How to avoid earthing

[HTuser]

Hi all,

My relative bought a PC recently, the earth to neutral voltage is very high - around 15 Volts . They had many failures earlier with the previous PC.

Even though they tried making a better earth pit and adding salt etc the voltage didn't come below 12Volt.

Currently they are having a 600VA UPS which is passing the earth to neutral voltage as it is to the PC.

Is there any way in which we can avoid the building earth. I read that in case of some UPS and other power conditioners they short earth and neutral in the output side hence earth voltage is not an issue.

Is there any low cost product which can be used between UPS and PC which can avoid the earth

 

[captrajesh]

15 volts difference between neutral and earth? < than 5V is ok. Something is seriously wrong with the power supply.

Also, why on earth would one short neutral and earth?

 

[gobble]

15 volts difference between neutral and earth? < than 5V is ok. Something is seriously wrong with the power supply.

Also, why on earth would one short neutral and earth?

Short? He meant that the UPS is passing earth and neutral as-it-is on to the PC hence providing no benefit

--G0bble

 

[HTuser]

What I meant is, the voltage difference between Earth and Neutral at the output side of some devices are ZERO.

I presume that they are not taking the building earth to outside, and the earth point and neutral point in the output side is shorted.

Few products mentioning the ZERO volts given below
CVT
OPTO Instruments - CVT, Voltage Stabilizer (CVT)
Elent : Online UPS, Offline UPS, UPS Systems, Servo Controlled Voltage Stabilizers (SCVS), Indian UPS Manufacturers, UPS Exporter from Elent Electronic Enterprises, India

The products are highend, I am looking for a product which will be cheaper, I don't require backup time. The requirement is to have the E to N voltage less than 3 Volts.

 

[borg]

Why the OP want to "avoid earthing".? the purpose of earthing is to protect us from getting electrocuted in case an exposed part of equipment (say metal body), comes in contact to a live wire, and in electronic items like pc helps containing electromagnetic interference as well

Just make sure your house has got good earth connection and it is available at every point and dont worry too much about the measured voltages, if the earth wire is broken then you wont be seeing just 12 or 15v

 

[captrajesh]

Short? He meant that the UPS is passing earth and neutral as-it-is on to the PC hence providing no benefit

I was referring to this: -

I read that in case of some UPS and other power conditioners they short earth and neutral in the output side hence earth voltage is not an issue.

 

[Santy]

Is there any low cost product which can be used between UPS and PC which can avoid the earth

Only Earth can avoid faulty currents passing over equipments. No other war around. Check the grounding system of your building. The earth wire may be cut in between. It may need a replacement. See if other plug points also have this problem. Better to call an electrician if things are not alright.

 

[sfilinto]

shorting the earth & neutral is a workaround as somebodyelse mentioned. dont go down this path.

if you have checked the earthing throughly this could be an issue with the neutal.
some of the joints ( on the neutral line ) will be having a poor contact or even carbon.

have that checked & cleaned.
been there-done that.
SF

 

[suhasscorpio]

I believe the actual problem is that the neutral line has some volts coming in due to fault at the transmission end.
Best way to find out is try to measure the volts between line/phase vs. neutral, neutral vs. ground and line/phase vs. ground.
Ex: If you say get a reading of 10v with neutral vs. ground. you will see there is a diff of approx of 10v between line vs. neutral and line vs. ground.

I too have been facing this problem for may yrs due to faulty transmission and as we reached a dead end to get this fixed from KEB end had to invest in an isolation transformer for the costly electronic equipments in the house.

UPS do not solve this problem as the APC one that we have has the same issue when we are on backup power the neutral has shown up to 20v.

Once proper setup of an isolation transformer is set up you can get an ideal neutral which measures 5v to almost 0v

Isolation transformer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Moviela]

There should be at least two wires coming to your building. One is the live wire or L, and the other is called the neutral wire or N. The N wire should be at ground potential. The L wire should be red, and the N wire can be any colour, except red or green. The wires from the pole should pass through a meter to measure your usage, a main switch, and then a distribution box to distribute power to the branch circuits. The branch circuits should have 3 wires. A L, a N, and a Ground. The ground (always green, or green with a yellow stripe) protects humans from shock.

Will a device work without a proper ground? Yes all day long. If there is an insulation breakdown and the L wire current touches the exposed surface a person could get killed. That is the reason the ground is necessary. No current flows in the wire, except to prevent injury to a person.

Outside your building a copper plate should be buried deep in the ground. This is about 2 meters. A bare copper conductor of equal size of the incoming L and N wires should connect from the buried plate to the distribution box. All of the N wires from the branch circuits should be connected together in the distribution box and to the N wire from the pole. The earth plate should also be connected to the same bus bar as all the N's. The green ground wires should also be connected to the same N wires. None of the N wires in the house should have a fuse or switch in them.

You should measure 220 v between the L and N, and between the L and Ground, and no voltage between the N and Ground. Any voltage between the N and Ground is probably a phantom voltage capacitively coupled by the length of L and Ground running next to each other. Connect an incandescent lamp between the wires (N and Ground) and measure again. It will drop to zero. (the lamp should not light up.) If not you have some dodgy connections in the N and Ground wires in the house.

The whole house should be connected to Earth a one "holy point" outside. Don't connect items in the house to a water or gas pipe. Of course the washer and geyser will be connected to a pipe, but they should have a green Ground wire connection too.

For more reading on how homes are wired:

http://www.nios.ac.in/secscicour/CHAPTER13.pdf

 

[square_wave]

There should be at least two wires coming to your building. One is the live wire or L, and the other is called the neutral wire or N. The N wire should be at ground potential. The L wire should be red, and the N wire can be any colour, except red or green. The wires from the pole should pass through a meter to measure your usage, a main switch, and then a distribution box to distribute power to the branch circuits. The branch circuits should have 3 wires. A L, a N, and a Ground. The ground (always green, or green with a yellow stripe) protects humans from shock.

Will a device work without a proper ground? Yes all day long. If there is an insulation breakdown and the L wire current touches the exposed surface a person could get killed. That is the reason the ground is necessary. No current flows in the wire, except to prevent injury to a person.

Outside your building a copper plate should be buried deep in the ground. This is about 2 meters. A bare copper conductor of equal size of the incoming L and N wires should connect from the buried plate to the distribution box. All of the N wires from the branch circuits should be connected together in the distribution box and to the N wire from the pole. The earth plate should also be connected to the same bus bar as all the N's. The green ground wires should also be connected to the same N wires. None of the N wires in the house should have a fuse or switch in them.

You should measure 220 v between the L and N, and between the L and Ground, and no voltage between the N and Ground. Any voltage between the N and Ground is probably a phantom voltage capacitively coupled by the length of L and Ground running next to each other. Connect an incandescent lamp between the wires (N and Ground) and measure again. It will drop to zero. (the lamp should not light up.) If not you have some dodgy connections in the N and Ground wires in the house.

The whole house should be connected to Earth a one "holy point" outside. Don't connect items in the house to a water or gas pipe. Of course the washer and geyser will be connected to a pipe, but they should have a green Ground wire connection too.

For more reading on how homes are wired:

http://www.nios.ac.in/secscicour/CHAPTER13.pdf

I wish all our homes were wired like this. Wishful thinking !

 

[venkatcr]

I wish all our homes were wired like this. Wishful thinking !

What is so great. My house is wired exactly like. I have a 30 feet hole into which the earthing is sunk.

Cheers

 

[HTuser]

Thanks for the responses.

After doing a research, we found that Motherboard failures are common in our area. When we measured we found that Neutral to Earth Voltage is coming around 12Volts in all these homes.

Hence the issue looks to be with the EB supply. We have reported to EB and expecting some solution.

As per my knowledge Proper Earth is very critical for computers for normal operation.

What is the approximate cost of 1KVA Isolation Transformer? can it solve the issue with EB supply and provide proper voltage to the system?
The existing ground was tested by electrician and it is made as per general grounding methods.

 

[sumeshj]

Hey, why don't you take advantage of the 15V difference and use the 'earth' as a huge unlimited 15V battery? I know this won't solve any of your problems but you've got yourself a free 15V power source buddy!

This is something I used to do when I was a kid and lived in a house which had its own earthing pit, and as a result there was a voltage difference of around 5V to 6V between neutral and earth. I simply connected the two (neutral and earth) to a 6V bulb (one of the diwali string light bulbs actually). And voila, I got myself a free light that was on 24/7, even when there was no electricity. In fact I used to use it as 'emergency light' whenever there were power cuts.

This DIY is pretty simple actually. Get a 3-pin plug, open it up and connect a bulb (or two bulbs in series) taken out from a diwali string light. Just make sure you connect it to earth and neutral (and not earth and live).

 

[Love4sound]

Thanks for the responses.

After doing a research, we found that Motherboard failures are common in our area. When we measured we found that Neutral to Earth Voltage is coming around 12Volts in all these homes.

Hence the issue looks to be with the EB supply. We have reported to EB and expecting some solution.

As per my knowledge Proper Earth is very critical for computers for normal operation.

What is the approximate cost of 1KVA Isolation Transformer? can it solve the issue with EB supply and provide proper voltage to the system?
The existing ground was tested by electrician and it is made as per general grounding methods.

@HTuser What was the issue and how was it solved? I am facing the same issue now

My earthing is screwed

Dear Fm’s As the title suggests my earthing is all messed up. Neutral to earth reading as per IEEE standard should not exceed 3 volts for homes and 5 for industrial. Mine is always around 15-30. I contacted vertex and had their electrician inspect my grounding. As per his suggestions we...

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