Earth fault/leakage current tracing

[Engineer54]

Over the years I have worked with 3 hospital engineers and all of them were ex chief Engineers from the Navy, 2 liked the sauce and the 3rd was a bit of a stickler, but all 3 were top guys, but knew absolutely nothing about electrical engineering.

Strange how even at the top of the food chain like site forman and Clerk of works, you very rarely find an Electrical Engineer running a project, I suppose the electric side is too complicated lol.

Top posts E54,I still go down the line that there are terminations and joints breaking down, would be nice to get a thermal camera on these to just see.

In my experience The Engineering Managers i've come across have been first rate, be they from a mechanical or an electrical background. All have known there hospitals and plant inside out so to speak... Can't say any of them have been ex services, most have come from industrial backgrounds. Those that didn't have much of an electrical background were sensible enough to recruit an electrical engineering assistant, and vice versa with the electrical biased engineering managers. ...For sure none were fools...lol!!

I agree that this problem doesn't sound like a leakage problem, in the true sense of the term, but rather an earth fault or faults. Which is why i asked if any of the breakers had tripped out on an earth fault , frankly i'm surprised they haven't, Not exactly normal to see ...50 to 70+A returning on the earthing system constantly to the main switchboard.

The thermal imaging exercise is definitly a well worthwhile one, and could well turn up the problem relatively quickly, but i just get a feeling this could well end up, being an extensive search/trace operation, especially if this hospitals electrical system hasn't been looked after or maintained over the years. The older the plant the more maintenance, inspection, and testing time should be allocated. Which is where s good hospital engineering manager comes into his own, ...Knowing his hospital!!

Unfortunately, we don't known the extent and condition of this older section of the hospitals installation. All the usual add-on electrical installations to the original layout, and how they have been integrated, can well be the source of the present problem and can be a nightmare to trace if they have been bodged... lol!!

 

[tes11]

hey sparkydue hows it going i have similar problem at supermarket right now 125A on main earth at main switchboard activating high leakage alarm on new switchboard was wondering how u got on with your problem as it seems very similar to my problem cheers

 

[tes11]

help from all would be much appreciated

 

[sparkydude]

Still working through it currently , we are beginning to swap circuits over from old panel to new next week for the next 3 months so are hoping we will track it down once we have swapped a few over.
Lots of theories floating around, mainly pointing to switch mode power supplies and chiller supplies, but no conclusive proof of anything as yet .

Let me know how you go on as it may help me also Lol

Nick