Earth leakage trips everytime loadshedding ends

**ians** · 18-Nov-21, 03:43 PM

Load shedding from 12pm - 2 pm ... my earth leakage unit tripped again ... went and had a look at the recorder ... let me put it to you like this ... best you check your insurance is going to pay for damages to electronic equipment.

You need to install surge protection ... a trip connect ... a surge arrestor at each plug point ... a contactor with a delay timer and every other protective device that you can think of ... yes it is that bad.

It seems the grid cant handle the load switching ... I am sure eskom have installed relay which switch off the power first them energise the new area being powered ... it looks to me like the grid cant handle the switching .. .what they should have in place is a ripple relay system like they did in the old days ... it was mounted inside every ones DB.

**adrianh** · 18-Nov-21, 04:01 PM

Can't you just install a device to delay the Mains reconnect for a couple of minutes?

**ians** · 19-Nov-21, 07:52 AM

I changed the settings to dips and swells ... 939 events recorded so far ... all dips ... as low as 151 VAC

I have been putting some thought into this problem...

I am at the end of the line (last house on the feed)

load shedding kicks in ... power switches off .. .the ripple runs down the line and I collect it.

The power switches on ... the arc on the contact on the load shedding relay as it flashes trying to make contact ... once again a ripple effect down the line.

But now we have detected a new problem ... voltage dips ... 939 dips recorded since I switched settings on the PQA ... the lights flicker every time I switch on an appliance ... what I think has happened ... there is now a loose connection at the pole or further up stream caused by the load shedding off and on.

If I look at the trend ... the problem started as the the power switched on after the last stage of load shedding ... it got really bad at 7 pm last night ...dropping as low as 151 VAC for a period of time.

since then all night you can see the random dips ... destroying my electronic devices.

**ians** · 19-Nov-21, 07:54 AM

I decided to go check the power line feeding my house with the thermal camera ... imagine that a hot spot on the neutral wire ... it looks like a bad connection on the airdac connector.

**Justloadit** · 19-Nov-21, 10:33 AM

Could also be a damaged/pitted contact on the supply switching circuit breakers

**ians** · 19-Nov-21, 05:00 PM

Sine wave is not flat topping anymore ... no more flickering lights ... no more transients on the wave form ... no more tripping earth leakage.

The electricity department arrived today while I was on site ... wife showed him where the hot spot was ... cut back the wire and replaced the fuse.

My concern is why is it the fuse and wiring keep burning ... this is not the first time the fuse and wiring has been repaired.

Besides replacing the fuse and tails ... the light supply cable on the pole burnt off and landed on the the steel arm ... and we all know what happened.

**MZOMUHLE** · 20-Nov-21, 12:05 PM

What the second electrician recommanded is the only way to solve your issue. Remember we do have flow of current in small amount even if line power is switched off. Elevated voltages contribute to that as well even some times loose connections on your nuetral lines.My suggestions.

**GCE** · 22-Nov-21, 05:18 AM

Originally Posted by ians

My concern is why is it the fuse and wiring keep burning ... this is not the first time the fuse and wiring has been repaired.

Besides replacing the fuse and tails ... the light supply cable on the pole burnt off and landed on the the steel arm ... and we all know what happened.

Overhead lines are generally aluminum conductors along with aluminum clamps , they use copper wiring directly onto the aluminum instead of using a copper to aluminum lug - There is a reaction between the 2 materials which causes that corrosion and loose connection

**ians** · 22-Nov-21, 07:21 AM

Originally Posted by GCE

Overhead lines are generally aluminum conductors along with aluminum clamps , they use copper wiring directly onto the aluminum instead of using a copper to aluminum lug - There is a reaction between the 2 materials which causes that corrosion and loose connection

They use a clamp to hook the copper tail to the ally bundle conductor ... its not a direct connection. The thermal image I took indicated a bad connection at the connector. Maybe they put it on the wrong way.

The fluke is still recording double figure transients and some really distorted the wave forms.

The earth leakage has stopped tripping.

It's time to do a loop impedance test back to the transformer.

**Leecatt** · 27-Nov-21, 08:12 AM

Returning to the original question, my customer had a CBI Earth leakage 3ka which was found to be off whenever the loadshedding finished. I've replaced it with a ACDC 6ka unit and the problem has gone away. Been 3 weeks now.

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