On Sun, 28 Jul 2019 23:50:11 -0400, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Sat, 27 Jul 2019 15:31:46 -0000 (UTC), "Arlen G.
Holder" wrote:

From the US homeowner's perspective of working backward from a wall outlet
o What is the difference between ground and neutral in the US?

A friend is debugging why the washing machine metal case is hot only when

BTW, there is suppposed to be a separate wire from a cabinet screw in
the washing machine metal case to a ground, often clamped onto a cold
water pipe (assuming they aren't plastic. It has to be cold, not hot,
which wends its way through the water heater.).

This seems to me like the part of installation easiest to forget,
because there is no jack for that wire in the machine and no wire
dangling from the machine until you attach one. And lots of people
install washing machines without reading the directions.

But I'd make sure it's there and I'd put it on if it's not. I don't
know what happens when there is already a problem and the missing wire
is installed, but that's the way it should be.


the water pipes are hooked up and water flowing through them when I tried
to explain to that homeowner over the phone the difference between ground
and neutral - where - I'm not sure I have it all figured out myself.

Connecting to a cold water pipe these days is as likely to energize
the faucet as it is to actually bond anything. There is just too much
plastic in plumbing to count on any pipe being grounded.