Quick story....any mind? Good!
Once upon a time...
I was setting up a pool side Luau for a corporate customer of mine followed by a dance party on the pool
deck at the Hilton at Myrtle Beach, SC. I ordered a 100 amp service (it was the biggest they had) for lighting and found 2 open 20 amp circuits for sound. (The band provided sound, we just did the
truss and lighting.....the pic is before we raised the
truss, the wind was too strong right then to raise the
truss just yet)
We couldn't begin set up until 3pm for an 8pm show, so we had little time to set up. I got there, my guys started putting the
truss up and hanging lights, and I put my multimeter on the
power distro that they had for me. We had a problem, only one
phase had
power and I was getting 50volts on the
ground and 80 volts on the
neutral. I asked to talk to the electrician and we went to the panel room. He had it hooked up very wrong, (I still can't figure out what he did), but the electrical room was under the pool side bar and had more than 8" of water on the floor. He said that it was like this everyday, as the room was below sea
level. He was hooking up the cable to the
breaker on a hot panel with the front
cover off as he was standing on a cinder
block that was standing on its ends. It was ridiculous and one of the more unsafe things that I have seen.
I don't remember the cost of that service, but I think it was about $300 for 100 amps, but it was not 3
phase.