Indeed in the rest of the house, turnining on a load causes drops in voltage
in other completely different circuits. For example when I start the dryer,
which has its own 50A breaker from the main panel, this causes the computer
UPS to beep for a few seconds due to the drop in voltage. The computer is
on a different circuit with a 15A fuse in the main panel.

If this was a problem with the main panel, will the electric company come
out to fix it without charge? The panel looks pretty old, it might be the
original from 1950. How do these open or bad neutral connections occur? Is
it something like rust build up?


"Ralph Mowery" wrote in message
ink.net...

Most of the time if you load one side of the wiring and the voltage on the
other side goes higher you have a neutral problem. Check at the braker
box where the power comes in and see if you get a change there of more
than a volt or two as you load the circuits. If so, it may be a problem
with the power company.

A house should be wired so the load is split between the two sides of the
wiring comming into a house. If the loads were ballanced exectually you
would not need the neuteral wire. This is almost an impossable situation.
The neutral carries the unballanced current. If there is a problem with
the neutral (open or bad connection) , one side of the wiring gets a
larger voltage and the othe side goes to a lower voltage depending on
which is loaded the most.