SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Our power went down yesterday afternoon (December 12). The utility posted a message on their 1-800 number with expected repair time (a few hours later), but no explanation except that ~2000 customers were affected in our suburban area (Northeast USA).
Here's the weird bit -- LED bulbs stayed on, at reduced brightness. I got out a meter and measured 16 VAC in the house. This was enough to make useful light from "dimmable" LED bulbs (happened to be GE brand). After it got dark, we could also see that incandescent bulbs were giving off a faint reddish glow.
16VAC was also enough to keep a Netgear home router/Wi-Fi box going, it must have a switcher in the wall wart that accepts a really wide input voltage range?
Called a friend on the other side of the country who is an EE (with hardware background). He didn't have a good explanation, but suggested that in the process of bringing the grid back up there might be some big voltage swings--recommended unplugging everything we could. Went out to dinner and all was restored when we got home (no damage).
He also told a story from a rural area (near CA-Nevada border) where there was a power failure that upset the normally-balanced split phase -- instead of ~120V on both sides of neutral, the power went to 80V on one side and 160V on the other side of neutral. Equipment on the high voltage side failed due to extended over-voltage, seems that surge suppressors won't deal with this much energy.
Anyone? How does the grid fail-soft?
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday December 15 2015, @05:10AM
This!
You would be surprised how often this happens. Or current leaks through some rats nest behind someone's desk with half on one circuit and half on another, and no fool proof way to depower the entire circuit, while power leaks through what should be low-voltage wiring.
Its Christmas lights season. Who knows how many snowbanks and puddles someone ran extension cords through. It could be leaking from between neighbors or _cough_ borrowed power.
16 volts is an odd number. That's far more unbalanced than is likely to happen in the real world.
And your friend was right, shutting everything off was the way to go. But pulling your main breaker would have been the smart thing to do, as no mater what you shut off, you are bound to forget something somewhere and it could cost you a major appliance.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.