will a loose neutral wire cause a high electric bill?

[The motor guy]

The neighbor was complaining about the power dropping whenever they turned on something that used a lot of amperage and they were also complaining about high electric bills. This got me thinking, won't their electric bill be cheaper now that they don't have power going to places it shouldn't be?

 

[JHZR2]

What does "power dropping" mean? Breakers opening? Lights dimming?

A loose connection could be very dangerous and cause voltage drops thst might dim lights, but not sure that it would consume power.

If something is burning extra energy, and it's enough to affect mains power or the bill, I'd suspect it's a pretty big fault, and probably would be very close to being on fire.

Easiest thing to check is how fast the meter is spinning, then turn off breakers and find the culprit. Go from there.

If there's concerns about loose or bad connections dissipating energy, it's probably prudent to get a pro in there immediately before the house burns down.

 

[gman2304]

I wonder if your furnace/ac problems a few days ago that suddenly fixed itself could be tied into this? Do you live in a condo or apartment?

 

[The motor guy]

Originally Posted by JHZR2
What does "power dropping" mean? Breakers opening? Lights dimming?

A loose connection could be very dangerous and cause voltage drops thst might dim lights, but not sure that it would consume power.

If something is burning extra energy, and it's enough to affect mains power or the bill, I'd suspect it's a pretty big fault, and probably would be very close to being on fire.

Easiest thing to check is how fast the meter is spinning, then turn off breakers and find the culprit. Go from there.

If there's concerns about loose or bad connections dissipating energy, it's probably prudent to get a pro in there immediately before the house burns down.




They were saying that certain appliances wouldn't really turn on and it would dim the lights and essentially cause a huge voltage drop on a large portion of the house.

I never had any issues and they complained about this for like three months and all it was was a loose neutral wire in the breaker box.

As far as my ac/heater not wanting to turn on, yeah that's kind of what it seemed like. It was slow to startup and it kind of surged up and down for a minute or so before smoothing out. Although I didn't see any lights dimming or anything like that, but the HVAC system is on the 240V side I would assume the 120 things would be wired separately.

 

[The motor guy]

Originally Posted by gman2304
I wonder if your furnace/ac problems a few days ago that suddenly fixed itself could be tied into this? Do you live in a condo or apartment?


Condo. They fixed their loose connections about 3 weeks before this happened.

 

[bullwinkle]

If your heat or A/C is running on 240 VAC, the neutral isn't really going to do much, other than limiting shock hazards & the control circuitry. Loose wires + big electrical loads=arcing & wires burning off. Hopefully not setting stuff around them on fire!

 

[danez_yoda]

not diy way around it for tye aberage citizen. you have a wiring issue that needs to be addressed by a professional.

what could be happening is you have a bad connectin that is causng high resistance, when the high load appliance turns on the voltage drops. when the high load trues to run at low voltage it actually pulls more current than it would at the correct voltage, since you pay for current at the meter it could make your bill higher but you are also heating up somethng in the wiring to dissipate the extra power, this is dangerous and could cause a fire,

get it checked by a pro.

 

[WyrTwister]

Ran into my share of loose neutrals over the years . Never thought of how it would or would not change the electric bill .

You can certainly burn up stuff , especially electronics . Burn out a lot of light bulbs / lamps , too .

 

[supton]

If you think you have a loose wire on the service drop, my understanding is that the power company sends a guy out pronto to fix it. They don't fool around with that sort of problem--and neither should you. If you think you've got a wiring problem, it needs immediate attention.

 

[Dave Sherman]

I don't think it would have a significant effect on the electric bill, but open neutrals can do very bad things. It can cause big voltage drops one on leg, but at the same time it causes voltage increases on the other leg and it can fry things on that leg. A guy once sent me a video where he turned on an electric heater and his kitchen light gradually dimmed. I told him to unplug all his electronics and get an electrician out pronto. Yep, open neutral.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

I had a problem where they wired to many "nodes" together at one outlet and the black wire was melting and burning insulation back about and inch from the connexion on the outlet.

My wife would wake up upstairs when I was watching TV at night down stairs and say, " I smell O'pa smoking a pipe again in the house!" I would say, " You're having a dream - go back to sleep ".

I tried many times to trace the circuits from the basement but never could find any noticable problems.

The issue was many circuits were formed using the duplex outlet boxs and some switch boxes as a large junction with a tons of wires stuffed in there,

Finally a good electrician my wife called found the issue.


On ground issues It seems my bill went up when I remade the "stake" grounds near the meter. Out house was grounded back at the x-former pole guy 200 feet back at the street - too far away to be effective. I have no city underground water pipes for a good earth. Just poly from the drilled well. Edison v. Tesla. Ac wins!

funny most stuff is DC except motors and cal-rods. Money to be saved with local natural gas generation of DC for large factories with fluorescent lamps, etc.

 

[Driz]

If you're on a well the first thing to look for is a lot of condensation all over the tank and piping. When the foot valve fails at the bottom of the well your pump runs an awful lot and Jacks your bill sky high. It's easy enough the check just look for the condensation and watch and see if the pressures running up and down incorrectly.

 

[LeakySeals]

Whenever I've had light dimming issues it was usually too many old electronics on the same circuit using the old style circuit breakers. It's also a clue that the wires are heating up. It's time to modernize the electrical appliances and wiring in that house.

 

[wag123]

Depending on when it was built, it could have aluminum wiring. Aluminum wiring can cause all kinds of problems.

 

[dnewton3]

We are discussing a loose neutral and power consumption, so I'll chime in with this ...

240v single phase systems would not see any power draw change, because technically they don't need the neutral to operate. It' just operates from phase peak on one side to the phase peak on the other. Whether the neutral is loose ore even missing, it does not affect the operation of the circuit.

120v single phase has to be viewed a little differently. They operate from phase peak to center (aka no voltage potential; the technically correct way of stating it's equally centered between phases). Electric bills are driven by power consumption; power is a measure of energy per unit of time. Typically stated on a bill as kw/hours. If you have a disconnected neutral in 120v ph1, then your appliance/bulb/thing won't work at all; it's a open circuit. Zero power because of zero current flow.

But we'll look at 120v ph1 with a loose neutral ...
Start with this electrical math: P = (I^2) x (R); stated as power equals current squared times resistance
A loose neutral wire on a 120v ph1 will cause increased power consumption because the circuit wiring is becoming an additional point of resistance, which when applied to the circuit math, it increases the power draw.
P = (I^2) x (R)
Power draw goes up when the current stays the same and resistance goes up.


PS - it's not just a loose neutral in 120v ph1 that will increase power consumption; it would also happen if the hot wire were also loosely connected. Either way causes higher resistance in the circuit.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

N is usually parallel the same circuit as GND in 1p 120v

Simplistically , with a loose neutral you increase the wiring R on that leg by 2x as the GND is tied to N, but the N+G leg is 1/2 the Black leg R to start in a basic circuit.

But then It all gets complicated with 3 way switches and switched outlets.

 

[exranger06]

Originally Posted by ARCOgraphite
N is usually parallel the same circuit as GND in 1p 120v

Simplistically , with a loose neutral you increase the wiring R on that leg by 2x as the GND is tied to N, but the N+G leg is 1/2 the Black leg R to start in a basic circuit.

But then It all gets complicated with 3 way switches and switched outlets.


Everything you posted is nonsense. The ground wire normally carries NO current whatsoever. Power flows down the hot leg, and is returned via the neutral wire. The ground wire does basically nothing 99.99% of the time. If a wire came loose, either in a junction box or in an appliance, and something became energized that's not supposed to (either a metal junction box or conduit or other part of the house's electrical system, or the metal enclosure of an appliance), then you will basically have a line-to-ground fault, since the aforementioned metal part should be connected to the ground wire. The ground wire is bonded to neutral so it can carry current back to the source. The whole point of the ground wire is to basically create a short circuit (the equivalent of a line-to-neutral fault) if an exposed metal part/appliance becomes energized. This causes a ton of fault current to go through the circuit, which makes the circuit breaker trip and turn off the power ASAP.
This is the only situation in which the ground wire carries any current. If everything is connected and working properly, the ground wire is carrying NO current and is basically doing NOTHING. It is only there as a safety in case something goes wrong and something gets energized that's not supposed to.

The ground wire should be bonded to neutral ONLY at the main panel/main disconnect and should NOT be bonded together ANYWHERE else, including subpanels. There should NEVER be any parallel paths where normal current is flowing down the neutral and the ground wire at the same time.

 

[exranger06]

And to answer OP: Loose connections in general are BAD! It is difficult for electricity to flow through a loose connection. In other words, it creates resistance. Resistance creates heat. Heat creates fire! I suppose it's possible that the added resistance/heat can increase electric consumption (electric heaters "consume" energy, after all), but my main concern would be the fire hazard. Also, when it comes to loose neutrals, you have a real potential to damage electronics and appliances from over-voltage. This is because the current will flow down a hot leg, through an appliance, and instead of returning via the neutral, it goes through another appliance, which is connected to the OTHER hot leg, essentially creating a 240V circuit. That's no good when the appliance/electronics are designed to run on 120V.

 

[MolaKule]

And let's not lose sight of the fact that heating in wiring or a connection is due to P = I*I*R or I^2*R.

Any resistance in a circuit means a loss of power to a load such as an appliance.

A bad or oxidized connection adds resistance to a circuit which means a heating (temperature rise) at that bad connection.

Below is an illustration of a Breaker Box or, "Load Distribution Center." Most residential breaker boxes are now 200 Amp service minimum.

For 120VAC circuits, the Black wire (called the "hot" wire) comes from the circuit breaker.

The White wire (Neutral) connects to the internal Ground Bus (Neutral Safety Bus) as does the Safety Ground (bare wire).

All three wires then travel on to the "Branch" circuits (loads, outlets, lights, etc.).

Don't be fooled by the term, "Neutral Wire." The Neutral wires carries current as does the Black 'Hot" wire and there is a voltage across the Black and Neutral (White) wires of 120VAC.

Also, across the Black Wire and Safety Ground (bare wire) there is voltage of 120VAC as measured on an AC voltmeter.

However, the Safety Ground (bare wire) carries no current unless there is a fault such as a short, say at the outlet.

 

[exranger06]

Originally Posted by MolaKule
The White wire (Neutral) connects to the internal Ground Bus (Neutral Safety Bus) as does the Safety Ground (bare wire).

This is true only in a "main" breaker panel. If it's a subpanel, the neutral bar/bus is separate from the ground bar/bus. The ground bar is bonded to the panel enclosure, while the neutral bar is to be isolated from the enclosure. Neutral wires for the branch circuits go on the neutral bar, ground wires go on the ground bar. The neutral should be bonded to ground only at ONE point, which is at the first point of disconnect. If you have a disconnect right next to the meter, that's where it should be bonded, and the panel in the house should have separate neutral and ground bars. If there is no disconnect outside and the service goes from the meter straight into the main breaker panel, then the main breaker in the panel is the first point of disconnect and the neutrals and grounds can go on the same bar.