Deadshort
Member
Roger that!!
On our vessels this is a common occurence.
We do not tap to ground so we have no Neutal on our system.
If one leg grounds on our 440, 220, or 110 volt systems then it will pull the other 2 legs of that system high. It doesnt need to be anything that big either for this to happen.
And should you happen to get 2 phases go to ground at the same time, it is not pretty.
With a factory full of 440 volt motors sitting just inches from the deck that has a continuous flow of salt water running across it, and a bunch of, Well, really special people doing high pressure, salt water washdown on everything including the electrical equipment, I end up looking for ground faults all the time.
(And NO they are not supposed to be washing the electrical equipment with HP salt water, but you can talk till you are blue in the face and it does little good)
We have ground fault meters on our main distribution board in the ECR that detect when voltage is going to ground.
BCS
Washing electrical equipment with high pressure salt water
You might as well stand on top of a hill in a lightning storm wearing wet copper armour and shouting "all the gods are bast@rds!" (with apologies to Terry Pratchett).
Sounds like the production employees in the wet pet food plant I am a maintenance electrician in. They routinely spray anything and everything with 400 PSI water, not salt water but it is treated with chlorine. We have local motor disconnects that fill with water on a routine basis so I ordered a drain to put in the box to keep it from filling. Our maintenance manager told me I couldn't use that I have to find the source of the water and fix it. I said OK I'll take all the hose reels out of the plant, actually I'll do one better, I'll shut off the wells, no more water issues.
The amount of stupid from management is unbelievable.