Stray voltage

[BeanAnimal]

Update! So I got the GFCI extension and plugged both the extensions from the tank into it. Nothing is tripping the GFCI.
What suggestions do you have moving forward?

Was the tank and sump water grounded to a know good ground during this test?

You are not going to like my answer:

I am not comfortable walking you through much more troubleshooting for the simple reason that you indicate that you and your wife both got serious shocks from the aquarium.

I would also very seriously discourage you from taking troubleshooting advice from anybody else on this forum, no matter how well intentioned it it.

Mains voltage is no joke - yes most of us have been zapped a few times, some of us badly. The thing is that it actually doesn't take much to stop the heart and most of us are just lucky.

The GFCI is there to help protect you, but should not be solely relied on in this case.

As subsea indicated, I would call a master electrician and have him go through everything.

While it is possible that a heater or other device is only faulting intermittently, and thus the GFCI has not tripped, trying to walk you through finding it and testing various other aspects if your home's electrical service are beyond what can be safely explained here.

 

[BeanAnimal]

A GFCI looks for unbalanced current. That means that current coming in is not equal to current going out. If that happens, the GFCI automatically trips. So if some current is flowing through you, then that is current that won't be coming back through the GFCI, and it will trip.

The issue that I have moving forward in this particular case is the severity of the shock that both he and his wife received prior to the GFCI being installed.

Where the GFCI can't protect you is when you become part of the circuit between hot and neutral and are not grounded.... this is where things get hard to sort out. Just because you are on a tile floor, does not mean you are at ground potential. Lifted neutrals, or floating conductors from the pole, other devices in the home that have faulted, etc. could put the floor at some other potential. I don't think such a discussion is within the scope of most people here and it I would hate to see somebody get hurt or lose their life trying to sort it out.

 

[Subsea]

@hashbrown1408,

Get a master electrician to perform diagnostic evaluation. I am an excellent mechanical engineer and a decent electrician for hooking up house circuits. You need a master electrician or industrial electrician at your home. I just spent $22K on electrical upgrades on 30 year old house. Get professionals. You will be glad you did.

 

[Subsea]

@hashbrown1408
When you search for qualified electrician ask technician if he has a Meg meter. The test is a diagnostic tool to evaluate potential for future electrical leakage to ground and will show any present leakage to ground.

“Megged" is an electrical term that refers to the process of using a Megger to measure the insulation resistance of an electrical system. This test is also known as an Insulation Resistance Test (Meg Test). “​

PS: The first time I saw a Meg used was by Wildlife & Fisheries biologist that we’re doing population density research of fish species. Stun them enough with high voltage low amps so that they float to surface for a few minutes before reviving and swimming off.
Some outlaws I have known, use the technique to harvest fish to eat.

 

[W31Olds]

I agree with Subsea, if your not familiar with AC circuit analysis, safety protocols, and using instrumentation I would hire an Electrician. However, before doing so I would ask if he will troubleshoot the devices in your setup. He may just check the house wiring only, indicate it's working properly and say something in your Tank setup is causing the problem and not want to diagnose it. As far as a Megger goes, this device should absolutely never be used by an unqualified person and not in a home setting. I Managed a Test Department for a large Defense Contractor for over 20 years and have personally used Meggers to test Insulation breakdown and these instruments are highly lethal. I would never trust an Electrician to use one in my house.

 

[Paul B]

As subsea indicated, I would call a master electrician and have him go through everything.

I am a Master electrician. A really good looking one. And I am not sure how you are reading 5-10 volts. 5-10 volts should not give you any shock.

if you have your meter set correctly on the AC scale and the reading is anywhere below about 100 volts, it is induced current which is normal.

Being you are getting a shock, there is another problem and as Bean said, you need a GFI (as we call them in the trade.)

If it doesn't trip, you are good to go. I personally would add a ground probe. I use a stainless steel antenna but you can also use a stainless knife or spoon. Just bend it over the edge of the tank so it hits the water and connect it to a ground but that is for another conversation.

Of course you can buy one but I don't buy anything. It's just me.

 

[Subsea]

I agree with Subsea, if your not familiar with AC circuit analysis, safety protocols, and using instrumentation I would hire an Electrician. However, before doing so I would ask if he will troubleshoot the devices in your setup. He may just check the house wiring only, indicate it's working properly and say something in your Tank setup is causing the problem and not want to diagnose it. As far as a Megger goes, this device should absolutely never be used by an unqualified person and not in a home setting. I Managed a Test Department for a large Defense Contractor for over 20 years and have personally used Meggers to test Insulation breakdown and these instruments are highly lethal. I would never trust an Electrician to use one in my house.

Established procedures & protocols are always good. Airline pilots go thru a monotonous, detailed checklist before every departure & landing.


When I worked on the Discovery Seven Seas, a dynamically positioned drillship, she had just set the deepwater drilling depth record of 7600’ in 1977 in the North Sea during the winter. We were a cocky bunch to work with: Aussies, Scottish & Americans (Cowboys & Cajuns). If something broke, we fixed it. Electricians & electronic technicians used oscilloscopes to diagnose printed circuit boards as well as replace diodes & resistors. With mechanics, welders & machinists, if it broke, we fixed it. In those days, we made it work, when no body else knew how.

After those days, we wrote SOP’s (standard operating procedures).
A Cajun Aggie in Austin, Tx.

 

[Subsea]

I am a Master electrician. A really good looking one. And I am not sure how you are reading 5-10 volts. 5-10 volts should not give you any shock.

if you have your meter set correctly on the AC scale and the reading is anywhere below about 100 volts, it is induced current which is normal.

Being you are getting a shock, there is another problem and as Bean said, you need a GFI (as we call them in the trade.)

If it doesn't trip, you are good to go. I personally would add a ground probe. I use a stainless steel antenna but you can also use a stainless knife or spoon. Just bend it over the edge of the tank so it hits the water and connect it to a ground but that is for another conversation.

Of course you can buy one but I don't buy anything. It's just me.

Thanks for joining the party.

 

[BeanAnimal]

As far as a Megger goes, this device should absolutely never be used by an unqualified person and not in a home setting. I Managed a Test Department for a large Defense Contractor for over 20 years and have personally used Meggers to test Insulation breakdown and these instruments are highly lethal. I would never trust an Electrician to use one in my house.

FWIW most hand held meggers are not lethal even though we treat them with safe protocols, albeit getting whacked can be an eye opener. The old “here hold this for a second” joke, that was never that funny if you were the guy holding the leads.

Now hipots… those can be deadly.

I have one similar, but a bit older than this that I picked up at a business liquidation. I think mine does 4kV. mY megger is ancient too. Good old hand cranker :)


Gone are the days of non polarized plugs on metal chassis devices, flyback transformers and high voltage tube secondaries that some of us played with as kids…. So there is that.

Well, I still play with high voltage tube secondaries…

 

[W31Olds]

I've used both and I agree Hipot is more hazardous. Meggers usually have settings on the higher ranges that can cause a shock hazard. That being said, not likely you would ever use one to troubleshoot a Home Aquarium setup due to the fact that pump motors, heaters, etc. are not serviceable and same for items that are damaged by salt creep and Megohm testing just indicates you have a problem with the device.

 

[BeanAnimal]

I've used both and I agree Hipot is more hazardous. Meggers usually have settings on the higher ranges that can cause a shock hazard. That being said, not likely you would ever use one to troubleshoot a Home Aquarium setup due to the fact that pump motors, heaters, etc. are not serviceable and same for items that are damaged by salt creep and Megohm testing just indicates you have a problem with the device.

I actually did quite a bit of insulation testing on powerheads (and a few heaters) many years ago after a few old ones shocked me. Certainly not repairable, but was curious as to the breakdown. As far as I can tell, most were not actual motor insulation breakdowns but water breaking through the potting compound and contacting the mains to motor connections... As Paul often points out, this typically manifests as somewhere north of 90 volts to ground in the water.

In any case, most of this is beyond safe conversation for the general audience on a reef aquarium forum :)

 

[W31Olds]

Yes, I'm wary of pumps after buying a couple of used ones. One didn't function so I inspected the impeller housing and sure enough there was a hairline crack with what looked liked rust leaching out. I suspected it may have been dropped at some point. Had it been working probably would have caused voltage leakage at some point. In any case, saltwater and AC voltage just don't play well together. :)

 

[Paul B]

, flyback transformers and high voltage tube secondaries that some of us played with as kids…. So there is that.

I now use an electric eel. :anguished-face:

 

[hashbrown1408]

Update! Thanks for all the positive insight guys, I’m a neuroscientist not an electrician so really wasn’t too confident fiddling around with the tank whilst it was giving us shocks. I took all your recommendations and got a GFCI outlet installed and had an electrician come out. He figured it out to be the pump from my UV sterilizer.

I removed it an now the tank is safe. Moving forward I’m definitely going to increase my cable management to make it easier in the future if I have problems to trace it.

Once we removed the UV pump he couldn’t find any issues internally, we did noticed some salt creep had made its way to the power box for the UV pump, not sure if that’s what killed it.
Anyhow I really appreciate all your input and learn something new everyday with this hobby so thankyou

 

[W31Olds]

Hash, great news to hear that you remedied the problem and now have a safer tank. FYI, Power Management (monitoring) is an important consideration with the investment many reefers have made in livestock. This is especially true for people who travel, experience power outages (me), or have small systems that can rapidly change.

 

[Bohemian Waxwing]

So was the process to unplug one component at a time until the meter no longer showed a spiked voltage reading?

Just curious

 

[hashbrown1408]

So was the process to unplug one component at a time until the meter no longer showed a spiked voltage reading?

Just curious

Yes (kind of) I used the recommendations of the reefers above^ and bought a GFCI outlet. After plugging my tank into this it tripped and then process of elimination by unplugging each component one at a time found the issue.

Little did I know that I had left my UV sterilizer unplugged and the GFCI wasn’t tripping I couldn’t understand why it wasn’t (but I was too scared to touch the water to see if the problem had resolved) the electrician came and it turned out that it was the one cable I unplugged randomly that was actually causing the issue

 

[Bohemian Waxwing]

Yes (kind of) I used the recommendations of the reefers above^ and bought a GFCI outlet. After plugging my tank into this it tripped and then process of elimination by unplugging each component one at a time found the issue.

Little did I know that I had left my UV sterilizer unplugged and the GFCI wasn’t tripping I couldn’t understand why it wasn’t (but I was too scared to touch the water to see if the problem had resolved) the electrician came and it turned out that it was the one cable I unplugged randomly that was actually causing the issue

Wanna hear something messed up?

I worked at a big chain pet store here in Canada for about 15 years, and when we would get shocked by one of our tanks, we would do the same but use our hand as the test subject!

For whatever reason, we only ever got small shocks. Maybe we were lucky but no one ever got zapped bad. We would unplug pumps and heaters until we no longer got buzzed lol.

Insane to think we had so much water and not a single GFI outlet!

 

[BeanAnimal]

Assuming it tripped the GFCI when he plugged it in...

 

[BeanAnimal]

Wanna hear something messed up?

I worked at a big chain pet store here in Canada for about 15 years, and when we would get shocked by one of our tanks, we would do the same but use our hand as the test subject!

For whatever reason, we only ever got small shocks. Maybe we were lucky but no one ever got zapped bad. We would unplug pumps and heaters until we no longer got buzzed lol.

Insane to think we had so much water and not a single GFI outlet!

We do all kinds of things, ignorant of the actual danger, only to find out years later how luck we actually were.

I don't known when exactly CEC adopted GFCI, but I would assume it as the mid 70s shorty after the NFPA (NEC) did.

Early NEC code only required them outdoors and around pools - later being expanded to cover bathrooms in the early 80s, then kitchens and wet locations in the late 80s and most wet locations by early 2000s.

Again knowing that the CEC typically adopts NEC standards, some years after NEC, it would likely not have been until the 2010s or even later that CEC would have required those tanks to be GFCI/RCSD protected. Depending on the age of the store, they may still be open and grandfathered under old code of they have not remodeled...

That and there is always the inspector that does not understand the grey area and the builder and/or owner that deceive the inspector by misrepresenting what will be plugged in where, to keep costs and red tape down.

Anyway... makes you wonder sometimes how safe your LFS, local spa, etc. actually are ;)