110v Hot TO Ground

Ravenvalor

Senior Member
I am getting 122v from hot to ground at the source of a 12/2UF cable and 110v from hot to ground at the end of the cable about 100’ away. It’s not even enough to light a 10w LED lamp. The hot to neutral is fine at 122v at the end of the cable. It’s direct buried but i checked it with my UF cable fault locator and didn’t pick up any faults. It trips a GFCI receptacle at its source but when I bypass the GFCI it doesn’t trip. Just giving me a low reading from hot to ground. I suppose it could have a nick in the jacket at the ground. Or there could be a direct burial splice in the ground that has a loose ground connection. My fault locator would not have picked it up if I had it connected to the hot only.
I will scan again but this time connect to ground.
Thanks for letting me vent. 😀
 
L-N will power a load, but L-G will not?

Sounds like a broken EGC to me, and you're using a high-impedance meter.

Measure resistance between N and G in the cable when disconnected at both ends?
 
Sounds like a damaged cable. Forget the ground for a minute. You have the same voltage at the source as at the end so those wires (the hot and neutral) are not completely broken but when you put a load on it (even such a small load) and the bulb is dim you have voltage drop because the cable is damaged. Further proof of that is that the gfci trips.
 
If it’s damaged that means that it was probably not installed deep enough and therefore likely to get damaged again. Best to replace the cable.

Thanks for the great advice.
I would take a decent load like a heat gun or small electric heater. Connect it between hot & neutral at the far end and check the voltage your getting when it runs. If it will not work or the voltage drops the hot or neutral is damaged. If that is ok then connect the load between hot and ground and see what happens but don't leave it on long just enough to check voltage.

Either way if the GFCI is tripping it is probably done
 
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