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Off Topic Electrical Issue

EBEBRATT-Ed
EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
For those that are interested be cautious about disconnecting any ground wires on water piping.

Here's why.

To make it simple, most that post here have probably looked inside their electrical panel at some point. You may have noticed the "neutral bar" this is where all your white (neutral) wires terminate Including the white neutral coming in from the POCO, also any equipment ground wires (green or bare) and also the "grounding electrode conductor" that's the bare wire going to your metal water pipe or well casing or ground rods.

I ran into a job where a plumber called me, he was trying to solder and the valves in the house wouldn't hold tight (even the main) so he loosened the nut on the water meter to let the water drip out so he could solder. He saw an arc and got knocked on his butt. He was so scared he wouldn't go back in the house

The problem was out at the transformer on the pole a loose neutral wire (open neutral). Look at a transformer mounted on a pole, there is always a ground wire from the transformer down the pole to earth.

When the neutral is loose or open the power is going to find it's way back to the transformer somehow. Since it can't get back through the neutral it goes through the neutral bar to bare wire to the water pipe to earth, through the earth to the transformer ground rod and up the pole to the transformer.

I put my amprobe around the water pipe and read 5 amps.


But it gets better.

Even if all the wiring in you house is perfect and the power to your house is SHUT OFF you may have power flowing through your water pipe, If your neighbor has a loose neutral and your house is closer to the transformer
kcoppIronmanratioMilanDZmanDZoroSuperTech

Comments

  • Wellness
    Wellness Member Posts: 139
    A good multi-meter should be in everyone's toolkit, no matter what the trade. It's never good to guess about whether the power is on or whether an appliance is properly grounded.
  • Jamie Hall
    Jamie Hall Member Posts: 23,090
    That must have been... ah... interesting, @EBEBRATT-Ed ! Glad you weren't the plumber... Open neutrals do all sorts of strange and wonderful things. Stray ground currents are, if anything worse. If you begin to think that a place is haunted, the electrical box is a good place to begin for one's exorcism!

    And for @Wellness - yes, a multimeter and use it! I also have, and always use, one of those handy dandy little screwdrivers with a neon light in it which cheerfully lights up anytime it's near a powered wire and you are holding it. Easier to use -- and in your pocket -- so therefore it gets used.
    Br. Jamie, osb
    Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England
  • the_donut
    the_donut Member Posts: 374
    edited February 2018
    I had one at a group of Townhomes. Owner spent mucho dinero on upgrading exterior. New fascia, siding, paint, landscaping, the works. Tech calls me saying washing machine gave him a jolt. They were cleaning out the vent outside and he caught 120.

    I came by with voltmeter, drip edge was electrified over 12’ run. Turns out a nail hit one side of the hots when they redid the building.
  • ChrisJ
    ChrisJ Member Posts: 15,553
    If I was in the business I'd treat all pipes like they're carrying current. Do like I did at a friends house and clamp a 4 awg jumper cable across it while working on it. It's a quick and easy way to make sure you don't become a wire.

    Even if you're further from the pole than a neighbor the pipe could still be energized.
    Single pipe quasi-vapor system. Typical operating pressure 0.14 - 0.43 oz. EcoSteam ES-20 Advanced Control for Residential Steam boilers. Rectorseal Steamaster water treatment
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    edited February 2018
    The importance of good grounding and good connections on everything can't be over emphasized.

    @the_donut roofers and siding guys always seem to use screws and nails 3 times longer than they need to be.

    In a commercial building with corrugated roof decking with bar joists we always used to run conduit above the top of the bar joist inside the corrugations. Was fast and seemed like a good idea everyone did it

    Well, the roofers and their 2' screws put a stop to that a few years back and the electrical code grew again
    Solid_Fuel_Man
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    Ed, was there a bonding jumper across that water meter?
    That is required and should not be disconnected.
    I have found them thrown into the corner by the plumber.....the very person they were put there to protect!
    rick in Alaska
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    @jughne, No, this was an older job that had not been upgraded. But you are right, a bonding jumper would have prevented an arc but still would have had current flow through bonding jumper.

    When I jump a meter I try and leave some slack in the wire for that reason. Pull them tight and the plumbers remove them. I can just here them saying "dam stupid electricians"

    Actually, what happened in this case (in addition to the lost neutral) was the ground connection to the street side of the meter the clamp was corroded and loose as well. I found neutral current traveling through the cold water pipe when it should have flowed from the panel through the water pipe ground that was loose. The boiler and some other stuff was wired in bx so

    picture this. Power goes out on the hot branch circuits comes back through the neutrals to the neutral bar. (cant' get back through water pipe ground or neutral because they are both loose) so.....it travels through high resistance BX outer casing (attached to the panel) to the boiler to the cold water pipe back the cold water pipe through earth to the transformer.

    There is a reason a lot of people don't like BX and a few cities don't allow it's use. MC cable with a green ground, greenfield with a green ground or romex don't have this issue.

    Could have burnt the place to the ground if the bx casing had seen enough load. In this case the house was vacant. Something I found that you don't see very often and something I will never forget
    Solid_Fuel_ManSuperTech
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018
    Not bad idea to jumper over joints your unsoldering, especially near water meter. I used some heavy car jumpers, but really should use clamps that won't easily slip off.

    With city water , every house ties neutral to city water pipe. So if a house has open neutral then current will try to travel thru water pipe to neighbor's house then thru their water pipe to neutral to try to get back to pole transformer.

    I put a clamp on amp-meter on my water main before the meter, saw ~ 3 amps when I had a lot of house loads on.

    But I think low number like that is normal even if none of neighbors house had issues with open neutrals (every house has neutral wired to city water pipe). Our house is furthest from pole transformer, ~ 700 ft. The CITY water pipe and neutral wire to the transformer are basically wired in parelle. So they will share the current based on resistance of each.

    Unless there is a lost/bad neutral or ground if you open water line likely to be not much voltage across ends. Looks like voltage would just be the IR loss on neutral from house to pole transformer. Maybe couple volts at most??? But with lost neutral it could be ~ 120V , lethal.

  • Zman
    Zman Member Posts: 7,559
    @EBEBRATT-Ed
    Thanks for the great post. I always caution folks about this scenario. They generally look at me like I am nuts.

    I have a similar story about a welder thawing an underground pipe and a neighbors house with a very hot neutral.

    Thanks for the post!
    "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough"
    Albert Einstein
  • Harvey Ramer
    Harvey Ramer Member Posts: 2,239
    I found one where the overhead service was connected to the entrance cable with box connectors. They lost the neutral and the panel was not grounded.
    The lady got lit up in her shower. Not cool, but that's what a half price service install from a handyman gets you.
    SuperTech
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    edited February 2018
    The bad connection can be even a mile away if you are on a dead end primary feeder.
    One guy at the end of the line would get a tickle touching his tub faucet while he was sitting in the water. Obviously this was concerning.

    After checking the usual suspects of water heater, submerged pump and panel neutral it was discovered that his electrical system and water piping was actually well grounded.
    The tub was "hot" via the galv drain line that went out the west side of the basement and was buried to some form of drain field.

    Milivolts showed up between the drain fitting and the faucet.
    Something you notice when sitting in the water.

    The rural electric system (REA) had a failing connection on their neutral/ground wire some distance away.
    It was a 7,200 volt to ground/neutral primary.
    Each pole had a ground wire connected from the neutral to a ground rod at the base of the pole.
    The current flows thru the 7200 hot to his transformer and must return thru the neutral to the sub-station.

    With a bad connection(s) somewhere between those points the return current will split to go down the pole grounds trying to get back, flowing thru the earth in all directions looking for a good ground bath back to it's sub-station (source).
    His system/plumbing/water well, all on the east side of the house was the best ground around and the stray voltage came from the west thru his tub drain and who ever was sitting in it.

    A call to the REA describing the situation was surprisingly clearly understood. They came out within an hour and found the problem.

    To prevent a future occurrence I installed a jumper from his metal drain line to his water lines.....just like a water meter. o:)

    Stray voltage on a dairy farm had been a problem as milk cows are very sensitive to any millivolts and will not release their milk.
    This leads to the "Mastitis" disease and while being treated with penicillin, their milk must be dumped down the drain.$$$$$
    Eventually will not enter the barn.

    For the dairy farms this has been a serious issue with lawyers involved, so the bathtub event got attention right away.

    All electric utilities do or should take grounding at every possible point as serious business.
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018

    As a kid we had a bad utility clamp at weatherhead on neutral. As we turned on /off loads, some lights went overly bright and others very dim. As a result the unbalanced hot lead currents very likely were going down the waterpipe. Would guess if high enough current might heat up neighbor's neutral bond to water pipe, if his bond wire was small or bad connection.

    Little surprising code doesn't require a bond between sewer and water pipes. In fact I think "new" electrical code does, if you can touch both lines ( < 6ft apart). Which I see sink as qualifying. But I never seen it done.

    --------------------------------------------------------------

    I've read about voltage differences between the 2. Read about a guy eating in his kitchen, he noticed a thump sound in sink before each crack of a distant thunder storm. Turned out a spark was jumping between kitchen faucet and metal sink, magnetic field was thumping a spoon in sink. Story goes sewer pipe went to septic field (ground) and I think water line was tied to utility neutral. So when lighting struck in distance some of it's voltage got into utility street lines and conducted to the house. WOW.
  • Shalom
    Shalom Member Posts: 165
    edited February 2018
    We had a lifted neutral here at my store a couple years back. This place is wired with a single phase with center tapped neutral/ground, and the neutral came loose in the box. Result was that the 230 volt appliances (freezers, etc.) which are wired phase to phase carried on as normal, but all the 115 volt stuff (various banks of lights, my computers, etc.) wound up randomly going on and off as pairs of breakers wound up in series and the resistance varied on each leg... I had a multi meter plugged in and it was swinging around all the way from 85 to 150 volts.

    (Oh, and the O&R crew wouldn't touch it because they were poles only, and this came in from underground, so we needed a different crew to come in and fix it. No matter that the problem was neither on a pole nor underground, but right there in the box, "essa no my yob" as Freddy Prinze used to say.)
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018
    On another website a guy was adding a sub-panel to his OLD fuse panel, so he could take advantage of a code grandfather clause and not have to replace old panel. Afterwards the 120V electronics in his house fried.

    He later found as he was pulling new wires thru wall to the old panel they tugged the supply neutral to the OLD box out of it's loose connector. So much for saving money by not using an competent electrician
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    One reason for metallic water service pipes to be bonded to the neutral/ground buss is to possibly reduce that voltage difference if the utility neutral is lost.

    On a jobsite we had the neutral completely break apart on the overhead triplex, it was a short drop and the 2 insulated hots were holding the triplex in place. The temp service had a #4 copper water pipe grounding cable in place. There was very little imbalance as the 3/4" copper pipe went to the main and the building across the street also had the proper grounding set up.
    So we "borrowed" someone else's neutral for awhile.
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018
    That's why I think code wants bond to water pipe BEFORE water meter. Less likely anyone will open line to street and get across the voltage.

    But never know how things are wired in houses, believe code also allows equipment to be "grounded" to water line in the house (ei washing machine, etc.). Short to case in that equipment and water line can carry current if it's not high enough to trip panel breaker/fuse.

    Interestingly I read code allows ~ one size smaller wire to bond to water pipe IF that wire is armored ( I see "BX" type armor on that bond wire in our 60 year old house). Think I'ld prefer larger gauge wire to protect against more current from any neighbor's lost neutral
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    In the past you could bond the panel to the cold water pipe and jumper the water meter.
    Then you had to go to the entry point of the water pipe.
    (In case the house went to PEX etc.)
    I believe you had to in effect still jumper the water meter.
    But the H&C copper must be bonded to the panel even if you had PEX water service line into the house.

    "All metal that could become energized is to be bonded to the electric system" The size of that bonding jumper would be governed by the largest breaker serving that area.
    Usually just a 20 amp breaker so #12 would work.
    This is to include all ductwork, (Jumper across flex connectors on rectangular duct work), gas piping etc.
    Many of these items are overlooked. The gas line might be grounded thru the furnace circuit, though not very well.
    It is assumed the ductwork is grounded thru the furnace circuit also. The ACR line set would be grounded thru the AC compressor. Hydronic piping would probably be grounded thru the boiler by it's circuit.
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    edited February 2018
    Everything has current flowing through it. You just learn not to be in it's path.

    The earth is nothing more than a crude battery, chemicals and moisture. That's why swimming pools are a big deal. You can't get rid of stray voltage but the trick is so that a person can't touch 2 stray voltages or 1 stray voltage and ground at the same time.

    Most (but not all) of this goes back to good connections & proper grounding
    ChrisJ
  • DZoro
    DZoro Member Posts: 1,048
    Thanks for the "off topic" I'm not a electrician, but follow very closely on electrical knowledge, and have learned much from all of your discussions :)
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    As you said stray voltage is everywhere.
    Now to get the cows to come into the barn, they must come from dirt to concrete. So a graduated grounding grid is recommended in their approach ramp.

    Think of it as PEX tubing buried in concrete. Where you step on the ramp from the dirt the grid is buried deeper, (less heat from PEX) less change in the potential voltage. Then as you walk up the ramp the buried grounding grid is gradually raised up (more heat from PEX) so the change in potential is greater but less noticeable. Then that grid is bonded to all the mesh and rebar and every metal object in the barn. So if effect you have "cows on a wire" by the time they are inside. As you can imagine this is a hard sell to some hard header farmers. But I am sure the big boys in the business are aware of the need.
    This may have been introduced by this state dept of AG.

    Don't know if this applies to swimming pools or not.
    But then we have more cows than people in this state.
    Cows are more sensitive creatures. ;)
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    Never did any farm electrical but I have herd that from others that it is exactly as you said. cows are more sensitive.

    Very similar to pools. they want a grounding grid now including the pool and everything else around it metal or not, concrete, paving stones etc "equipotential plain" to keep everything at the same potential.

    Haven't done one and won't. Stick to mech rooms
  • Solid_Fuel_Man
    Solid_Fuel_Man Member Posts: 2,646
    I ran a #4 copper to my 50foot well casing (200' well). Much better than the (2) required ground rods. Studies have shown that the best grounding electrode is concrete encased rebar in a slab (ufer) but most slabs have plastic and or foam below now so not in contact with the earth, therefore not required to be bonded.

    I've seen many bad neutral connections, many in the meter socket itself.
    Serving Northern Maine HVAC & Controls. I burn wood, it smells good!
  • ChrisJ
    ChrisJ Member Posts: 15,553
    edited February 2018
    As far as I was aware, and I could be mistaken but I thought the entire reason for Grounding of the neutral was to ensure it was at,or very close to the same potential as the dirt, concrete etc around and in the structure? Floating neutrals function just fine,they're just dangerous. I would imagine power transmission would be a lot easier if they could have a floating neutral as this should eliminate capacitance issues no?

    I've personally never pictured it as a backup in case the neutral to the pole fails and from what I've heard it doesn't do very well at it.
    Single pipe quasi-vapor system. Typical operating pressure 0.14 - 0.43 oz. EcoSteam ES-20 Advanced Control for Residential Steam boilers. Rectorseal Steamaster water treatment
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018
    Yes reason for ground wire is to try to keep load equipment cases at earth potential, for safty so don't get shocks. It also allows short circuit currents to be high enough for breaker to open, so cases don't stay live and be electrocution hazzard. Ground wire is jumpered to neutral usually at breaker panel and tied to ground rod/water pipe at that point (star grounding)
    ----------------------------------

    Think every utility system connects neutral to earth to minimize voltage stress on the insulation from static and lighting strikes. ( submarines don't, to keep working even with battle damage)

    Also read ungrounded systems have ~ 8X the insulation voltage stress from system transients as grounded systems have. So utilities ground the neutral to minimize insulation failures.

    But with utility neutral connected to earth the wall outlet neutral can be a volt or so above earth potential from IR drop along the neutral. So buildings dedicate a separate ground wire to connect to building equipment case ( washer , drier, dishwasher, etc.....) . Under normal operation no current in the ground lead so you typically don't get a ZAP if touch equipment case and earth or water line.
    -------------------------
    In a large industrial building we got minor shocks off grounded equipment cases (oscilloscope, meters, power supplies , ect .....while standing on cement and had finger cut. Apparently there was a nearby neutral to ground wire short and IR drop along the neutral was raising wall outlet (120V) ground up to ~ 1 Volt above earth potential
    Solid_Fuel_Man
  • ChrisJ
    ChrisJ Member Posts: 15,553
    > @Leonard said:
    > Think every utility system grounds the neutral to minimize voltage stress on the insulation from static and lighting strikes. Also read ungrounded systems have ~ 8X the insulation voltage stress from system transients as grounded systems have. So they ground the neutral to minimize insulation failures.

    Wouldn't grounding make it more likely to get hit by lightning? Why would lightning hit a floating system?
    Single pipe quasi-vapor system. Typical operating pressure 0.14 - 0.43 oz. EcoSteam ES-20 Advanced Control for Residential Steam boilers. Rectorseal Steamaster water treatment
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    Grounding the neutral insures that if a hot conductor in your house shorts to ground then the overcurrent device would open if enough flow was there to achieve that typically 15-20 amps.
    If that amount of flow is not achieved then perhaps ground fault protectors will open. And if that near short simply arcs, not tripping the breaker then the new savior of AFCI devices will shut off.

    When you go back to the primary side of the transformer probably feeding your house. It has, perhaps, the 7200 hot wire and a common neutral/ground wire as the return.
    If that neutral opens on the primary side of the system (the secondary shares that conductor also) then the return 7200 is looking for that path. The idea is to give it as many alternate pathways to return to the sub-station as possible. This is when the need for the grounding electrode system gets serious, as you could have much higher voltage across be it the water meter or such.

    The higher voltage transmission systems, 69,000 volts and up carry power in only 3 conductors with that nominal voltage being phase to phase. You may see static wires above the arms, they are to dissipate some of the EMF field and hopefully pick up the lighting.

    The 3 hot conductors are considered to be a delta system without a neutral.
    They are often arranged in a physical triangular formation as this is more contusive to lower line loss and possibly lower the capacitive loss you speak of.
    Solid_Fuel_Man
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    @ChrisJ , that's not the purpose of the neutral and only when things so bad, not supposed to act as a backup neutral Grounding to the earth is supposed to:

    Discharge lightning strikes to earth if the electrical is hit
    Stabilize the voltage to ground
    Keep all metal at the same potential
    Low resistance ground should cause fuses and breakers to trip quickly on a short to ground.

    @Solid_Fuel_Man , your right ground rods are very poor, well casing or water pipe is better, rebar, plates or bare copper wire buried in the earth is the best. If the slab is insulated the best ground is to bury it under the building footing.

    Ground rods were added to the code for service upgrades to existing buildings to act as supplemental grounds due to plastic water meters and plastic pipe...somebody replaces their water line with plastic then don't have a ground. Ground rods better than nothing...but not much better

    Solid_Fuel_Man
  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 15,405
    And the POCO saves money as it doesnt have to run a neutral, it creates one at the transformer
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    Ground rods require only a #6 copper wire connection to your system. The theory is that they can only dissipate what #6 can carry.

    The Ufer grounding electrode is one that requires, I believe, 20' of rebar buried in the footings of a building. It is important to have the weight of the house on that footing in contact with the earth. Most often the rebar is all tied together in the entire footings and often the poured walls also. But it only requires #4 copper to be connected. Again the limitation of dissipation.
    Ufers were developed because of non conductive water service lines coming into being. It is second best to copper water service.

    Now, if you have a metallic/copper water line, that connection has to be sized according to the service entrance conductors.
    On a large commercial service that can be up to 3/0 copper.
    About the size of 1/2" nominal copper pipe. Because the dissipation current possible for a conductive water system is almost unlimited.

    Rods and Ufers just have their limitations.
  • Leonard
    Leonard Member Posts: 903
    edited February 2018
    Earth soil is a very poor conductor. Ground rods are lucky to have only 20 ohms resistance back to utility pole transformer neutral.

    Was a video by Mike Holt (EE and licensesed professional engineer , writes for electrician magazine EC&M). To show how high resistance earth soil is , he drove two 50ft deep ground rods, connected them together, and connected 120V hot lead to them. The current was not enough to trip a 15 amp breaker. For 15 amp 120V breaker to trip would require soil to be less than 15 ohms. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=13&v=Yg6G5VUSsWA

    That's why code requires a ground wire between outlets and breaker panel (not a just a local ground rod). It allows a short to draw enough amps to trip the breaker and shut off the electrocution hazard.
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    ED, any transformer need 2 connections for the primary.
    The secondary has 2 hot connections with a center tap between them to give the 120, yes they establish a neutral.
    But that neutral is common with the grounded connection on the primary. So for part of the system the secondary center tap and the primary grounded/neutral utilize the same conductor.
    This is obvious on the simpler residential overhead distribution systems.
  • Jamie Hall
    Jamie Hall Member Posts: 23,090
    I hadn't run into that graded ground grid, idea, @JUGHNE -- if I ever have to do a concrete floor in our barns, I'll use it. Thank you! Horses (which we do) are even more sensitive than cows -- which is why electric fences work. And everything metal -- everything! -- in a barn is bonded.

    Oddly the resistance in a ground system isn't all bad -- it damps out any resonance which might occur in a short involving capacitance or reactance. Which is why, back in the stone age of cathode ray tube televisions, if you wanted to work on the picture tube you grounded the plate not with a jumper, but with a resistor -- typically around 10K ohms. True for any power supply with capacitance in it.
    Br. Jamie, osb
    Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England
    Solid_Fuel_Man
  • JUGHNE
    JUGHNE Member Posts: 11,038
    I recall about the first color TVs, if you moved them across the room they had to be re-calibrated/tuned. Oddles of knobs to fiddle with. As fussy as a high dollar piano.

    And I recall seeing an ad for the first color TV, $999.00.
    And all the headaches to go with it.

    Today cleaning files, I threw out the book for the first brand new TV. 1996 RCA 27" (color BTY). receipt was for $624.75.....purchased on lay-a-way for Christmas.
    Dealer mentioned it was one of the last TV's made in the USA.
  • BobC
    BobC Member Posts: 5,475
    Tricky **** did us that favor when he sold the domestic consumer electronics industry down the river for their support of his Vietnam policies. Up until then virtually all the TV's were mad here, 10 years later virtually none of them were made here.

    I can remember working on TV's made in the 50's - Capeheart, Andrea, Stromgberg Carlson, Zenith, etc. they were all built like tanks. There were some schlok operations around, remember mad man Muntz? He tried to compete with the Japs on price but the sets didn't work all that well. The level of workmanship was very good, the early Japanese sets were not very good but they learned quickly.

    BTW I still own and occasionally use slide rules i had in High School, the one in the bench drawer gets used when I forget to bring my calculator down cellar with me.

    Bob
    Smith G8-3 with EZ Gas @ 90,000 BTU, Single pipe steam
    Vaporstat with a 12oz cut-out and 4oz cut-in
    3PSI gauge
    CLamb
  • ChrisJ
    ChrisJ Member Posts: 15,553
    edited February 2018
    > @BobC said:
    > Tricky **** did us that favor when he sold the domestic consumer electronics industry down the river for their support of his Vietnam policies. Up until then virtually all the TV's were mad here, 10 years later virtually none of them were made here.
    >
    > I can remember working on TV's made in the 50's - Capeheart, Andrea, Stromgberg Carlson, Zenith, etc. they were all built like tanks. There were some schlok operations around, remember mad man Muntz? He tried to compete with the Japs on price but the sets didn't work all that well. The level of workmanship was very good, the early Japanese sets were not very good but they learned quickly.
    >
    > BTW I still own and occasionally use slide rules i had in High School, the one in the bench drawer gets used when I forget to bring my calculator down cellar with me.
    >
    > Bob

    Regardless of where they were made, my preference for CRTs was Sony's Trinitron.
    Single pipe quasi-vapor system. Typical operating pressure 0.14 - 0.43 oz. EcoSteam ES-20 Advanced Control for Residential Steam boilers. Rectorseal Steamaster water treatment
  • Fred
    Fred Member Posts: 8,542
    edited February 2018
    15 or 20 years ago, Sony was sued for designing and incorporating components that were intended to fail in five years and, they were quite good at that plan, give or take a few months of average use.
    I might add that Toshiba took a huge financial hit and law suit for using used components in their "New" products. Those used components were recovered from products, mostly laptops that were taken in as trade-ins or from warranty returns.
  • BobC
    BobC Member Posts: 5,475
    The Trinitrons were pretty late in the game. A top tier B&W set from the mid to late 50's had a VERY good picture, much more detail then color TV's of the 60's.

    Bob
    Smith G8-3 with EZ Gas @ 90,000 BTU, Single pipe steam
    Vaporstat with a 12oz cut-out and 4oz cut-in
    3PSI gauge
  • ChrisJ
    ChrisJ Member Posts: 15,553
    > @Fred said:
    > 15 or 20 years ago, Sony was sued for designing and incorporating components that were intended to fail in five years and, they were quite good at that plan, give or take a few months of average use.
    > I might add that Toshiba took a huge financial hit and law suit for using used components in their "New" products. Those used components were recovered from products, mostly laptops that were taken in as trade-ins or from warranty returns.

    Yes I recall the Sony issue and even dealt with it. TV still had the best picture out of any sd crt then. Later on I got my hands on a Unity Motion UHD-3200. that was a shadow mask crt but it was 720p. Not bad for 1998
    Single pipe quasi-vapor system. Typical operating pressure 0.14 - 0.43 oz. EcoSteam ES-20 Advanced Control for Residential Steam boilers. Rectorseal Steamaster water treatment