Electricians, I need your help! I'm fearing a shocking experience...

PerlNinja · #1 09-16-2011, 01:49 AM

Let me throw up a little background info first; I'm living in Indonesia, where building codes are nonexistant, and your nearest electrician is that one guy that worked up the guts to start messing with it at some point. If you're lucky, it's some old guy which means he managed to not zap himself into last week. If you're unlucky, it's some guy that has gotten lucky.

The problem is this; when houses are built, generally speaking the electric wiring is held together with duct tape, more duct tape, and an extra helping of duct tape. Power outlets are also *not* grounded.

I've got the euro-style 2 prong plug with the 2 little tabs on the side for grounding, but none of the sockets in the house are in fact grounded. Yes, I have tried to convince the guy that did our wiring to ground it, but was told the following on various occasions:

* Oh it's not needed, it just costs extra for the wiring
* You can't do that
* I won't do that

To the point where I explained forcefully that I wanted things to be done properly, at which point the guy said "ok, sure" and then did it his own way anyway.

Long story short: up to now it hasn't caused issues. Lately though, I'm starting to get zapped by my bass. Nothing severe, just that slight tingle you'd get from static electricity, except... well, you know. 220v/60hz isn't a good thing to have going through your strings, if you know what I mean.

So, help! How do I go about grounding a power socket? I'm assuming that grounding a single socket isn't going to make things any better, and I have to ground every last one of them? Is there a way around this, because they didn't even put ground wires in the walls, and I'm not too keen on putting them in....

Please, electricians and other electrically knowledgeable people, help me out and stop my fingers from feeling they're dancing on an electric chair.

Strohsx · #2 09-16-2011, 03:37 AM

First things first, turn off the power to the outlet and always use insulated tools.

Any who, you can most certainly ground 1 outlet without much work. Not sure about Indoneisa but here I;d go to the hardware store buy a new outlet, a length of ground wire (12 or 14ga stranded) and a little clamp to fit it to a water pipe.

The shocking is interesting I've never been shocked by an ungrounded outlet except that one time in high school standing in a puddle in sandals while using an ungrounded extension cord with a power drill. Not fun.

It's obvious that it's not the only issue but worth a shot.

Another option that you could try is to simply put a decent powerstrip with a surge protector and see if that does the trick.

I'm not an electrician, but certainly more competent than the one who wired up your house.

Longhair · #3 09-16-2011, 03:42 AM

If there are no building codes, what ever information is given sight unseen may kill you.

We had some wiring done here about a year ago by a sub-contractor and a few things needed to be fixed. The contractor (person who hired the sub-contractor) took for granted that everything was wired correctly - first mistake.

--- background info ---

Brown Wire - live
Blue Wire - neutral
Yellow/Green - ground

In theory it is safe to touch the blue wire because there is no current but in reality, one should always test for live wires before thinking about touching them.

--- end background info ---

Back to the contractor...

There were a few places where the sub-contractor switched the brown and blue wires thinking that it did not matter. The contractor was shocked a few times because he did not learn his lesson the first, second, third... times. The wiring did not match the circuit breakers either.

I picked up a Fluke VoltAlert so when I need to change an outlet or something, I am positive that the circuit breaker turned off the correct outlet without looking for a lamp. This will also let me know if in fact the blue wire (live) is in fact live and not switched with the brown (neutral) wire.

Auzzie-Phoenix · #4 09-16-2011, 03:44 AM

I've had that happen with my first amp. A yamaha jx30b... If I was practicing and sat down on the radiator in the practice room, I'd get a nice buzzing sensation. The amp was ungrounded, which caused the electrical buzzing. I've since replaced the cord of the amp from a 2 prong false ground to a 3 prong actual ground. This fixed the problem. But the same issue would definitely come about from not having a ground anywhere along the electrical chain.

You can definitely run a groundwire to a metal waterpipe as a simple solution, though the proper way to do it is to run the groundwire to the electrical panel's ground tap (provided it has one and it is properly set up).

PerlNinja · #5 09-16-2011, 04:54 AM

The electrical panel is another can of worms I don't want to touch with a 20ft barge pole. The way the national power company handles things is that you get a certain amount of Va to play with (watts, in other words). They effect this by jacking a breaker into the outside meter, currently 16 amps, so I'm at 220v * 16 amps = 3520 watts.

From there, it runs inside to the breaker box which has a single (I kid you not) 16 amp breaker. From the breaker box a single cable runs throughout the house and branches into the leads to the power sockets. All along this single cable, there is duct tape whenever a branch is made.

Now, grounding to a water pipe isn't an option since... there are none. We get our water from a well that has an electric pump going on it (ungrounded, lovely that...), and all pipes are PVC. No radiators in the vicinity either.

As far as cable colours go, I'm paranoid on that ever since I've seen some guy just randomly wire **** up and proclaiming that the colors didn't really matter since hey, it worked, didn't it?

So my plan is to take one power outlet that has most of my computer hardware running off it (plus the practice 15W combo amp), take a ground wire, and connect that to a metal pole that I'm going to jack a couple meters into the ground.

Longhair · #6 09-16-2011, 07:29 AM

I haven't tried this but it does sound logical (the water drill part):

Ground Rods the Easy Way

PerlNinja · #7 09-16-2011, 08:49 AM

Ooooh, that looks like it just might be the thing! Thanks Longhair

Auzzie-Phoenix · #8 09-16-2011, 04:02 PM

Ideally, in a proper wiring situation each room of the house would be handled by it's own breaker/fuse. The lines running to each room would run to junction boxes where they get split into parallel circuits that each light/outlet would tap into. Each light/outlet would be grounded to the ground in the junction box, and each junction box would be tied to the main ground at the primary electrical panel.

Of course for safety reasons, you would use wiring that is sheathed, and each sheath would correspond correctly at all points. A metal pole sunk into the ground several feet/meters would work appropriately as a ground.

PerlNinja · #9 09-16-2011, 08:20 PM

Yeah, the ideal situation is exactly what I asked them to do - I'm not an electrician but have hung around enough of them to have a basic idea of how to "properly" wire a residence.

The only thing on my mind now is this; the metal rod going into the ground. Does it matter if the ground is incredibly dry? I can imagine there wouldn't be a "decent" contact between the rod and the soil, so I might have to get me a 20ft rod so I can hit the ground water level.

PerlNinja · #10 09-17-2011, 04:06 AM

Welp.

I guess I need to do this stuff before practicing more bass, tried to get some practice in earlier and the amount of electricity coming through was enough to cramp up my left hand. Tried plugging in a GFCI but it trips instantly so it makes the need for grounding all the more obvious.

FML.

subdude67 · #11 09-17-2011, 05:24 AM

hi ninja,

seems we have not just bent customs officers in common....

after moving house recently i had similar issues like electric currents on water tabs, the fridge and other metal housed appliances.

allthouth our wiring was a bit better than yours seems to be, the whole house was not grounded beyond a thin wire literally plugged 1 inch into the soil.

i got a copper rod about 2 feet long and 1/4 inch thick and used 2 hose clamps to tighten the ground cable (use a solid gauge) to the rod.
dig a vertical hole as deep as it needs to be so that the rod goes in. the hole should be about 8 inches in diameter.
with the rod in the center of the hole, fill the hole as tightly as you can with a mix of charcoal and about 2 kilos of salt and a top layer of soil. pour some water over everything.
charcoal is an excellent electric conductor, the salt will keep the environment nice humid.

all that's left is to connect your ground wires from the outlets to the main pannel and the pannel ground to the rod.

hope you can make it work, be safe!

PerlNinja · #12 09-24-2011, 05:06 PM

So a little update on this one; not a damn thing in the house is grounded. The local "electrician" refused to work on it saying that it was fine the way it was and that doing things differently was just going to make it all worse. Read this as: "I've got no idea what I'm talking about, but I heard that this 3rd wire thing is just nonsense so I'm going to stick to that point like a drowning sailor to a lifevest".

So I figured I'd go at it myself. Unfortunately... instead of using pvc pipe for the cabling and putting that into the wall, they built the wall, then plastered it, then cracked open a few slots, put the wires in, and plastered over it. There's also no 3rd wire in sight, so I guess I'm looking at a total remodeling.

But.. I did sort it out. I had an A-ha moment. The one time I didn't get the **** zapped out of me this week is when I figured I'd try playing and I was wearing slippers inside the house (which is one of those things that after being here for 4 years I never do; wearing shoes/slippers inside is a no-no) ... and lo and behold, no zappage. And no hum. And I can record to my Macbook Air without hum and interference and what not.

So I put one of those sound-deadening rubber slabs on the floor (it's about 2x2 meters, not sure where it came form but meh...) and put my chair on it and my desk over it. Zap-free existance.

Not the best solution but ...

Steve · #13 09-24-2011, 08:16 PM

ok so, I'm an honest to God licensed master electrician in Florida.

Here's my best advice for you given the circumstance you describe:

Get a wireless unit. It will protect you completely everywhere you go.

Balog · #14 09-27-2011, 01:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PerlNinja

The electrical panel is another can of worms I don't want to touch with a 20ft barge pole. The way the national power company handles things is that you get a certain amount of Va to play with (watts, in other words). They effect this by jacking a breaker into the outside meter, currently 16 amps, so I'm at 220v * 16 amps = 3520 watts.

From there, it runs inside to the breaker box which has a single (I kid you not) 16 amp breaker. From the breaker box a single cable runs throughout the house and branches into the leads to the power sockets. All along this single cable, there is duct tape whenever a branch is made.

Now, grounding to a water pipe isn't an option since... there are none. We get our water from a well that has an electric pump going on it (ungrounded, lovely that...), and all pipes are PVC. No radiators in the vicinity either.

As far as cable colours go, I'm paranoid on that ever since I've seen some guy just randomly wire **** up and proclaiming that the colors didn't really matter since hey, it worked, didn't it?

So my plan is to take one power outlet that has most of my computer hardware running off it (plus the practice 15W combo amp), take a ground wire, and connect that to a metal pole that I'm going to jack a couple meters into the ground.

The entire house is only supplied at 16A?!?!

Even at 220 in stead of the 110 in the states, that's nuts. And here I was wondering how people got by with just 100A service...

Jay2U · #15 09-27-2011, 05:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PerlNinja

Please, electricians and other electrically knowledgeable people, help me out and stop my fingers from feeling they're dancing on an electric chair.

Teman yang terhormat,

I know what you are talking about. I've seen it with my own eyes. The joints in the wiring along the ceiling of a hotel room just weren't insulated at all. I suppose the power supply of your amp uses switching technology, as opposed to the oldfashioned mains transformer. This can be the cause of some voltage being present on the input socket of your amp. Normally this is harmless, as it isn't capable of delivering enough current to be lethal. It isn't comfortable, however, and if something goes wrong, your bass might become a human toaster.

Here in Europe it is common practice to use earthed outlets in kitchens, outside and in places like workshops. The word earth explains a lot. If you drive a metal rod into the ground, deep enough to reach the groundwater, you'll have an electrical earth. Just wire the rod to outlets with an earth connection. Good luck!

PerlNinja · #16 09-30-2011, 03:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Balog

The entire house is only supplied at 16A?!?!

Even at 220 in stead of the 110 in the states, that's nuts. And here I was wondering how people got by with just 100A service...

Yes, and I'm one of the few people in the neighbourhood to have 16A coming in. That's the realm of small offices. Most people here run on 4A to 8A - when the house was built, and PLN (the power company) came to put their default kit in, we got 8A.

When everything (read: 2 AC's, 2 fridges, 2 laptops, 1 desktop, bass amp, lamps, fans, washing machine, rice cooker, toaster, water pump) is running, the max load I've seen is 13.4A.

PerlNinja · #17 09-30-2011, 03:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steve

ok so, I'm an honest to God licensed master electrician in Florida.

Here's my best advice for you given the circumstance you describe:

Get a wireless unit. It will protect you completely everywhere you go.

This. +10

It's on my "Dear Santa" list, I figured I might as well

Internet Police · #18 09-30-2011, 04:00 PM

No job is too hot to handle here at TB

skychief · #19 09-30-2011, 04:14 PM

get a 6 or 7 foot length of rebar. get a 12 lb sledge hammer. Drive the rebar into the ground near the power junction box so 8 or 10 inches is sticking out of the ground. Use 8 or 10-gauge copper wire (solid core-not stranded) and clamp the wire to the rebar (grounding rod).

Call back the "electrician" and let him hook up the wire to the junction box. If the house wiring was done correctly, all your outlets should be grounded.

If not, well,,, get ready for a fantastic pyrotechnic display!!

PerlNinja · #20 09-30-2011, 04:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by skychief

get a 6 or 7 foot length of rebar. get a 12 lb sledge hammer. Drive the rebar into the ground near the power junction box so 8 or 10 inches is sticking out of the ground. Use 8 or 10-gauge copper wire (solid core-not stranded) and clamp the wire to the rebar (grounding rod).

Call back the "electrician" and let him hook up the wire to the junction box. If the house wiring was done correctly, all your outlets should be grounded.

If not, well,,, get ready for a fantastic pyrotechnic display!!

That's a big if :P

I'm not going to bother I think, I'll take the suggestion of wireless kit to heart and get me some. I'm most likely moving the entire family to the USA sometime late next year, so I don't want to spend money on doing something that's going to be here for at most another year or so.