fixerupper
Well-known Member
Years ago, back in the seventies, over on the other farm, whenever a 110V motor was started up the lights would brighten a bit over the whole farm. By whole farm I mean five buildings with old 120 volt service through copper wires to every building but the shop which was newer 240 with aluminum triplex. Whenever I'd hit the trigger on the big drill or the bench grinder in the shop the lights would brighten barely noticeably in every building. My welder was a Lincoln 225 AC buzz box and it worked OK but the lights flickered a bit on the whole farm when I used it. The service to the farm was initially 60 amp but was upgraded to a whopping 100 amps which stopped the flickering from the welder, but that didn't solve the light brightening problem. Two local electricians were stumped but both of them mumbled the word Neutral meaning a bad neutral somewhere. When the service was upgraded to 100 amps the triplex coming into the farm was replaced as was the meter box and everything on the meter pole was re crimped so the problem had to be somewhere else. Overhead wires to every building came off of that one meter pole except for two sheds that were subbed off the next building nearby, as far as I can remember. Today all of the original buildings are gone with some new ones put up with new buried wiring on the whole place so the problem is long gone, but sometimes that nagging question with no answer comes to mind; what made the lights go brighter? Do any of you guys have an idea? John? Buick?