rrrr]

Edison will come out for free, do that before spending money on an electrician, A Troubleman will come out and isolate the service and tell you one way or another what direction the problem is, and Might even isolate the breaker giving you the problem if it's inside the house.

You pay a decent sized bill every month and they are one of the few utilities that will come out for free and trouble shoot, use their expertise. You pay every month for it.
Nothing against electricians, but they are parts changers for the most part ( Don't kill me not all). Edison will isolate you from them and see where the problem is.

IBEW 40 years.

That's a bit funny, because the first time the forty year old 25 kVA transformer in my alley blew up, I explained to the Oncor foreman it was feeding six two story homes, summer ambient temps were over 100°, I had already complained the service voltage at my meter was below spec, I had shot it with an infrared thermometer, which indicated it was overloaded and overheating, and a 67 kVA replacement was a good idea.

He dismissed me with that well practiced lineman look, and dropped a used and reconditioned (rattle can rebuild) 25 on the pad. Four months later when that one overheated and failed, it was replaced with a 67.

There are weak sisters in all trades.

 

[rrrr]

On one particularly long day, my last call was to a house that was having electrical issues with parts of the house. This was pretty late in the day, and nobody else was out working, and was after-hours for the utility service crews too. My first clue that I should've just quit for the day was right when I got the dead front off the panel and reached for a suspect breaker to shut it off-my pager (yes-it was that long ago, Ha,Ha!) starts buzzing like crazy and scares the crap out of me.

Some time around 1989 my pager went off when I was leaning into the rectifier compartment of a running 480 volt 500 kVA UPS, trying to clip an ocilloscope lead on the 412 volt DC bus so I could check the AC ripple current and health of the DC capacitor bank.

It's the closest I've come to shitting my pants since I was in diapers.

 

[Sleek-Jet]

That's a bit funny, because the first time the forty year old 25 kVA transformer in my alley blew up, I explained to the Oncor foreman it was feeding six two story homes, summer ambient temps were over 100°, in had already complained the service voltage at my meter was below spec, I had shot it with an infrared thermometer, which indicated it was overloaded and overheating, and a 67 kVA replacement was a good idea.

He dismissed me with that well practiced lineman look, and dropped a used and reconditioned (rattle can rebuild) 25 on the pad. Four months later when that one overheated and failed, it was replaced with a 67.

There are weak sisters in all trades.

Lineman typically don't have the discretion to upgrade a transformer, especially in a large utility. He probably turned in the ticket and it was routed to engineering who did the same math you did and decided that the next time the pot was replaced it needed to be X kVa. This all went into the database or maps and when the 25 kVA gave up the ghost they replaced with a larger transformer.

 

[rrrr]

Lineman typically don't have the discretion to upgrade a transformer, especially in a large utility. He probably turned in the ticket and it was routed to engineering who did the same math you did and decided that the next time the pot was replaced it needed to be X kVa. This all went into the database or maps and when the 25 kVA gave up the ghost they replaced with a larger transformer.

I don't want to imply I'm smarter than the utility guys about their world. They have my respect.

 

[oldman]

Edison will be out sometime in the next 5 days to check things out....

Update?

 

[lbhsbz]

Update?

No idea...My dad grabbed the kid and went to Mammoth for a few days. They're coming home tonight, I'll ask.

 

[Kachina26]

Some time around 1989 my pager went off when I was leaning into the rectifier compartment of a running 480 volt 500 kVA UPS, trying to clip an ocilloscope lead on the 412 volt DC bus so I could check the AC ripple current and health of the DC capacitor bank.

It's the closest I've come to shitting my pants since I was in diapers.

Yeah, got bit by the pager while adjusting the timing on a distributor once or twice. Not quite the same level of danger (ok, no danger), but it makes you jump anyway.

 

[lbhsbz]

Saw him today…Edison never came out….but furnace blower was on…so we went out to the panel…the leg in question was a 104V, the other leg was at 130V.

He’ll call again tomorrow and raise hell.

 

[lbhsbz]

Well, Dad got bored so he went over to the neighbors house and clipped onto their neutral buss and ran 130ft of wire over to his panel…then measured 120V on the money between both of his hot legs and the neighbor’s neutral with the same load as the last test.

These both come off the same transformer.

Any issues with temporarily bonding the neutral from the neighbors house with his neutral for testing? (He owns both properties)

Edison did come out…broke some insulation of a connection at the weatherhead…and evidently left without doing anything else.

 

[oldman]

No issues with scabbing off the neighbor.
Leave it connected it will keep from damaging your dad's stuff.
Guy that came out is a dead beat.
I'll be the first to call it out.

 

[Sleek-Jet]

No problem with that at all, at least as a temporary fix. We've done the same to get full service restored to a customer. However, those times are usually on an underground service where it might be a couple of hours or even a day before the crew can dig up and repair the service. OH usually gets repaired right away.

A couple reasons why the lineman that came out didn't fix it on the first trip. Could be he ran out of stuff on the truck to make the fix or the service wire might be so ratty they want to run new tri-plex back to the transformer. Could be because he's lazy also. Keep making noise till they come back to fix it.