Effect of High Tension Power Lines

[philgr]

In our area, many of the RV storage centers (including mine) are located under high tension power transmission lines. When parked under the lines, touching any metal part of my 5th wheel gives me quite a buzz. My real concern however is what is this doing to my RV and its electronics. There are a lot of RVs at these places, so my first inclination is to think that if there really was a problem, everybody would have left. Maybe however, they are doing something that I am not doing. Does anyone have any experience with damage caused by being in close proximity to power transmission lines? Is there anything that can be done to mitigate this problem short of moving to a different, e.g. farther away location?

[itsabouttime]

What you have is called a capacitive voltage divider. I was once parked, along with a coworker under some HV lines. We got shocked from his trick and actually measured 900 volts to ground. Mine had no voltage. The difference; my truck was dirty all the way to the ground but he kept his very clean. Yep, just ground your rig.
Russ

[B_O__Plenty]

I live close to some high tension lines but they haven't affected us at all. My 3 eyed cat and five legged kittens like to play under them..

B.O.

[C_Schomer]

The place I work has the most nit-pickin, BB stackers I've ever seen in my life. The 525 kv lines are about 70' up and if there was a health hazard, someone would be screaming bloody murder by now! Craig

[RoyB]

Just remember the only RV real grounding you have is when you are plugged into a properly wired 120VAC PEDESTAL or house receptacle. The normal place for your RV wiring GREEN wire to go to Earth ground is through the facility (or home) wiring.

If you are NOT plugged into a 120VAC Pedestal at the facility or at home then you may want to add a simple ground on your your own if the RV is parked for long term.

This could be as simple as a chain hanging from the RV main frame and touching ground or a more sophisticated Earth Ground Rod approach. The GROUND ROD approach will have to remembered when you move the RV TRAILER so I suspect a sign of some sort would be required to remind you to remove the ground rod wiring before moving the trailer. The RV trailer may have some protection already added with the trailer tongue jack touching the Earth ground. Same with stabilizing Jacks being deployed when parked. A parked Motorhome parked would most likely have less induced power protection being the RV Frame is isolated from ground by the rubber tires.

Along this line of having an ungrounded RV is if it was struck by lightning it would probably do damage to all of your electronics inside. This would probably still happen whether it was grounded or not but at least being grounded would be some protection from lightning.

I have witnessed one event where a car was struck by lightning sitting in the driveway and the whole car was engulfed in a bluish corona which you could see dissipating down the sidewalls of the tires during the heavy rain storm that was present at the time. After the storm passed all of the car on-board computers and other electronics aboard was zapped and had to be replaced. Even the car radio was zapped.

Just some of my thoughts and experiences here for what ever it is worth to you.

Roy Ken

[lfr101]

The voltage is in fact produced by the magnetic lines of force produced around the high voltage conductors, the higher the voltage and current the larger the amount of induced voltage you will get, this is the same way as a transformer works. If you drop a small piece of chain from the frame of the trailer to the ground this should drain off the induced voltage.

[Vulcaneer]

Most storage places have a chain link fence around them.. Try clamping a ground wire from the frame of you RV to the fence. Then see if you have a problem.

Grounding your RV should solve the problem. Your electronics are most likely safe.

[greende]

Induction voltage can be quite a bit. There are safety standards that the power company has to abide by. They had to prevent a farmer neighbor of ours from tilling a field last year because of this. Had to raise the lines. If you want to persue this, call the power company and they will come out and measure the voltage and see if it is within specs.

[rfryer]

It's induced voltage from the high voltage lines. The city used to park their buses under a line and the drivers would get zapped when they stepped on the bus in the morning. They eliminated it by grounding the buses. It's rare, but fence lines paralleling the lines sometimes get induced voltage in them, too.

[Still_Working]

Old-Biscuit wrote:
The high voltage lines (13K 66K 220K 500K 1M) are NOT insulated so there is a LOT of induced voltage from those lines.

Yes you can light up a fluorescent light, yes you can feel a buzz but your on-board electronics are OK

What you stated is true. Induced electricity will shock the heck out of you. Back in the day of open wire telephone lines we had grounds on the line to take the induce electricity to ground. When we started to move customer to buried cable, we had to run a ground wire from open wire to ground or risk being shocked from the induced electricity when we got ready to remove the open wire lines. This happens when power lines run in the area of non grounded metal objects.

[2oldman]

philgr wrote:
.. post from 2oldman, but I don't remember seeing anything there about any actual damage being caused by parking under high tension lines.

While using some musical gear, I was having a bit of trouble with one of my effects boxes. That wasn't normal. At first, I attributed it to those power lines, but I subsequently discovered a frayed wire in the power supply.

Whether it was power lines, the power supply, or both, I just can't be sure. But I'm not parking there again.

[Old-Biscuit]

The high voltage lines (13K 66K 220K 500K 1M) are NOT insulated so there is a LOT of induced voltage from those lines.

Yes you can light up a fluorescent light, yes you can feel a buzz but your on-board electronics are OK

[timmac]

Bull Rider wrote:

No tinfoil hat about it, I to got shocked once when parked under a high power lines with my older class C I use to own, I have also seen fluorescent lights light up when holding them under high power lines.

[rockintom]

philgr wrote:
Thanks for the feedback. For Rockintom, the RV is not plugged in at the storage facility. I saw the earlier post from 2oldman, but I don't remember seeing anything there about any actual damage being caused by parking under high tension lines. That is really what I am interested in.

I'm learning a lot here. I've not experienced this.

[philgr]

Thanks for the feedback. For Rockintom, the RV is not plugged in at the storage facility. I saw the earlier post from 2oldman, but I don't remember seeing anything there about any actual damage being caused by parking under high tension lines. That is really what I am interested in.