ryanm84 Posted January 15, 2014 Author Share Posted January 15, 2014 The meter was the problem. I grabbed a new one and had no issues. I had no reason to believe that the old one wouldn't read correctly. Good exercise for me to get this squared away and give some confidence that my electronics aren't at risk and that I don't have an immediate risk in the house in general. Thanks all for your ideas and input. Really helped narrow down the problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mungkiman Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 Great news. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CECAA850 Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 At times when my battery is low, my meter will read low DC voltage. Don't know why or if it would do it with AC as well. You might check the batteries before you chunk it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jason str Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 Always good to have a backup meter around just in case there is any question. Glad things turned out OK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest " " Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 (edited) it sounds like you are measuring a circut that has a very long run with undersized wire and that circut already has a load. so what everyone has said...but also..measure the circut again with no load...pop the breaker and see what shuts off...go and unplug those items...retest with no load...then test with the treadmill plugged in. question that needs to be answered is to find the cuase of the voltage drop which is apprently being aggrivated by undersize wire for the lengths involved. I just bought 250ft of 10/4 and replaced almost as much 14/3, 12/3, for the same reason. when using ?/3 the neutral is shared across both legs which means your current ccapacity is actually 20% less.....so 14/3 is 14 guage if you only use the red or black and the white but if you use both the red and the back, the white can not handle current for both the red and the black so you get a very large voltage drop becuase of this...and the circut behaves like 16 guage becuase the while can not handle the current of 2 14 guage circuts. to furthur illustrate...I put in 10/4 for a generator transfer box and most folks would wire dual 30 amp breakers for this....but since we are sharing a nuetral, the correct breakers is dual 25 amp breakers. beyond 25 amps on my neutral lead i will start to heat up the cable and get signigicant voltage drops. If i was only useing the red or the black with the white, I could have used a 30 amp breaker. so basically, depending how far from the mains you are, and the type of run, you might be exceeeding the current capability of the neutral even though the breaker does not pop becuase the wrong size breaker was put in for circuts that include a red and a black sharing the same neutral wire. the breaker would have been fine for the same wire size if only a black or red was being used. Edited January 31, 2014 by speakerfritz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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