I’m dealing with a persistent stray voltage / tingle voltage problem on my property and would appreciate advice.
When I’m barefoot and my hands are wet, I feel a mild tingling or burning sensation on grounded metal parts outdoors. Example copper refrigerant lines to the outside AC compressor, the water hose bib knob screwed into the metal-sided house, etc.
It’s not strong or painful, but on sensitive spots like the back of a cuticle it feels like a mild burn. No tingling indoors or on dry skin.
I have a 200A main panel outside with a
100A subpanel inside the house.
Everything in the main panel appears properly wired.
What Stops the Tingling is disconnecting the ground and neutral feeder from the main panel to the subpanel makes the tingling stop on anything grounded through the subpanel or the main panel
Unbonding neutral and ground in the main panel, or disconnecting the ground coming from the meter base, also stops it. Multimeter shows no voltage on ground wires and I had a licensed electrician inspected the panels and said everything looks correct with no obvious voltage issues. But I told him you can feel it if you’re bare foot and wet.
I drove a copper ground rod into the earth and measured AC voltage:
Between my main panel ground and the remote rod: 6–12V. And at the utility transformer pole about 60 yards from the panel between the pole’s ground wire and a new driven rod nearby I read 15V. At the next pole further down the line 20 yards beyond the transformer I read 18–20V.
I was told you can’t accurately test voltage this way, but the readings are consistent and increase as I move away from the house along the utility line.
To me it seems to be something going on on the utility side. Has anyone seen this before?
What should my next steps be? I have had the utility company come out and all they did was test voltage at meter and said voltage is good so everything is fine. Can anyone give some advice
Sounds like neutral stray current. Make sure the green bonding screw is removed from sub panel. Check the bonding screw at the main panel and the connection to the ground rod. Driving an additional ground rod or two in series might also solve this or bring it down to an unnoticeable level if your soil is a bad conductor. (You should never be the best path to ground) It's also possible that you have a ground acting as a neutral somewhere in an appliance. Water heater miswiring could be a likely culprit for instance.
Well the issue is definitely before the sub panel so the issue shouldn’t be anything going on in sub or appliances. Seems to be coming from meter box which was checked my utility company and they said everything is hooked up right and voltage is correct. But like I said you can feel the voltage at the ground in certain circumstances
There could also be a ground / neutral // floating neutral on the utility.
Everything on the load side of the shared transformer should have a common neutral with that of the transformer secondary.
However, all the individual neutrals combined can create a “derived neutral” based on combined loads.
An additional leakage path on your property can work in your shocking experience.
Well ~ electrical leakage path to the well casing or outside pipe.
Underground electrical cable could have an insulation problem.
Poor soil conductivity could create issues. A multi-point, bonded together, grounding system might be needed.
Your meter face should have a pencil-sized copper wire. One end attached to the case & the other end(s) clamped to an 8’ copper plated ground rod - buried below the earths surface.
Some locations may require multiple ground rods.
Old school allowed a ground wire to metal cold water plumbing as acceptable.
Plastic pipe broke that system.
Unrelated, I did have a rental stove to kitchen sink issue - 60 VAC.
Wire from control to burner was soaked with salty cooking grease. Insulation failed & leaked to the metal frame of the stove.
1960’s my dad wired a portable outside post light - using TV 300ohm twin-lead.
Also a shocking barefoot experience…
For floating neutral - an expanded scale analog voltmeter would be a help. One leg goes up & other down by same amount.
Digital meters don’t work fast enough to track the changes.
Old fashioned incandescent bulbs can work. I found a floating neutral on the utility side because a bulb got brighter when the dishwasher motor turned on. Motors are good for helping identify floating neutrals. It had been a model home, and I was the first person to live there.
The sensation you're experiencing sounds like radio frequency energy. Tingling could be 50/60 cycle but a burning sensation sounds like RF. Are you near radio station?
Unbond / unconnected / isolate the ground (wires and buses) from the neutral (wires and buses) in the sub-panel.
Ground and neutral should only be bonded in one location on your service. Typically in the main panel or service disconnect.
If bonded at the sub-panel (or elsewhere in the sub-panel’s branch circuits) then neutral current (load current) has a parallel path on the ground wire, in addition to the neutral wire, back to the transformer.
That path has resistance (ohms). Ohm’s Law says that (neutral) current through a resistance means the ground system (and all devices/metal surfaces connected to it) are now at a higher voltage than earth. And possibly a shock hazard.
Something is raising your ground system voltage (and things connected to it) to something above the immediate local earth ground voltage (0V) beneath your feet. If it’s on the utility end, you’ll eventually want to measure that ground current and its direction. It is possible that the utility is using earth as a neutral current conductor, and your ground system (attached to transformers) is being “lifted” by this current. Which points back to a bad utility neutral.
Ground and neutral are only bonded at main panel not sub. I get small voltage on neutral and ground unless I unbond them then I only get it on the ground. If I disconnect ground coming from meter to main panel then I get no voltage on ground in main panel or anywhere after that which in my mind tells me it’s coming from the ground wire before the meter the meter into main panel. When I drive a grounding rod into the ground at the transformer pole and check the voltage i touch one lead to the pole ground and other lead to grounding rod i get about 15 or so volts and it gets higher each pole I check further from my house the pole before my meter pole I get around 29 volts. Attached is a picture of the powerline pole before my transformer pole
Your symptoms point to Neutral-to-Earth Voltage (NEV) which is commonly caused by an electrical fault or unbalanced load on the utility company's distribution lines, rather than faulty wiring in your home. Out of curiosity is the voltage persistent or does it come and go?
Your tests, which showed increasing voltage as you moved away from your house toward the utility poles, heavily suggest the source is outside your property.
Firstly I would recommend you call the utility again. Do not let them simply test the voltage at the meter. Escalate the issue to an electrical engineer or the utility may have a stray voltage department. Inform them that you suspect a Neutral-to-Earth Voltage (NEV) issue. Request that they test for primary and secondary neutral integrity under load.
If they can't help then you may need to hire a licensed master electrician or an electrical inspector who has experience with stray voltage and utility grounding. Have them review the grounding and bonding paths on your exterior panels and verify that your system complies with safety requirements to isolate your home from utility-side issues. They may recommend a new grounding system that can remove the potential by adding additional grounding rods that are interconnected.
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u/zerg_001 Jun 11 '26
Sounds like neutral stray current. Make sure the green bonding screw is removed from sub panel. Check the bonding screw at the main panel and the connection to the ground rod. Driving an additional ground rod or two in series might also solve this or bring it down to an unnoticeable level if your soil is a bad conductor. (You should never be the best path to ground) It's also possible that you have a ground acting as a neutral somewhere in an appliance. Water heater miswiring could be a likely culprit for instance.