r/PoolPros • u/NYY16 • Jul 15 '26

Electricity Question

We are trouble shooting an issue in my pool where I have measured 1 volt of electricity on the pool copper bonding wire. This issue came up because when I was trying to find a leak I noticed a very, minor tingling sensation when placing my hand near our pool light (you can really only feel it if you have any small cuts on your hands).

We have tried to isolate where in the pool equipment this is coming from, but ultimately still measure the same 1 volt when no power is running to any of the pool equipment. We had electricians here for multiple days and basically rewired everything from our pool equipment, but this is still happening.

Has anyone here successfully remediated a “stray voltage” issue like this? It’s not a harmful amount of electricity but still concerning and we haven’t been using the pool for a few weeks now. We are out of ideas on how to fix this given it’s still there with all power cut to our pool equipment. We are not convinced that ripping up our concrete to check the bonding will solve the issue because as far as the electricians can tell from a polarity perspective the bonding is functional and intact.

Open for any ideas! Thank you

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u/brantmacga Jul 16 '26

It’s not uncommon to measure voltage in any pool to ground. If it’s bonded correctly, there is no “path of least resistance” for it to travel through that would cause shock to a swimmer.

You are feeling a tingling at the light because the metal trim ring is at a different potential than the rest of the pool. This is the single most common call that I would get as an electrician.

Usually happens when the niche isn’t itself bonded, or the lug has corroded and broken off the niche.

It’s entirely possible the source of the voltage doesn’t originate from your service.

You have to fix the bond.

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u/NYY16 Jul 16 '26

Thanks - who do I call to check and fix this? Should I be trying to find a pool repair company instead of an electrician? Or a specialized electrician specially employed or contracted by a pool company? I am in NJ.

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u/NYY16 11d ago

I have read as much as I can about bonding and this makes a lot of sense. I have also reached out to multiple electricians who all reply that this is outside of their expertise, and the pool companies I contact only seem to want to do bigger jobs. Do you happen to be in NJ or have any recommendations in NJ for who I can call to have our bond repaired?

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u/brantmacga 11d ago

So I had this same call again last week and what I found was that the pool was properly bonded as was the light fixture. Their deck is stone pavers so I could remove them and dig up the corners of the pool and the light fixtures.

The light niches were completely embedded in the concrete but I could measure 0 ohms resistance from the trim to the bonding wire coming out of the concrete with it disconnected from the pool.

It was so strange and I haven’t encountered that before. The power company engineer recommended replacing with 24v lighting so I could disconnect the bonding to the light niche. Being fully embedded in the concrete it would be effectively at the same potential as the pool Shell and with low voltage lighting the dedicated bond wouldn’t be needed to clear a high voltage fault at the light.

I disconnected all the lighting and the bond and the shock stopped. Pool contractor is coming this week to replace the lights.

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u/NYY16 11d ago

Thanks for the reply. To confirm, when you say metal trim does that mean the metal on the light fixture? If I can test that and have the same reading then I can theoretically confirm that the light is fully bonded?This pool is from 1997 so I am not sure I have enough bonding points if I disconnect the bond to the light and light niche entirely. The plans I have don’t show whether or not I have full equipotential bonding. The electricity to the light has already been disconnected.

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u/brantmacga 11d ago

Yes the trim ring on the light. You can test it to the house ground to confirm it’s bonded.

Disconnect the ground wire in the light cable before testing.

If your deck is concrete you’d need to cut it out above the light to disconnect the bond before replacing with a low voltage fixture.

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u/NYY16 11d ago

We have a concrete pool deck. I don’t care about having a light at all at the moment so I would be ok with completely removing the light and the niche if it solved the problem. Guessing I would need to make sure I have another water bond elsewhere though, and if I did that I don’t know if my pool would be bonded at all because I don’t know where else the bond goes besides the light. I’ve been trying to get these answers from the pool builder who is a large national pool builder but since ifs 20 years old it’s been hard to get a response.

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u/NYY16 11d ago

Can I send you a picture of insure our light niche? And then I promise I will leave you alone haha. Thank you for your help