Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!wuarchive!csus.edu!uop!quack!mrapple From: mrapple@quack.sac.ca.us (Nick Sayer) Newsgroups: sci.electronics Subject: ANOTHER house wiring question (this one's basic) Message-ID: Date: 12 Jan 91 08:53:55 GMT Organization: The Duck Pond, Stockton, CA Lines: 23 The radio shmuck testers seem to say, and a volt meter seems to prove, that there is an AC potential between hot and ground and hot and neutral, but there is no potential between neutral and ground. Now ground and neutral clearly are not the same thing. I would expect negative side effects were I foolish enough to hook a light bulb between hot and ground. But wait! In AC, every half cycle the current goes the other way! So why isn't there a potential between neutral and ground? Inquiring minds want to know! What, exactly is the theory here? Ground is connected (basically) to a big pipe in the dirt, and hot and neutral go up to the pole, but some more details for a complete software weenie would be great. -- Nick Sayer | Think of me as a recombinant | RIP: Mel Blanc mrapple@quack.sac.ca.us | Simpson: Homer's looks, Lisa's | 1908-1989 N6QQQ [44.2.1.17] | brains, Bart's manners, and | May he never 209-952-5347 (Telebit) | Maggie's appetite for TV. --Me | be silenced.