Hello Redditors,
I discovered that there are electricity leakages in my flat. In the uploaded picture (screenshot of a video I took), there are 120V between the Dishwasher and the oven! Basically some appliances in the kitchen are "live" and can electrocutate. (I already got shocked, hence I started measuring). I think whats happening is that "Earth Line" is connected to one of the electrical lines, and thus the appliances housing are live. Not only those two, but also more appliances.
I took some videos and sent it to the Landlord some months ago. Landlord claims that she asked an Eletrician about this, and she said that his answer was something like: "It an old building, and they had to make connections like that, it's normal". So landlord claimed it's normal and didn't do anything.
To me, this is definitely not normal. How critical is this situation? Should I accept it as it is, or is there something I can do?
by monox-gg
19 comments
Absolutely not normal, and a liability that your landlord should address immediately. No idea about the legal situation here, but maybe you can even get an electrician in and tell them to send the bill to the landlord (but I recommend checking with a legal professional)
what the hell… this can be really really dangerous. your landlord has to fix that right now!
What happens if you put a load parallel to the measurement? Can you measure with a “Duspol”? Does it trigger the RCD?
I’d assume that the PE is interrupted somewhere or missing. It’s a topic for your landlord and an electrician then.
How old is the electrical installation?
It’s a hazard that can be potentially deadly, even with an RCD that’s hopefully installed and working.
What the electrician meant, if your landlord even asked one, is, that in the past often the earth was used as a regular “Phase” to cut costs. This is definitely not okay, since some appliances need a functioning PE to prevent exactly that from happening.
I’d suggest asking the Mieterbund, if further demands by you are not met. Stay safe.
Check the voltage between each appliance’s housing and the ground pin a known working outlet (note: the two side pins of the outlet are the ground pins). That should give you a more definitive answer which appliance is mis-wired, and whether either of them is actually mis-wired or not.
> It an old building, and they had to make connections like that
No, they didn’t have to: that claim is what we in my country of birth call “bollocks”. The whole point of the earth line is to make electric shocks less likely. If it’s an old building it’s very likely the wiring is dangerously substandard and was probably put in by somebody who didn’t know what they were doing, and that has to be fixed ASAP before somebody gets seriously hurt.
Inform the landlord in writing what the problem is and set a specific deadline for the repairs to be made — I’d say, given the serious risk to yourself and anyone else in the apartment, you can make that deadline very tight. If the landlord fails to comply, get an electrician in as a matter of urgency and then bill the landlord.
It may be a simple easily-fixed piece of botched wiring, but if you’re unlucky it may need wires to be ripped out of the walls. I believe if the necessary repairs mean the apartment is temporarily uninhabitable, the landlord has to find you alternative accommodation, but IANAL so don’t take my word for it.
If you haven’t done so already, you should join a local renters’ association (“Mieterverein”). They can offer you help and advice for situations like this.
first you ask your landlord to send help. if he don’t respond, you inform him that you will order an eletrician in 2 weeks (give a clear but realistic deadline) if he don’t act.
also you state that if the eletrician (you hire) find any serious problems, you will bill the eletrician cost to the landlord.
make all statements written and keep everything for later.
and/or seek help at the “Deutscher Mieterbund”
Its probably just a missing ground (wire) causing a voltage potential. An electrician can help.
Electrician here.
Theres multiple reasons that can happen. Is your house older? Meaning built somewhere around and before 1970? That means it’s still “Klassische Nullung”. What you could be experiencing is a Neutralleiterabriss causing a Sternpunkverschiebung.
I’d start flipping off all Breaker and disconnect **all** electrical devices before they take damage. Then flip the breakers on again. The voltage should’ve changed.
If the voltage havent changed after disconning all devices you can disconnect, then one of the ground its most likely faulty and you’re looking at a Körperschluss. Rather unlikely though as it should 230V then.
You should call a local electrician now (unless you can last without power until tomorrow). It’ll be counted as “Notdienst” but depending on the fault your landlord has to pay for it. Whatever you do, do not Plug any devices into your outlets. These can be Destroyed that way.
This happens protective earth (PW, green-yellow) of one of the devices is not connected correctly on the far end from here. This floating wire (and the housing of the device it’s connected to) catches about half mains voltage from the neighbouring hot and neutral wire.
This can’t deliver much current. It’s enough to shock you a little, but if it were connected to mains, it would have been way more serious than just a little shock. (And we don’t have 120V mains)
BUT if there’s a problem inside the device and a hot wire touches the housing from inside, that voltage would not be diverted by protective earth, and it could electrocute you.
In old buildings, there may be no protective earth, the protective earth contact would be directly connected to neutral at the outlet. But even then, there should not be half mains voltage.
Therefore, I would not accept that.
Well it’s not in Portugal…
RCD has left the chat
Now you announce that you are cutting rent until this problem is fixed.
Then you lawyer up because your landlord is quite obviously either an idiot or an asshole.
Missing ground wire contact.
This happens often, if the groundwire in the wallplug is overpainted when someone paints the wall. Have seen this again just some weeks ago. 118V at the touch panel of a dishwasher. Cleaned the wall plug and it was gone. 118V sounds much, but in most cases its not dangerous, because there is no Power/Ampere behind this.
> I think whats happening is that “Earth Line” is connected to one of the electrical lines,
Yes, that’s likely.
> How critical is this situation?
Well, you don’t want to get shocked when touching appliances.
> or is there something I can do?
If the landlord won’t do anything, and since you seem to have knowledge about electricity: Look at how the dishwasher and the oven are connected, identify the wrong connections, and correct them. If you are doing that without an electrician, you need to know what you are doing, and the risk is on you.
The alternative is to pressure the landlord into doing something.
The second alternative is paying an electrician yourself.
> “It an old building, and they had to make connections like that,
So typically in an old building, it does happen that neutral and protective earth are on one line, that means when neutral starts to move under load, yes, you can get a bit of voltage between metal covers and actual earth. But it should never be 120V, which is what you’d get between different phases.
So something is clearly wrong.
That is a good example why you don’t use a Multimeter for that.
The high resistance of the meter lets you measure bullshit if you don’t know how to use it.
Get a Duspol and measure it.
Earth is connected to almost all appliances with a metal housing. N and PE are connected after the RCD
50V DC is considered the red line of safety, this is 100+ AC… Can kill you
Die Sache ist ernst…
somewhere the Ground is not connected and you have a leaking Live wire over a Capacitor onto the housing. Don’t use any of those until this is fixed. Best go to the Fuse-box and switch off the Fuses for those.
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