ground falt

[skystormfarms]

i have just ben blown acros the room by a psu i have photos but the psu still works so y wold the psu throwme acrose the room but still work ?

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

Get your meter and test your ground to neutral on your outlets and see if any voltage exist, if it does then you got Line *hot* grounding out in a J-box or circuit *known in the trade as a hot ground* and the ground wire is disconnected or nonexistent somewhere on it's way back to the load center and not tripping the breaker. It could also be a mis-wire, someone accidentally wired Line to the ground screw on the outlet. The third photo looks like it did trip, but arc quite a bit on the first before tripping which might still mean an improper grounding and that the breaker did it's job tripping when the circuit exceeded it's amps limit.

If you don't see anything interesting on the house electrical then suspect the PSU. I'm curious as you are.


You're lucky that you didn't die.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

well i am wondering 110v sparks and tingels but 240v blows u acrose the room and some times threu walls but my psu is 110v so it had to be no ground and after the pumping transforer?

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

Yep that sounds like 120v.

Remember it's not the volts that will kill you, it's the load being pass through you.

edit: in the first picture, I see the GE logo, is this a power strip?

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

the load pasd thru you what do you mean?

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

the load pasd thru you what do you mean?

Load = amps

Say you connect you're self in series with the circuit. You got Line *hot wire* coming from the load center *breaker box* going through a device *ie your PSU* then you got load going back to the breaker box via the Load *neutral wire.* Should you intervene between the load or line, you become part of the circuit, with that any amps traveling that came from other devices or any amps you're creating via resistances. Doing so will put alot of current across your heart enough to make it stop beating completely. GFCI outlets and GFI Breakers trip at I think 5 milliamps.

Most residential and commercial A/C Circuit wiring are done parallel and daisy chained therefore only devices that are connected via receptacle work in series but will not run in series with other devices connected to the same outlet, but anything traveling down the neutral return carries amps from all the devices that are in parallel of each other. So basically if you grab the neutral wire of a circuit at the panel then ground yourself to the neutral bus bar you get all current from all the devices in that circuit. Where as at a receptacle you may just get the current from the device or devices via a power strip that are plugged into the receptacle.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

no gfci's here to old still how did it blow me acros the room it did just that

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

The only way I see you getting blown across the room is if something backfed into the hot Line and then arc to ground on the plug causing that familiar tingle and spark sensation usually something holding a charge. I'm no electrician, I may have apprenticed for year and half, but I don't know everything. Like I said earlier perhaps that one outlet is a hot ground.

Looking at the picture it looks like it started from the ground prong so perhaps a short in the PSU.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

i will look at the psu should i have manigement look at the pannel? ok i looked at the filter bord and it is black with soot

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

First You will have to flip the breaker back on to do the test. I would look at the receptacle in question and take a reading with a multimeter. Neutral is on the left, hot is on the right, ground is on the bottom.
Just do a Neutral to ground on the A/C setting of your DMM, You should get 0 - 0.05 depending on how good your DMM is. If you get anything other then that like a normal 120 then you got a problem.

After that I wouldn't worry about your house electircal and focus on your PSU. I never did ask what brand PSU and what is it used for?

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

neutral to gnd no volts psu antec re cap'd used for a vidio and gaming computer

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

Then something on the psu failed and grounded out or backfed. I'm not sure what tho since I'm inexperience in that field.

You said the main filter cap was black with soot?

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

yes but i desided to test the power strip hot is neutral

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

yes but i desided to test the power strip hot is neutral

Interesting... it's reversed that would totally cause the PSU to ground out and discharge heavily blowing you across the room. Damn if the power strip is recently new, you could call GE and threaten to SUE for damages.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

man i shold have not boght ge's crap can i sue fore the loss of a computer apower strip and boddley harm

[Mad_Professor]

Re: ground falt

man i shold have not boght ge's crap can i sue fore the loss of a computer apower strip and boddley harm

Depends on if the strip was repaired. If it's new then it was a manufacturing defect. You also gotta prove that recapping your PSU was not the issue. Is it like that for all the outlets on the strip or just one? You could call GE and see what they have to say about this, if they agree to compensate for your lost and reimburse you for damages to property and health you could do that. Or consult with a lawyer to see if you have a case, because to me it sounds like you could have been killed by this defect, and how many GE power strips out there that may have this defect.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

well like an idoyt i wanted to test the psu and i did a bench test and it works some how
and onley one cable wase pluged in to the surge strip

[daRk_Kon]

Re: ground falt

if your power supply works, you can test it with your multimeter to see if each wire reads the voltage its supposed to.

in order to do this, take your multimeter, switch it to DC 12v take your grounded wire into a black wire on the molex pins and the hot wire to the yellow, should read very close to 12v.

keep your lead in the black pin still and switch your hot wire lead out of the yellow and into red and it should read either 5 or 7 v i forget which.

[skystormfarms]

Re: ground falt

ok idi that and red 5v yellow 12v it hade to be sumthing

[daRk_Kon]

Re: ground falt

how long did your power strip work for before it blew you across the room?