Where does the neutral go?

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DanielGierlach

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Alaska
Sorry if this seems painfully obvious but I’ve never encountered this before. The gear is all old bucket style and soon to be replaced. The MDP feeds subs all over the building and this particular panel (480Y/277) has a neutral that is Not located on the neutral buss in the gear?

“Neutral conductor in this panel is not connected to neutral buss at the switchgear”

480 277 does all the air handler motors/vfd’s compressors and lighting
 
DanielGierlach said:
Sorry if this seems painfully obvious but I’ve never encountered this before. The gear is all old bucket style and soon to be replaced. The MDP feeds subs all over the building and this particular panel (480Y/277) has a neutral that is Not located on the neutral buss in the gear?

“Neutral conductor in this panel is not connected to neutral buss at the switchgear”

480 277 does all the air handler motors/vfd’s compressors and lighting
Click to expand...
So where does it go, or is it not landed at all?

277 volt loads will not work or will not have stable voltage to them if not solidly connected to the supply neutral. Should one have put the bonding screw/strap in the neutral bus in the subpanel, you may get parallel pathways over the EGC and as a result a more stable "neutral" but that is not code compliant either.
 
kwired said:
So where does it go, or is it not landed at all?

277 volt loads will not work or will not have stable voltage to them if not solidly connected to the supply neutral. Should one have put the bonding screw/strap in the neutral bus in the subpanel, you may get parallel pathways over the EGC and as a result a more stable "neutral" but that is not code compliant either.
Click to expand...
I don’t have a clue. I was just installing a surge arrester and saw the sticker on the inside cover after the fact. There is a neutral conductor landed in the panel/panel is a 277/480 wye connected. Old building from the 80’s in Alaska so no telling what is what. Eventually we’re gutting the whole building but it didn’t make sense to me so I thought I’d ask.
Not imperative. I’m sure I’ll find out at some point.
 
Well you said is not landed on the neutral bus in the gear, I was presuming you meant in the gear the feeder originates from. Does this mean there is no neutral conductor entering that gear with the ungrounded conductors of that feeder? If so that could be a shock incident waiting to happen. How likely, can depend on what actually has been done and other site conditions. If they bootlegged the neutral from neutral of another circuit, that is still not right but probably better situation than bootlegging it from an EGC or structural metal, water pipe, etc.
 
Is the panel connected to a separately derived system? Is the service a different voltage? I gather that's not the case, but it's the only thing that would make sense. Otherwise someone left you a note indicating they did something wrong, but not exactly what and how, and it's up to you to figure it out.
 
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