7,200 volts on house wiring

[kwired]

The neutral for the primary, is the same as the secondary, so that should have blew out the pole fuse rather quickly. That's a direct to ground fault.

Overcurrent protection on these lines is for protecting those lines, and not secondary wiring. If the protection device is a recloser, then you get a similar surge probably three times before the protective device remains open.

These conductors are not protected to tight levels that interior run conductors are typically protected, this is an attempt to allow for faults to burn clear instead of taking the line down which means less dispatching repair crews for minor incidents, and more system reliability from the consumers point of view.

 

[rgsmith]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'll try to answer a few of the questions that were brought up. I am the AHJ and seem to be the only person concerned. I did have the EC pull out several devices that had smoke damage on the wall around them and I inspected the wiring and everything looked good. I wasn't brought in until after everything was fixed so there may have been more that I didn't see. I did see that it burnt off the grounding electrode conductor at the ground rod and the EC replaced it and installed two new ground rods. I voiced my concerns to everyone involved and wrote up the inspection report to reflect my opinion. The thing that concerned me the most was that the contractor did the work and gave the utility company a letter of reconnect and the UC energized the house without me even looking at it. I contacted the utility company and they've at least admitted that they shouldn't have done that and assured me it wouldn't happen again.

 

[gordonious]

Rewire the house

Rewire the house

I once worked on a project where one phase was crossed with the neutral. Commercial project. Almost all or the branch neutral conductors became welded in the metal outlet boxes plus inside the metal conduits. This should tell you something. HGC E.E.S.

 

[north star]

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rgsmith,

If you have inspected what you can and documented everything
that you knew to document, ...discuss it with your BO, place a
copy in the file and move on......Doing anything else might get
you in trouble with "the powers-that-be", which [ might ] get
you terminated from your place of employment.

Working for an AHJ isn't all the glamour & glitz that some
might think that it is.....It is perfectly acceptable to have a
healthy amount of concern and wanting things done right and
SAFE.........Expressing that [ sometimes ] makes one a target
and possibly being labeled as a trouble-maker.......A lot of
people do not want things documented and then brought to
light! :huh:

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