How to Find an Open Neutral

In this video, I will show you step-by-step how to locate the open neutral.

[MucaroBoricua]

After watching more than ten YouTube videos, I finally found this one, which explains everything in a clear and thorough manner. Thank you.

[alano]

Really great advice.

I had a difficult time with a mysterious lost neutral. Symptoms were weird, like everything is "hot" per non-contact probe in the switch boxes. Thought I'd share.

I had a light and a ceiling fan which had lost neutral connection (lost someplace...not in the switch boxes). I located he appropriate breaker...which was labeled "lighting". Turns out that the home was wired creatively, and the breaker was labeled inaccurately. I could not determine where the neutral in the switch box was coming from, but found the neutral connection in service box to be tight. I eventually turned the breaker off and determined that there were a number of outlets in 2 bedrooms also powered by the breaker. I pulled every outlet powered by the circuit (as well as switch boxes for affected lights and ceiling fan). A couple outlets were the "end of the run" with only "power in" wires. A few were "daisy chained" feeding outlets down the line. There were 3 outlets which had 3 sets of wires ("Power-In", Daisy Chain feeding outlets down the line". I pulled outlets one by one and eventually found one with the 3 sets of wires...with a neutral stab-in which had fallen out and was loose in the box.

I struggled finding the problem initially because I limited my search to the switch boxes powered by the circuit. I was incredibly happy to find the easy-fix problem (I had visions of a broken wire (screw or nail penetration...and ripping off drywall)).

In hind sight the problem was simple...I just didn't start off correctly...by identifying all things powered by the circuit.

Bonus...I now own a wire tracer (Klein Pro-Tracer)...which didn't help that much (except that it verified that neutral in the outlet box fed the switch neutral)...but will help me in the future with other projects where I have unknown broken wires...both AC and DC.

Sorry for rambling...I just hope someone will find it helpful.

[charliebryant]

Glad to come across this video. My son had this happen in his house, his master bedroom had one outlet working and the rest of the outlets and lights only registered 60v. Had "electricians" come out and they were dumb founded, said probably a loose connection somewhere. Power came back on so they charged $275 and left. Power back off in a couple of days. We replaced the breaker and all outlets and switches in the room, nothing. Another technician came out and a loose neutral wire under the house in an outlet. Another $175. What was odd was the power came into the room at one outlet, back out to under the house then back to the room. It was the one under the house that threw us off, I would have thought it was 1st in line before the room.

[moynistan]

Went from freakout to fixed in 5 minutes because of this video. THANK YOU!!!

[atticstatic]

Thank you for this video, easy to follow steps to isolate and fix the open neutral issue I was experiencing.

[ecospider]

This is very helpful when you are dealing with a single leg of power. So 1 120v circuit breaker.

If you have a shared neutral, which means it it a single neutral wire for 2 different 120v circuits that are out of phase, then when you plug in that drill and there is a lightbulb on the other leg the drill receives 240v and blows up.

This is why a shared neutral is not used by many electricians. Even though that is actually how your house is connected to the street transformer.

[tianjansenvanrensburg]

Was very helpful had a shocking experience with a neutral today and was shocked by the result.Will surly go in with confidence on correting the problem.

[TWTH]

Interestingly, your tester indicates the correct defect when a GFCI is present because the contactor inside of the GFCI is a double pole single pole configuration. When a GFCI trips, it interrupts both the hot and the neutral. So, if you ever arrive to an outage, and you see there is no continuity between the equipment grounding conductor and the grounded conductor, you know that likely a hidden GFCI trip is to blame. Thank you for producing this video. Have a great day.

[bryanhiggins]

I spent hours looking for my open neutral until I watched this and found it in 5 minutes in my dining room light fixture.. thanks for the video!!

[Mozaco]

This is exactly what I needed, I have two outlets one that says no neutral and the other that says ground neutral reverse. Your great explanation will help me to fix this problem this weekend.

[nicksiragher]

Perfect for me, and I realise I need a socket tester. Thanks for taking the time to make this video, and set up the live test / demo rig

[tannerleteff]

The biggest problems in residential and apartment industry:
1) The breaker panelboard is burnt up at the breaker connection.
2) The neutral wire on the neutral bar in the breaker panel is burnt/loose.
3) Check every receptacle on the circuit, because the neutrals are most likely burnt. (Check all closets and cabinets and behind beds, people!)
4) check the series connection where the circuit splits off to difference fixtures or GFIs.

[Ducktruckful]

What a great job! I wish I had seen this before. I had the same problem . it took forever before I found that open neutral.

[Bobcat]

A GFCI determines a fault by metering the difference between the hot and the neutral. If the neutral is open the GFCI will trip. To many times when we replace a GFCI, only to find out the new one doesn’t work either, a neutral is the culprit. Great video, it shows how to use the tester to help isolate the problem.

[rlarajr]

One circuit just developed a hot ground reverse as shown by my three light tester. This was very helpful in how to diagnose it.

[AmericanOne]

I'll have to say this one is confusing to me. Looks like to me the tester should of shown that it was a open neutral. I had a tester similar to that years ago but haven't a clue where I lost it. I have a old school Simpson 260 and a digital Beckman HD110 I use now. Anyways...I enjoy your videos and glad your trying to help electricians and others solve their problems.

[joelharrison]

I had a friend that needed me to come over and see the problem with his wiring. The appliance’s such as the refrigerator etc would cause a voltage drop on one hot leg and the other would spike up such as 56v on one side and 178v on the other side. After all the trouble shooting for couple of days l had them to call the power company and the lady run a test over the phone which showed there was no problem on there end so I trouble shooted again at the panel box a couple more days and still had the same problem. So I had the power company to come out and check from the transformer back to the meter and they couldn’t find anything loose but they didn’t open the meter box and was going to leave until I got there. I had them to remove the meter and there was the problem a loose neutral bus bar and partially melted hot leg coming in from the street! Problem solved after all that! So if anyone is having this problem I would recommend doing this first before all the inside troubleshooting besides it’s a free service from the power company! By doing this first it could save the house from catching on fire and save the life of someone!

[jayjenkins]

Tjank you! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! I watched a half dozen other vids on this issue, which I have. None of the other vids made any sense and I didn't understand it. Your video was clear and explained the problem in a way that my underpowered simian brain could understand. Thank you@

[ktms]

What a great video, you must have thick skin talking about electrical. After watching a few videos it sure turns into who's got a bigger stick. Great video though and I learned a lot really helped me a lot.

[rajkas]

This is all good in theory and when you can see the wiring. The challenge is determining which outlets are connected and the direction of the wiring behind a wall. The tone tracer is not easy to use. Also outlets are easier to troubleshoot than light switches. I just spent 3 days fixing a few outlets. I can't believe how bad the quality of wiring in a 20 year old house.